Create pbix file for User -- no access to db server

[Coffeehouse45]

Hey All,
We are using Power BI report Server (jan 2025). I would like to avoid giving a user read access to our SQL Server. I'd rather create a .pbix file using the tables that they need, then set the file to refresh once per day (overnight). This way the user can create their report off of the .pbix file and I don't have to give them access to the dB server.

I'm new to power bi admin. Is this pretty simple to do? I'm not finding any articles on how to do it. Any gotcha's I need to know about?

Thanks!

[lbendlin · Accepted solution]

then set the file to refresh once per day (overnight).

There is no easy way to do that. I'd not want to suggest Power Automate Desktop as it is not reliable enough.

You could concoct a solution that includes a scheduled refresh of the semantic model and then a powershell (or similar) script to download the pbix to a shared folder. 

If you don't want your users to have access to the data, don't show them the data. Better yet, don't have the data yourself.