Explore your dbt project

Fast, local dbt project lineage and navigation inside your IDE.

Follow a model’s dependencies, open its source file, and see how projects connect. Explore the graph beside your code to investigate a change or learn an unfamiliar project.

Explore your project locally without creating an account, connecting a warehouse, or uploading project files.

Features

What you want to do	Explore
See what feeds a model and what depends on it	Model lineage
Move from a reference to the code behind it	Definition navigation
Understand dependencies across a workspace	Project overview
Keep the graph focused on your investigation	Graph controls
Bring a dependency graph into a review or conversation	Share lineage
Choose the look and behavior you prefer	Personalization
Combine specific models and dependencies in one view	Selection Lineage

Understand how your dbt models connect

See where a model gets its data and which resources depend on it. Follow those connections to learn an unfamiliar project, trace an input, or investigate downstream dependencies before changing code.

Explore upstream and downstream dependencies across projects and locally installed packages.
Read materialization and deprecation labels on the cards.
Open a model’s source file from the graph.

Expand upstream and downstream dependencies around a focused model

Go from a reference to its definition

Use Cmd/Ctrl-click to open supported ref(), source(), macro, doc(), and function() targets. Follow references in SQL and YAML; hover over YAML doc-block references to read their descriptions.

Jump between definitions without opening the lineage panel.

Navigate from a dbt reference directly to its definition

See how your projects fit together

Open Summary to see resource totals and dependencies between projects. Switch to Model lineage to explore individual models and their dependencies.

In Model lineage, choose All projects or limit the view to the focused model’s project.

Explore workspace totals and dependencies between projects in Summary

Arrange and simplify your graph

Pan, zoom, move cards, and hide models to focus on the dependencies you need. Preserve card positions when you expand, or let daglane rearrange the graph.

Use Reset Layout to restore card positions and zoom. Use Reset to Focus to clear manual expansion and hidden models around your focus. Choose Undo to restore the previous view.

Use Share lineage to copy a screenshot, save a PNG, or export an editable SVG for a document or presentation.

Save interactive HTML to share a graph that teammates can explore. They can open the file in a browser, pan, zoom, find models, and move cards offline without installing daglane. The file includes the exported graph and its model names.

Export lineage as an image or a self-contained interactive HTML file

Personalize how daglane looks and behaves

Choose how daglane responds as you work. Follow the file you’re browsing or pin the graph to one model. Refresh automatically on save or update manually. Set upstream and downstream starting depths, and choose whether expansion rearranges cards or preserves their positions.

In Settings, choose colored or neutral cards, choose comfortable, compact or dense lineage spacing, and reduce motion. daglane's dbt file icons are always available in dbt workspaces.

Build a view from your own selections

Selection Lineage is always available for combining editable dbt-style selectors in one canvas. Select by model, tag, package, or materialization; add upstream/downstream depth and exclusions. If a selection would display more than 200 cards, daglane asks for confirmation with the exact count before showing it.

Use names and tags from your project in these examples. Add each selection separately.

Start with fct_orders and all its upstream dependencies:

--select +fct_orders

Explore resources tagged finance and their upstream dependencies, excluding ephemeral models:

--select +tag:finance --exclude config.materialized:ephemeral

Show fct_orders, up to two upstream generations, and one downstream generation. Exclude resources tagged deprecated:

--select 2+fct_orders+1 --exclude tag:deprecated

Add more selections, remove models, and reveal connections through hidden resources. Selection Lineage uses a supported subset of dbt selectors over daglane’s graph; it does not run dbt commands.

Start with a model you know

Install daglane in VS Code or Cursor and open your dbt workspace.
Open a model’s SQL file and use the daglane action on its editor tab.
Expand an upstream dependency, then open that model from the graph.

Feedback and support

Use daglane: Send Feedback from the Command Palette, or Summary → Send feedback. Review the prepared message in your email app or Gmail before sending.

Product information and support

daglane is an independent product for dbt projects. It is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or sponsored by dbt Labs.

daglane