Building a working pipeline view in Salesforce starts with the right report type and adds the dimensions your motion needs. Most sales-ops teams maintain two primary pipeline reports: a Pipeline Snapshot (current state) and a Pipeline Trend (week-over-week change). Both run off the Opportunity object with similar filters but different time windows.
- Open the Reports tab
From the App Launcher, search Reports and open the Reports list. Most sales-ops teams have a Pipeline folder with the standard reports already built and shared with managers.
- Click New Report and pick the Opportunity report type
The Opportunities report type covers most pipeline scenarios. Use Opportunities with Products if you need line-item granularity, or Opportunity History for trend reports tracking how pipeline shifted week over week.
- Set the date filter to your forecast period
Close Date this fiscal quarter is the typical starting point. Adjust based on the period you are forecasting against.
- Filter on IsClosed = false
Pipeline only counts open Opportunities. Closed Won and Closed Lost do not roll into pipeline math; they roll into quota attainment and win-rate reporting respectively.
- Group by Stage and by Forecast Category
Stage gives you the funnel view; Forecast Category collapses stages into the four executive buckets (Pipeline, Best Case, Commit, Closed).
- Add weighted Amount as a custom summary formula
Use the formula AMOUNT * Opportunity.Probability / 100 to surface weighted pipeline alongside raw Amount. The weighted number is what executives ask for first.
- Save and share the report
Move the report into the Pipeline folder and share with the relevant Public Groups (Sales Managers, Sales Operations, Executive Team) at the right access level.
Maintain both: Snapshot for the current pipeline number, Trend for week-over-week change. Combine in a dashboard so executives see both shapes side by side.
- Forecast Category mapping needs to be configured for every Stage; without it, weighted pipeline math has gaps where stages did not map.
- Custom summary formulas on Reports do not handle multi-currency; if your org is multi-currency, build the calculation in a custom field on Opportunity instead.
- Opportunity History trend reports do not surface every change; the snapshot frequency is daily by default and configurable through Historical Trending settings.