Images in export to pdf in Power BI connecting to sharepoint url

[abpgupta]

Hi All,

I have stored images in sharepoint and using urls as column in Power query.

In Desktop, images are not rendered; however, in Service I can see images rendered. While doing export to pdf, again images are broken. 

Is there any settings to make them appear in Desktop, Service and while exporting to pdf from service?

Thanks for any inputs! 

[v-sgandrathi]

Hi @abpgupta,

Thank you @BhavinVyas3003 and @Akash_Varuna for your detailed and insightful response.

The behavior described is expected due to how Power BI handles image rendering from authenticated sources like SharePoint. Power BI Desktop does not support authentication for external URLs, which is why images do not appear there. In Power BI Service, the images load correctly because it can authenticate the user session with SharePoint. Anyhow, during export to PDF from the Service, external images, particularly those hosted on secure or authenticated platforms—are not supported due to current export limitations and security considerations.

As suggested, the most effective workarounds are to embed the images as Base64 strings within the dataset or to host them in a publicly accessible location, such as Azure Blob Storage with anonymous access. Add on to that, it's important to ensure that the column containing image links is categorized as "Image URL" in Power BI for proper rendering where supported.

We appreciate your active participation in the forum, and thank you again for contributing valuable knowledge to the community.

If this solution worked for you, kindly mark it as Accept as Solution and feel free to give a Kudos, it would be much appreciated!

Regards,
Sahasra

Community Support Team.

[abpgupta]

Thanks everyone for providing options. Can you please provide any reference on below on how to set it up internally:
"to host them in a publicly accessible location, such as Azure Blob Storage with anonymous access." This would give  flexibility to change in images at centralized location when changes happen.

[v-sgandrathi]

Hi @abpgupta,

To host images in a publicly accessible location using Azure Blob Storage with anonymous access, first create a Storage Account in the Azure Portal. Within the storage account, create a new Blob Container and set its public access level to 'Blob (anonymous read access for blobs only)', which allows anyone with the URL to view the image without authentication. Upload your images into this container, and for each image, copy its Blob URL. These URLs can then be used in Power BI by storing them in a column, and setting the column’s data category to 'Image URL' under the Modeling tab. This setup enables centralized image management, any updates to the image file (with the same name) will reflect automatically in Power BI reports. This method ensures images render correctly in the Power BI Service, but they may still not appear in PDF exports due to Power BI’s current limitations with rendering external image URLs during export.

Thanks for reaching out! If this answer was helpful, please consider marking it as Accepted Solution and giving a Kudos, it helps the community!

Regards,
Sahasra.

[abpgupta]

Thanks for instructions for setting up Azure storage for Power BI. My objective is to render these images in pdf. From previous reply, I understood it is possible with Blob storage; however, in above comment, it looks there is still limitation while exporting to pdf.  Which is recommended and stable way to get images in pdf export from Power BI? Could you guide here?

[v-sgandrathi · Accepted solution]

Hi @abpgupta,

Thank you for your question. Using Azure Blob Storage to host images works well for displaying them in Power BI Service and allows centralized management. Anyhow, there is a known limitation where images from external URLs, whether from Blob Storage or SharePoint, do not reliably render in PDF exports from Power BI due to security and rendering restrictions.
The most stable and recommended approach to ensure images appear consistently in Power BI Desktop, Service, and PDF exports is to embed the images directly into the report by converting them to Base64 strings and including them in the data model.
This way, the images are stored inside the .pbix file itself, removing any dependency on external sources and ensuring they export correctly with the report.

Glad I could assist! If this answer helped resolve your issue, please mark it as Accept as Solution and give us Kudos to guide others facing the same concern.

Thanks for connecting with the Microsoft Fabric Community Forum.

[BhavinVyas3003]

Hi @abpgupta ,

To display SharePoint-hosted images in Power BI across Desktop, Service, and export to PDF, store the image URLs in a column formatted as "Image URL" (Data Category). While Service renders them, export to PDF does not support external image URLs due to security restrictions. To ensure images appear in exports, consider embedding images as Base64-encoded data URIs or use local files uploaded as web resources (e.g., in a public Blob Storage or OneLake with anonymous access). There's no setting to force PDF export to render external images.

[Akash_Varuna]

Hi @abpgupta It doesn’t work mostly because Power BI Desktop and PDF export can’t authenticate to access images stored on SharePoint URLs. While the Service handles authentication automatically, Desktop and export processes often fail to load secured images. To fix this, make images publicly accessible or use an authenticated hosting method supported by Power BI, and verify export settings allow external image loading.