Power BI with Azure SQL Data Warehouse

[ankitpatira]

When connecting from PowerBI service to Azure SQL Data Warehouse does it make and keep it live connection or it imports data into PowerBI ?

To give background on this issue, our requirement is to have data in the cloud to be stored in Australia only due to nature of the data and privacy and security concerns. We are able to confirm that Azure is hosted in Data centres in Australia but not for PowerBI. 

So by having Azure SQL Data Warehouse and then using PowerBI service to connect, is it ensured that data stays in Australia (Azure SQL Data warehouse that is hosted in Australia) and does not get imported into PowerBI.

[ashishrj]

Hi @ankitpatira. You can find a blog written in Community Blog about connecting Power BI with Azure SQL Datawarehouse. Click here to view. Hope this will help!

[greggyb]

Yes. There are two options for accessing data from Azure DW in Power BI. One fits your requirements. One does not.

DirectQuery = Data stays in source system. Power BI Service generates a query, which is evaluated against that source, the results of which are piped securely to the client running the report.

Data Import = Data lives with the .pbix file, and is hosted on Microsoft servers running Power BI.

[ankitpatira]

Thanks @greggyb and @ashishrj for the reply.

DirectQuery is the one that suits us.