Issue Connecting Snowflake to Power BI Service using Basic Authentication

[vamshikrishna20]

Hi, 

I have my PBI report connection to Snowflake in Direct query. In Desktop I am able to authenticate with Basic Authenticaition where iam providing user name and in place of password when iam passing JWT token, it is working fine and able to authenticate. 

But when published to service and trying to configure dataset settings, the same username and JWT token in place of password are not working for authentication. 

can someone help me understand what could be issue

[v-hashadapu]

Hi @vamshikrishna20 , Thank you for reaching out to the Microsoft Community Forum.

Power BI Desktop and Power BI Service handle credentials differently. In Desktop, the connection is established interactively and the Snowflake connector simply sends whatever you provide in the password field to Snowflake. So, if you paste a JWT token instead of a password, it can work for that session as long as the token is valid.

In Power BI Service, the dataset credentials must be stored and reused by the service. The Snowflake connector there expects a supported credential format (such as username and password or OAuth). A JWT token pasted into the password field is not a supported stored credential and is typically short-lived, so the Service cannot reuse it to authenticate the dataset.

To get this working in the Service, you’ll need to configure the dataset with a supported authentication method, usually a Snowflake username and password or OAuth/Entra ID if your Snowflake environment is configured for it. This allows the Service to securely store and reuse the credentials for queries.

Connect to Snowflake with Power BI - Power BI | Microsoft Learn

Snowflake MFA Key - Pair authentication for Powerbi - Microsoft Q&A

Key-pair authentication and key-pair rotation | Snowflake Documentation

Partner support for Snowflake authentication methods | Snowflake Documentation

[MohdZaid_]

Hey @vamshikrishna20 ,

This issue happens because Power BI Desktop and Power BI Service handle authentication differently. In Desktop, when you enter your Snowflake username and paste the JWT token in the password field under Basic Authentication, it works because Desktop simply uses that token for the current session. It does not strictly validate how the token is generated or refreshed. However, once you publish the report to Power BI Service, the Service needs to securely store and reuse the credentials for ongoing access and scheduled refresh. Since a JWT token is short-lived and cannot be refreshed automatically by the Service, it fails authentication. Power BI Service does not support using a JWT token as a password under Basic Authentication.

To resolve this, you should switch to a supported authentication method. The recommended approach is to configure OAuth 2.0 between Snowflake and Power BI Service, which allows secure token management and automatic refresh. Alternatively, you can use a standard Snowflake username and password (preferably a dedicated service account) if your security policies allow it. If your organization requires key pair or JWT-based authentication, then you would need to configure an On-Premises Data Gateway, since Power BI Service alone cannot manage JWT lifecycle.

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