Microsoft Power BI is truly a game-changer to the shifting business intelligence (BI) market. It offers a broad range of business intelligence (BI) and analytics capabilities with its Power BI suite, delivered via the Azure cloud. It is a next-level BI platform in data preparation, visual-based data discovery, data-driven reports and visuals, interactive dashboards, and augmented analytics. For 14 consecutive years, Gartner has recognized Microsoft as a Magic Quadrant Leader in analytics and business intelligence platforms.

With Power BI, enterprises can:

• Process and visually streamline massive quantity of data
• Quickly gather, analyze, publish, and share business data in interactive ways
• Build personalized dashboards to assess data quickly
• Find valuable trends/patterns and make better predictions
• Ensure data security with granular control over accessibility both internally and externally
• Combine Power BI with Power Apps and Power Automate to build innovative solutions

Choice Overload

It is apparent that PowerBI has a lot of options to offer and meets multiple use cases elegantly. At times though, Microsoft licensing could get overwhelming and create a “choice overload” problem for the users.

 You must carefully scrutinize all licensing choices and their respective terms and conditions. Prime among these are the sharing options and accessibility rules, which, if neglected, can negatively impact how you move, receive, or publish your data. Even, a choice confusion may increase the risk of overcommitting and subscribing to underutilized services—impacting your business values you want to drive from the platform and, of course, your ROI. So be careful how you choose the license.

The following section provides a high-level mapping of the typical use cases along with the various license options.

Licensing Options

Microsoft Power BI comes with flexible licensing options for Power BI: Power BI Pro and Power BI Premium. But in a price-sensitive market, the total cost of ownership (TCO) of modern BI tools is still a major concern for businesses.

So how do you know when to choose Power BI Desktop, Power BI Pro, or Power BI Premium? And what are key differences among them?

Comparison: Power BI Desktop vs. Power BI Pro vs. Power BI Premium

License Type	Power BI Desktop	Power BI Pro	Power BI Premium Per User	Power BI Premium  Per Capacity
Key Capabilities	Install right on your system	SaaS based deployment	SaaS based deployment	SaaS based deployment
	Start creating rich, interactive reports with visual analytics at your fingertips	An individual user license with modern, self-service analytics to visualize data with live dashboards and reports; share insights across your organization.	An individual user license to accelerate access to insights with advanced AI, unlock self-service prep for big data, and simplify data management and access at enterprise scale.	Enterprise-wide license to accelerate access to insights with advanced AI, unlock self-service prep for big data, and simplify data management and access—without per-user licenses for content consumers.
	Save your work to a file and publish your data and reports	Available free with Microsoft 365 E5.	It includes all Power BI Pro features.	It requires a Power BI Pro license for publishing content into Power BI Premium capacity.
	—	Model size limit: 1 GB	Model size limit: 100 GB	Model size limit: 400 GB
	Refresh rate: 8/day	Refresh rate: 8/day	Refresh rate: 48/day	Refresh rate: 48/day
	Connect to 70+ data sources	Connect to 100+ data sources	Connect to 100+ data sources	Connect to 100+ data sources
	Maximum storage: 10 GB/user	Maximum storage: 10 GB/user	Maximum storage: 100 TB	Maximum storage: 100 TB
Pricing	FREE	$9.99 Per user/month	$20 Per user/month	From $4,995 Per capacity/month
Sharing Option	Access to content in My Workspace	Publish content to other workspaces, share dashboards, subscribe to dashboards and reports, share with users who have a Pro license	Publish content to other workspaces, share dashboards, subscribe to dashboards and reports, share with users who have a Premium Per User license	Flexibility to publish reports broadly across an enterprise, without requiring recipients to be licensed individually per user.
	When workspace is in Premium capacity, consume content shared with them	When workspace is in Premium capacity, distribute content to users who have free licenses	When workspace is in Premium capacity, distribute content to users who have free and Pro licenses	The ability to maintain BI assets on-premises with Power BI Report Server.
Ideal for	Intended for individual purposes to build locally hosted data models and reports. Can be used as an effective collaboration tool between Report authors.	Ideal for organizations with smaller user license count needs.	Intended for enterprise-level businesses that generate huge amounts of data, and require extensive access to the app.	Ideal for organizations that need to buy in bulk to allow multiple users access to Power BI, without additional per-user costs.

*Check out the latest addition on the Autoscale as well.

Scenario Based Examples

It is natural to demand a license for every user. But there are more aspects/scenarios to pay attention to make informed decision and control your TCO.

Scenario 1:

You want every employee to have self-service BI and collaborate with each other – sharing dashboards, performing improvised analysis, and publishing reports.

Right Option:

Power BI Pro for every user

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Scenario 2:

Your organization has a combination of users who require self-service BI and collaboration.  And you have planned users who only need to consume BI content.

Right Options:

Power BI Pro for self-service BI and collaboration
Power BI Premium for those who distribute BI content to consumers

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Scenario 3:

Your organization where 1000 of selected users require self-service BI and collaboration and they need to keep reports on-premises.

Right Options:

Power BI Pro for users that require self-service BI and collaboration
Power BI Premium Per Capacity to be able to publish reports on-premises

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Do the math considering your user base, sharing needs, and budget, and then select the appropriate option. Fortunately, the low TCO of Microsoft Power BI is its principal strength due to two factors — a low per-user license cost, and the cloud architecture. Make the right choice. Or ask your Microsoft solution provider to get the complete Power BI licensing picture.