Capacity consumed by SQL Database

[AnHell]

Hello,

I have a Fabric database of the SQL Database type (not a Warehouse).

In this database, I have a single table with 16 million records.

I create a Power Bi on desktop that downloads part of this table, around 1 million records.

When I do this, in the Fabric Capacity Metrics report I see many connections of this type appear:
* Item kind: SQLDbNative
* Operation: Sql Usage
* User: SQL System

Each of these connections consumes between 3% and 6% of the capacity, easily causing the capacity to exceed 100%.

If the database is a Warehouse type, this does not happen.

Why does capacity consumption skyrocket when downloading data from a table of this type of database?

Thanks in advance!

[Zanqueta · Accepted solution]

Hi @AnHell,

This behaviour is expected and relates to how SQL Database items in Fabric consume capacity compared to Warehouse items.

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✅ Why does capacity consumption spike with SQL Database?

• A Fabric SQL Database uses SQLDbNative operations for queries. When Power BI connects and pulls 1 million rows, it executes large queries directly against the database engine.
• These queries are not optimised for analytical workloads like Warehouses are. Warehouses use distributed compute and caching, while SQL Databases behave more like traditional OLTP systems.
• Each query consumes compute resources from your Fabric capacity. For large extracts, multiple parallel operations can easily push usage above 100%.

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✅ Why is Warehouse different?

• Warehouses in Fabric are designed for analytical queries and leverage Direct Lake caching and distributed execution.
• When Power BI queries a Warehouse, the engine can optimise and scale better, reducing the per-query capacity footprint.

Official References:

SQL database Overview - Microsoft Fabric | Microsoft Learn

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[AnHell]

Thank you very much for the explanation.

Now I have to choose which path to take.

I liked using SQL Database because I could set permissions at the schema level and allow multiple users to access the same database but only see their own data.

If I go back to Warehouse, I gain capacity, but I lose granular permissions.

Thank you!