Join us at FabCon Atlanta from March 16 - 20, 2026, for the ultimate Fabric, Power BI, AI and SQL community-led event. Save $200 with code FABCOMM.
Register now!To celebrate FabCon Vienna, we are offering 50% off select exams. Ends October 3rd. Request your discount now.
I need to clear up my understand of the relationship between the windows authenticated account and the microsoft account when connecting to a SQL Server instance. I'm currently able to connect with windows authentication but getting 'we couldn't authenticate with the credentials provided' error when using the MS account (I'm not typing my password in wrong) - which is making me think the two are separate entities even though they are the same username in the same domain? Am I right in saying the MS account would need to be added to the AD group alongside windows account in order to access?
I was originally getting the error 'a connection was established, but an error occurred... certificate chain not trusted' when signing in with MS account, so set up a certificate for encrypted connections (working with windows auth). This made me think that the MS account was authorised to connect to the server but just failing at certificate handshake, but I guess this was a red herring and it never could authenticate to the server in the first place?
Lastly, what authentication is used when a user is viewing a report from a client (e.g. phone app)? Is this defined in the report or does the user choose how to authenticate (it all seems to happen automatically, even though I have signed in with my organisation MS account)?
Hi @JoshT ,
Please refer to the third - party bolg to know about the difference between the two types.
https://www.virtual-dba.com/differences-windows-sql-server-authentication/
Hi,
This blog is about windows authentication and SQL authentication. I was looking for the difference between windows authentication and microsoft account (i.e. what appears to be office365 login) authentication that seems to be unique to Power BI