Forum Discussion
Pro vs. Licensing question
You can take a look at this document. There is a list of Power BI Pro content as below. If the analytic team share Pro content with free users, free users will not be able to see these contents.
- Data from a DirectQuery dataset, such asSQL Server Analysis Services tabular data,Azure SQL Database, Azure SQL Data Warehouse, or Apache Spark for HDInsight.
- Data from adataset that refreshes more frequently than daily.
- Data from a dataset that connects to on-premises data using thePower BI Gateway - Personal or the On-premises Data Gateway.
- Data (including reports, dashboards or tiles) from a dataset that usesRow-level security (RLS).
- A dashboard or report that's installed from anorganizational content pack.
- A dashboard, report, or dataset that's contained in agroup workspace.
- A dashboard that contains data streamed at a rate above 10k rows/hour.
But if the analytic team only share the content which only contains following items, both pro and free users can see them.
- A dashboard or report connected to content packs for services (e.g. Dynamics CRM, Salesforce, and Google Analytics).
- A dashboard or report with data imported from files such as Excel spreadsheets, Power BI Desktop, and CSV.
- Tiles pinnedfrom a report in SQL Server Reporting Services.
Best Regards,
Herbert
robarivas You haven't mis-understood anything. If you as a report author use Pro content in the creation of a Power BI element, then the end user that is consuming that content is required to have the same level of licensing.
You mention "client" so depending on where data is stored, you could use Power BI Embedded in an application for them to access Power BI reports, and in that case, the pricing is completely different. But that would only be available in external facing applications.
Ok, so it sounds like if my team's end goal is to produce reports, dashboards, etc. for very many people then our only or best option is to stick with free licensing. (The assumption here is that the organization is unwilling to purchase licensing at this time for a slew of non-analysts).
Does it strike anyone else as extremely ironic that the cause of this pricing policy/structure can result in more robust use with the free version instead of the paid version??
robarivas I think the vast majority of businesses would fall into using the "Pro" version pretty fast. Groups alone is a good reason so content doesn't get stuck in one persons workspace. If you can make it work without a gateway, and other Pro features - cool, but I would be suprised if the majority of people stay with Free after the initial "POC" phase of determining if Power BI is a good fit.
