Work or School Account required when sharing with hotmail/ personal account?

[manners]

Hi,

I have been sharing reports and dashboards with external users using a mix of 'Work or School' accounts and 'Personal Accounts' for months and all has worked fine until about a week ago. The steps I take when adding a new user

1. Invite users as a guest in Azure AD

2. Add them to the required groups

3. Assign them a PowerBI Pro licence

4. Share the report through PowerBI.

• The user recieves the invite from Azure and can accept it. 
• The user can access a Sharepoint site due to the group assignment
• The user recives the invite to access the shared report, however when they click on it they are redirected to sign up with PowerBI. If they try to sign in, it requires a 'Work or School' account.
• A link to the PowerBI tenant results in the same experience.

I have consulted the guide and can't see what I'm missing. As i said, its been working for months and seems to only be affecting some accounts, i.e. there are plenty of personal accounts still working

I'm tearing my hair out on this one, so would appreciate some help.

Thanks in advance

[vanishbx]

Yes, a Work or School Account is typically required when sharing files or resources within Microsoft 365 if the recipient uses a Hotmail or personal account. Sharing with personal accounts may face limitations, but guest access could be an option in some cases.

[BallyKahlon]

We are facing this same issue recently and need an urgent explanation to detail what has changed and how this can be resolved.  Appreciate anyfeedback on this.

[manners]

I don't consider this a fix but we have managed to get people up and running again by getting them to delete their browser profile and creating it again using the correct account type, i.e 'Work or School' or 'Personal'

[SELECTDBA]

I am running into the exact same thing.  Were you able to find a solution for this?

[manners]

Unfortunately no 😞

[Anonymous]

Hi @manners ,

There are two main options you can choose in this scenario:

• Publish to Web: Allows you to share a report with people outside of Power BI. This provides an embed code that can be used to put into a blog post or website. This is just an iframe. Using this option provides no authentication to the report. Whoever has the URL can see the report. Be very careful about what data you share using this option. Reference: Publish from Power BI to the web
• Power BI Embedded: It is an Azure service that is a great option for ISVs and/or 3rd parties that want to include Power BI within their custom application. This allows for isolated workspaces and custom authentication handled by the application. Reference: Power BI Embedded documentation and GitHub Sample Repo

Best Regards

Community Support Team _ Polly

If this post helps, then please consider Accept it as the solution to help the other members find it more quickly.

[manners]

Hi, Thanks for taking the time to look at this and I agree that those are some alternatives. What I am trying to understand is why the method I have been using for months has stopped working, as docuemented here

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/power-bi/admin/service-admin-azure-ad-b2b

Is this no longer an option as you didn't mention it in your reply?

[AlexisOlson]

According to the official documentation (updated 10/19/2021):

• Power BI requires that you use a work or school email address. You can't sign up or purchase using email addresses provided by consumer email services or telecommunication providers. This includes outlook.com, hotmail.com, gmail.com, and others. If you don't have a work or school account, learn about alternate ways to sign up.

Also confirmed here:
https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/msoffice/forum/all/can-i-use-powerbi-with-a-microsoft365-persona...

[manners]

Hi Alexis, 

Really apprecaite you taking the time to look at this.

To be clear, I'm not wanting the guest users to sign up to PowerBI, I just want them to be able to read a dashboard/ report. 

From the docs I can see
Distribute content to external guest users with Azure AD B2B - Power BI | Microsoft Docs

What am i missing?

As mentioned, this has been working for a while now and only recently have I had issues.

[AlexisOlson]

It sure isn't very clear, is it?

Further down that page, it says:

• Guest users using social identities will experience more limitations because of sign-in restrictions.

  • They can use consumption experiences in the Power BI service through a web browser
  • They can't use the Power BI Mobile apps
  • They won't be able to sign in where a work or school account is required

It does seem like it should be possible though. The detailed documentation here says this:

Can I invite guest users with consumer email accounts?

Inviting guest users with consumer email accounts is supported in Power BI. This includes domains such as hotmail.com, outlook.com and gmail.com. However, those users may experience limitations beyond what users with work or school accounts encounter.

It seems like Microsoft has been making some authentication changes recently but isn't very clear where they apply. When is a "work or school account required"? I'm confused now too.

The Customer Support Team can hopefully provide a better answer.

[SELECTDBA]

Customer support team, we also need answer to this, so we'd appreciate a response.