What is the limitation of Power BI Free license ?

[testvolt]

Hi all,

Anyone can help to clarify what is the current limitation of Power BI free license ? I'm quite confuse as I thought for free user license, we can't connect to SQL server, limited to excel or csv, and we cannot share the report.

Understand the different between Pro vs Premium as it described in https://powerbi.microsoft.com/en-us/pricing/

but not too sure about the Free license. I have Pro license, but trying to create a new account and try the Free one, I can get data from my local SQL, I can Publish to PowerBI.com and I can share to my co-worker (withinn the same domain) which he also not a Pro user.

Thanks

[Tutu_in_YYC · Accepted solution]

Power BI Free license is pretty powerful.

It gives:

• Full access to power bi desktop ( includes connecting to multiple data sources and all the connectors )
• Publish to Power BI service but just "My workspace" ( your personal workspace )
• Use gateway to schedule refresh your reports
• Share your report to non pro license using "publish to web( public)"

But, publish to web is a non-secure way to share reports, as it is public. Any one with a link can view he report without security authentication. To share securely, both sharer and recipient have to have pro license or the report needs to be in a workspace with premium capacity.

Power BI Free doesnt give you:

• share reports securely ( important )
• create dataflow
• share dataset
• create a collaborative workspace
• create deployment pipeline
• setup incremental refresh
• embed in portal/teams
• and more...

[testvolt]

I see, yeah it seems pretty powerful already, to create an adhoc report and give it to your co-worker/bosses, except for the security part.

Thanks!

[Tutu_in_YYC]

Yup, security part is pretty important in order govern and protect your data, and avoid potential lawsuits 😄