Sharing a report saved in workspace

[foadhs]

Hi. We have a report created by a user with a Power BI Pro license. Using RLS we're looking to grant access to certain users to be able to view certain parts of the report related to their departments. The RLS roles have been created and published into a workspace. 1) Does this method work if our end users only have a Free license? 2) can we use this method to share with external users? 

What if we purchase a couple of Premium-per-user licenses and upgrade the workspace to Premium? Can we then use RLS to grant access to Free license holders and external users?

Your help is very much appreciated. 

[Tutu_in_YYC · Accepted solution]

Hi Foadhs,

1) Does this method work if our end users only have a Free license?

Yes, only if the reports are hosted in a Premium workspace

2) can we use this method to share with external users? 
Yes, same requirement as 1, and the external users will need to be in your Guest AD and they need Free license.

In general, what you need to consider is report access that is determined by licensing combinations. For Free users to acces reports securely, the reports have to be on premium workspaces ( not PPU ). If users have report access, RLS will work if you set it up properly.

One thing you need to be aware of is the available roles in workspace. Viewer role will respect the RLS, where as everything else will bypass the RLS. SO if you have a report consumer and you want RLS to work, dont add them to workspace with roles that is not Viewer. 
https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/power-bi/collaborate-share/service-roles-new-workspaces

[foadhs]

Thank you Tutu_in_YYC  really appreciate your response. One more quick question please: Does this work if we only upgrade our workspace to Premium-Per-User? My understanding is that PPU is not a full Premium license. 

[Tutu_in_YYC]

No it will not work. As PPU is user based license. If it is PPU workspace, all members have to have PPU license. It has to be Premium Capacity ( for organization ).

Now that you know about RLS, have you heard of OLS?
https://powerbi.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/object-level-security-ols-now-available-for-public-preview-...