Forum Discussion
Users Must Manually Refresh Browser to See Updated Power BI Dataset
I have a semantic model in Power BI that is being refreshed through a Power Automate API flow. I can see that the refresh is successfully completing on the backend, but users are not seeing the updated data unless they manually refresh their browser.
Why do users need to refresh their browser to see the updated dataset? Is there a way for the report to automatically reflect the refreshed data without requiring manual intervention?
For context, the report is using Import mode.
Hi, this is expected behavior in the Power BI Service. A semantic model refresh updates the cached data on the server, but each viewer's browser session keeps the query results it loaded the first time, so the visuals do not show the new data until the page is reloaded.
Automatic page refresh only works for DirectQuery models (or composite models with a DirectQuery source), so for an Import model there is no built-in way to push fresh data to already-open browser sessions. The practical options are to have viewers click the Refresh button on the report toolbar (or press F5) after the model finishes refreshing, or to convert the model (or part of it) to DirectQuery so you can enable automatic page refresh in the report.
If that solved your issue, please mark it as the accepted solution and give a kudos.
Thanks,
Shai Karmani
7 Replies
Hi, this is expected behavior in the Power BI Service. A semantic model refresh updates the cached data on the server, but each viewer's browser session keeps the query results it loaded the first time, so the visuals do not show the new data until the page is reloaded.
Automatic page refresh only works for DirectQuery models (or composite models with a DirectQuery source), so for an Import model there is no built-in way to push fresh data to already-open browser sessions. The practical options are to have viewers click the Refresh button on the report toolbar (or press F5) after the model finishes refreshing, or to convert the model (or part of it) to DirectQuery so you can enable automatic page refresh in the report.
If that solved your issue, please mark it as the accepted solution and give a kudos.
Thanks,
Shai KarmaniThank you! in order to solve the issue i added a small Table as a direct query which enabled the auto page refresh. I set the page refresh to a fixed interval. One thing i did notice is the "Data Updated" time is not displaying anymore and replaced with "Page Updated".
From microsoft " Only users with write permissions see their open reports updated automatically when the semantic model is refreshed." - Automatic Page Refresh in Power BI Desktop - Power BI | Microsoft Learn , which explains why some users were seeing updates automatically
Hi JJ108,
Hope you're doing well!
Import mode caches data in the browser. When a report loads, Power BI renders visuals from a local cache of the dataset snapshot that was loaded at session start. Even after your semantic model refreshes successfully on the backend, the user's active session still holds the old snapshot in memory. The browser has no mechanism to know the backend data changed mid-session.
This is fundamentally different from DirectQuery mode, where every visual interaction fires a live query to the source.
Power BI has a built-in Auto page refresh feature. In the report:
Go to Format page → Page refresh
Set an interval (minimum depends on your capacity, shared capacity minimum is 30 minutes; Premium/Fabric capacity can go much lower)
Set type to Fixed interval
This periodically re-queries the model and re-renders visuals automatically.
Be aware : Auto page refresh only works in Power BI Service (not Desktop), and the minimum refresh interval on shared/Pro capacity is 30 minutes.
Hope this helps! Don't forget to mark as solution and thumbs up if OK in order to keep helping others.
Best regards,
Oussama (Data Consultant - Expert Fabric & Power BI)
As a Workspace Admin, my browser session automatically reflects the updated data after a dataset refresh without needing to manually refresh .
However, our end users are accessing the report through an Org App and are NOT seeing the report auto-update. They have to manually refresh their browser to see the new data after a dataset refresh completes.
Our report is in Import Mode so Auto Page Refresh is not an option as that requires DirectQuery. The dataset refresh itself is working correctly ,, it is being triggered by a Power Automate cloud flow successfully. The issue is purely that the Org App viewer sessions are not being notified or updated when the dataset refresh completes.
Has anyone found a solution for pushing dataset refresh updates to active Org App viewer sessions without switching to DirectQuery or requiring users to manually refresh?"
If you embed the report in a custom portal/SharePoint page instead of the Org App, you can:
Have Power Automate send a signal (via webhook, Azure Service Bus, or SharePoint list update) when the dataset refresh completes
The host page listens for that signal and calls report.refresh() via the Power BI JavaScript SDK
This is the only way to programmatically push a refresh to active viewer sessions without DirectQuery.
Important: This requires moving away from the native Org App toward an embedded report experience.
To sum up, the native Power BI Org App has no mechanism to push refresh events to viewer sessions in Import mode. If automatic silent refresh for end users is a hard requirement, you must move the report delivery surface away from the Org App to an embedded experience where you control the host page and can invoke the JS SDK.
Hi JJ108 ,
Thanks for reaching out to Microsoft Fabric Community.Just wanted to check if the responses provided were helpful. If further assistance is needed, please reach out.
Thank you.Hi JJ108 ,
We wanted to kindly follow up regarding your query. If you need any further assistance, please reach out.
Thank you.
