Making Data-driven Decisions
The 4 Types of Licenses for Power BI: Which License best
suits your Company?
suits your
Pro, Premium per User, Microsoft Fabric or is the Free version enough? Microsoft offers different license types for Power BI - with different functional scope at different prices. But which license best meets the requirements and needs of your company and your Power BI users?
Ask yourself Basic Questions first
Start by asking yourself these fundamental questions:
- How big is your company?
- How many employees should use Power BI?
- How many of them should create and publish reports?
- And how many employees should only be able to view the reports and dashboards?
- Do you need extensive functions such as advanced AI or paginated reports?
- Do you want to work in the cloud or on-premises?
- Do you want to work mobile?
- What data volumes are you dealing with?
Typically, you need to distinguish between two groups of Power BI users with different roles:
- Report designers: These users create and publish reports.
- Report consumers: These users work with the finished reports, datasets and dashboards in the Power BI service.
What does this mean for the licenses?
All report designers need at least the Pro license.
Report consumers also need a Pro license - unless the reports are stored on a Microsoft Fabric capacity (from an F64 capacity or higher). You can think of the capacity as a kind of “virtual container” in which you store and manage the data. If your company has such a capacity license, report consumers can view the reports without additional licenses, as access is covered by the capacity license. For smaller capacities (e.g. F2 or F32), however, Pro licenses for consumers are still required.
The 4 Types of Licenses at a Glance
| Function / Target Group | Organization | Price | Strengths | Limitations | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Power BI Desktop | Beginners | Small enterprises oder Single users | € 0.00 | Free use without time limit |
|
| Power BI Pro | Individual users and teams working together on data reports | Small, medium and large companies that require the standard functions | € 13.10 per user per month |
Full version: More features than in the free version, including:
|
|
| Power BI Premium Per User |
Reporting, large amounts of data and AI possible → Licenses for individual users |
Small, medium and large companies that require extended functions | € 22.50 per user per month |
All functions of Power BI Pro and in addition, among others:
|
|
| Microsoft Fabric | Many users and high performance → Uniform platform for the entire company |
Large companies with extensive data requirements | from € 176.89 per SKU per month |
|
|
The Microsoft E5 Packages: Power BI Pro included
If you have the Microsoft E5 packages Microsoft 365 E5 or Office 365 E5 , the Power BI Pro license is already included. To benefit from this, you can also “upgrade” from an E3 package to an E5 package.
Difficult Decision: Power BI Desktop, Pro or Premium per User? Or Fabric after all?
Which is better for you depends, among other things, on the number of report designers and report consumers. To help you decide, we have three simple calculation examples for you:
Company A
This company employs 95 people who are supposed to work with Power BI. Of these, 15 employees are report designers and 80 are just users who only need to view and use the reports. The standard functions are basically sufficient for creating reports.
–> In this case, the cheapest option is to provide all 95 employees with a Pro license. You then pay 95 x €13.10 per month, i.e. a total of €1,244.50. As the Microsoft Fabric functions are not required, neither the purchase of a Premium license nor the use of Microsoft Fabric capacities is worthwhile.
Company B
The next company would like 50 of the 220 Power BI users to be authorized to create and publish reports. Of these, 20 should work with larger amounts of data and use more extensive premium add-on functions. The remaining 170 users are report consumers.
–> Under these conditions, you should opt for 200 Pro licenses and 20 Premium Per User licenses. This costs a total of €3,070: You pay €2,620 for the Pro licenses and €450 for the Premium Per User licenses. Here too, the Microsoft Fabric functions are not required, which is why reserving the capacities offers no added value for the company.
Company C
In this scenario, 730 employees are to work with Power BI: 30 of them as authors who create and publish reports, and the remaining 700 as consumers who merely view reports. The new Microsoft Fabric license model offers the following options: For this organization, an F64 capacity would be the optimal choice. This capacity covers access for all report consumers, so no additional licenses are required for the 700 consumers. However, authors who want to create and publish reports will still need individual Power BI Pro licenses.
Cost Breakdown
F64 capacity: €5,660.31 per month (with annual reservation)
+ 30 Power BI Pro licenses: €393 per month (€13.10 per license)
= total costs: €5,660.31 + €393 = €6,053.31 per month
Alternative: Pro Licenses for all Employees
Another option would be to purchase Power BI Pro licenses for all 730 employees. This option would allow both authors and consumers to create and consume reports - but without the benefits of a capacity license.
Cost breakdown:
730 Power BI Pro licenses: approx. €9,563 per month (€13.10 per license)
Comparison of Options
The combination of one F64 capacity and 30 Pro licenses is significantly more cost-effective than purchasing Pro licenses for all employees. With the recommended combination option, you save around €3,510 per month compared to the second option.
Not sure which License best suits your Company?
If you are still unsure which license is best suited to your company or are considering a combination of different licenses, we will be happy to help you decide.