Power BI, Native ARM on Windows 11 ARM edition

Hi davmarc23 ,

Based on the current public documentation, I do not think you are missing a hidden architecture selector.

The October 2025 blog says that Power BI Desktop is supported on Windows on ARM PCs with KB5065789 installed. However, the current official Download Center page still exposes PBIDesktopSetup_x64.exe, and the system requirements there still describe Power BI Desktop as available for 64-bit x64 platforms. The Microsoft Learn installation page also only describes the Store option and the direct executable option, with no separate ARM64 installer path documented.

So at least from the public documentation, this looks more like “Power BI Desktop is now officially supported on Windows on ARM” rather than “there is a separately downloadable native ARM64 Power BI Desktop build.”

That matches what you are seeing: the Store and Download Center install the x64 build, which then runs under Windows on ARM emulation. If Microsoft intended this to be a native ARM64 release, I would expect one of the following to exist publicly:

a documented ARM64 installer
an ARM64 package from the Microsoft Store
release notes explicitly saying that the x64 package contains native ARM64 binaries
a clear statement that x64 emulation is the supported ARM path

At this point, I would suggest raising this as a documentation/product issue rather than continuing to test older Windows builds or Insider builds. The ask to Microsoft should be very specific:

“Can the Power BI team confirm whether October 2025 ARM support means native ARM64 Power BI Desktop, or officially supported x64 Power BI Desktop running under Windows on ARM emulation? If native ARM64 is available, please provide the official installation path or direct ARM64 download link.”

Right now, I would not assume there is a reliable native ARM64 installer available unless someone from Microsoft confirms where it is distributed