Forum Discussion

samblackshaw28's avatar
samblackshaw28
Helper I
11 months ago
Solved

Sharing Reports

Hi,

 

For context, I have been learning Power BI for around a year and recently have become a microsoft Power BI Data Analyst Associate.

 

I am ready to start producing reports for people within my company of ~ 80 staff. However, I have recently realised that everyone who wants to view my report needs to have a 'pro' licence. It's not feesible for me to raise a request that everyone in my company has their own licence, most people will just be viewing 1 or 2 reports a month that I make. This would be a cost of around £800 a month that I cannot justify to a company that have not really used power BI previously. Maybe in a couple of years if Power BI is our main source of MI, but not just yet.

 

I was wondering if there is any workaround for this or this is the only way? It seems a bit ridiculous that you have to have a licence to just view a report. I have thought of the option of making a licence for each office we have (9 offices) which would reduce the cost but then I will not be able to implement RLS. We are an IFA and each adviser will only want a dashboard of their own figures.

 

Any help is much appreciated. 

 

Best Regards,

Sam.

Need Help
  • rohit1991's avatar
    rohit1991
    11 months ago

    Hi samblackshaw28 

     

    There isn’t a free way around this - to view reports in the Power BI Service, each user needs a Pro licence, or the reports must be hosted in a Premium/Fabric capacity so free users can access them. Premium is only cost-effective at larger scale, and PPU (Premium Per User) still requires every viewer to have it, so the realistic options today are either Pro licences for all report viewers or moving to Premium/Fabric if your company wants broader access. Otherwise, you’d need to share static exports (PDF/Excel), but those won’t be interactive.

2 Replies

  • rohit1991's avatar
    rohit1991
    Super User
    11 months ago

    Hi samblackshaw28 

     

    There isn’t a free way around this - to view reports in the Power BI Service, each user needs a Pro licence, or the reports must be hosted in a Premium/Fabric capacity so free users can access them. Premium is only cost-effective at larger scale, and PPU (Premium Per User) still requires every viewer to have it, so the realistic options today are either Pro licences for all report viewers or moving to Premium/Fabric if your company wants broader access. Otherwise, you’d need to share static exports (PDF/Excel), but those won’t be interactive.

    • samblackshaw28's avatar
      samblackshaw28
      Helper I
      11 months ago

      Thanks Rohit,

       

      I thought this would be the case. It's ashame really, it makes Power BI less feesible for smaller companies like mine. It's understandable to need a licence to create and share reports, but to view them should be free in my opinion.

       

      Thanks for your help!