Power BI Pro – Incremental Refresh Not Working with API-based Dataset

[Chikku]

Hi everyone, I’m new to working with APIs in Power BI and need help setting up incremental refresh for a growing dataset.

My Setup:

- Power BI Pro user

- Not using Premium Workspace

- Data source: API fetching 5 years of sales order data

- Dataset keeps growing over time

What I’ve Done:

1. Created RangeStart and RangeEnd parameters

2. Used them in the filter for the date field (order date)

3. Enabled Incremental Refresh in Power BI Desktop

4. Published the dataset to Power BI Service

Issue:

- Incremental refresh is not working after publishing

- I suspect it's because the API does not support query folding

- I’m not sure if I’ve set everything up correctly

My Questions:

1. Does Power BI Pro support incremental refresh without Premium?

2. Can incremental refresh work with APIs that don’t support query folding?

3. What’s the correct way to implement incremental refresh with an API source?

4. Can someone guide me step-by-step or suggest a workaround?

Any help or examples would be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance!

[v-ssriganesh]

Hello @Chikku,
Just checking in have you been able to resolve this issue? If so, it would be greatly appreciated if you could mark the most helpful reply accordingly. This helps other community members quickly find relevant solutions.
Please don’t forget to “Accept as Solution” and Give “Kudos” if the response was helpful.
Thank you.

[v-ssriganesh]

Hello @Chikku,

Could you please confirm if your query have been resolved? If they have, kindly mark the helpful response and accept it as the solution. This will assist other community members in resolving similar issues more efficiently.

Thank you.

[Poojara_D12]

Hi @Chikku 

You're on the right path with setting up incremental refresh in Power BI, but there are a few important considerations and limitations, especially when using APIs and a Power BI Pro license. First, incremental refresh is only supported in Premium workspaces, so with a Power BI Pro license, even though you can define the refresh settings in Power BI Desktop, it won’t function as expected after publishing to the Service unless the dataset is hosted in a Premium (or Premium Per User - PPU) workspace. That’s likely the core reason your refresh isn’t working post-publish.

Secondly, incremental refresh relies on query folding, which allows Power BI to push date-based filters (like RangeStart and RangeEnd) back to the source system. If your API doesn’t support this — which is common for REST APIs — Power BI can’t effectively partition the data, and it ends up pulling the full dataset during every refresh.

To implement incremental refresh correctly with an API:

You need to ensure your query is foldable, meaning Power BI can dynamically construct the API request with parameters (e.g., appending ?startDate=xxx&endDate=xxx).

Structure your API call in Power Query so it explicitly uses the RangeStart and RangeEnd parameters to request data in slices.

Make sure the applied filter is directly on a datetime field and used early in the query steps (before transformations that might block folding).

As a workaround, if your API doesn't support folding, consider:

Using Power Automate or Azure Data Factory to pre-stage API data into a storage location like Azure SQL, SharePoint, or Data Lake.

Then, connect Power BI to that intermediate store (which does support folding), enabling proper incremental refresh.

Alternatively, use custom functions in Power Query to page through and slice API responses by date, but this approach won't technically count as incremental refresh and will still trigger full refresh behavior.

In summary, incremental refresh with an API requires Premium capacity and a foldable query. Without both, you'll need to either upgrade your workspace or change the architecture to include an intermediate storage layer that supports efficient querying and folding.

[v-ssriganesh]

Hi @Chikku,
Thank you for reaching out to the Microsoft Fabric Forum Community. Please consider below points:

1. Yes, Power BI Pro supports incremental refresh Premium isn’t required for Pro-level functionality.
2. Yes, it can work with APIs if you embed date filters into the API call effectively doing manual query folding.
3. Correct approach: create RangeStart/RangeEnd parameters → pass them into your API query (e.g: in Web.Contents) → filter using those parameters in the query → configure incremental refresh in Power BI Desktop → publish and schedule.
4.  If embedding isn’t possible, move data into a foldable source (e.g: Dataflow, Datamart, Azure SQL) first, then apply incremental refresh
   
   

Refer below official documentations:

• Configure incremental refresh
• Incremental refresh and real-time data for semantic models
  
  

If this information is helpful, please “Accept as solution” and give a "kudos" to assist other community members in resolving similar issues more efficiently.
Thank you.

[v-ssriganesh]

Hi @Chikku,
I hope the information provided has been useful. Please let me know if you need further clarification or would like to continue the discussion.
If your question has been answered, please “Accept as Solution” and Give “Kudos” so others with similar issues can easily find the resolution.
Thank you.