Power BI report data sources in Power BI Report Server

Power BI reports can connect to a number of data sources. Depending on how data is used, different data sources are available. Data can be imported or data can be queried directly using DirectQuery, or a live connection to SQL Server Analysis Services. Some data sources are available in Power BI Desktop that is optimized for use with Power BI Report Server, but they aren't supported when published to Power BI Report Server.

The data sources below are specific to Power BI reports used within Power BI Report Server. For information about data sources supported with paginated reports (.rdl), see Data Sources Supported by Reporting Services.

Important

All data sources in a Power BI Desktop report must support configuring scheduled refresh.

List of supported data sources

Data source Cached data Scheduled refresh Live/DirectQuery
SQL Server Database Yes Yes Yes
SQL Server Analysis Services Yes Yes Yes
Azure SQL Database Yes Yes Yes
Azure Analysis Services database Yes No Yes
Azure Synapse Analytics (formerly SQL Data Warehouse) Yes Yes Yes
Access Database Yes Yes No
Active Directory Yes Yes No
Amazon Athena Yes No No
Amazon Redshift Yes No No
Azure Blob Storage Yes Yes No
Azure Cosmos DB Yes No No
Azure Data Explorer (Kusto) Yes No No
Azure Data Lake Store Yes No No
Azure HDInsight (HDFS) Yes No No
Azure HDInsight Spark Yes No No
Azure Table Storage Yes Yes No
Denodo Yes No No
Dynamics 365 (online) Yes No No
Excel Yes Yes No
Facebook Yes No No
Folder Yes Yes No
Google Analytics Yes No No
Google BigQuery Yes No No
Hadoop File (HDFS) Yes No No
IBM DB2 Database Yes Yes No
IBM Netezza Yes No No
Impala Yes No No
JSON Yes Yes No
Microsoft Exchange Yes No No
Microsoft Exchange Online Yes No No
MySQL Database Yes Yes No
OData Feed Yes Yes No
ODBC Yes Yes No
OLE DB Yes Yes No
Oracle Database Yes Yes Yes
PostgreSQL Database Yes Yes No
Power BI dataset in the Power BI service No No No
Power BI dataset in Power BI Report Server No No No
Projectplace for Power BI Yes No No
R Script Yes No No
Salesforce Objects Yes No No
Salesforce Reports Yes No No
SAP Business Warehouse server Yes Yes Yes
SAP HANA Database Yes Yes Yes
SharePoint File (on-premises) Yes Yes No
SharePoint Folder (on-premises) Yes Yes No
SharePoint List (on-premises) Yes Yes No
SharePoint Online File Yes No No
SharePoint Online Folder Yes No No
SharePoint Online List Yes No No
Smartsheet Yes No No
Snowflake Yes No No
Spark Yes No No
Sybase Database Yes Yes No
Teradata Yes Yes Yes
Text/CSV Yes Yes No
Vertica Yes No No
Web Yes Yes No
XML Yes Yes No
appFigures (Beta) Yes No No
Common Data Service (Legacy) Yes No No
Dynamics 365 for Customer Insights (Beta) Yes No No
Dynamics 365 for Financials (Beta) Yes No No
GitHub (Beta) Yes No No
IBM Informix database (Beta) Yes No No
MailChimp (Beta) Yes No No
Microsoft Azure Consumption Insights (Beta) Yes No No
Mixpanel (Beta) Yes No No
Planview Enterprise One - CTM (Beta) Yes No No
Planview Enterprise One - PRM (Beta) Yes No No
QuickBooks Online (Beta) Yes No No
SparkPost (Beta) Yes No No
SQL Sentry (Beta) Yes No No
Stripe (Beta) Yes No No
SweetIQ (Beta) Yes No No
Troux (Beta) Yes No No
Twilio (Beta) Yes No No
tyGraph (Beta) Yes No No
Visual Studio Team Services (Beta) Yes No No
Webtrends Analytics (Beta) Yes No No
Zendesk (Beta) Yes No No
Other data sources available but not listed above Yes No No

Important

Row-level security configured at the data source should work for certain DirectQuery (SQL Server, Azure SQL Database, Oracle and Teradata) and live connections assuming Kerberos is configured properly in your environment.

List of supported authentication methods for model refresh

Power BI Report Server does not support OAuth-based authentication for model refresh. Some data sources such as Excel or Access databases make use of a separate step like File or Web to connect to data.

Data source Anonymous Authentication Key Authentication Username and Password Windows Authentication
SQL Server Database No No Yes Yes
SQL Server Analysis Services No No Yes Yes
Azure SQL Database No No Yes No
Azure Analysis Services database No No Yes (1) No
Azure Synapse Analytics (formerly SQL Data Warehouse) No No Yes No
Active Directory No No Yes Yes
Amazon Athena No No No No
Amazon Redshift No No No No
Azure Blob Storage Yes Yes No No
Azure Cosmos DB No No No No
Azure Data Explorer (Kusto) No No No No
Azure Data Lake Store No No No No
Azure HDInsight (HDFS) No No No No
Azure HDInsight Spark No No No No
Azure Table Storage No Yes No No
Denodo No No No No
Dynamics 365 (online) No No No No
Facebook No No No No
Folder No No No Yes
Google Analytics No No No No
Google BigQuery No No No No
Hadoop File (HDFS) No No No No
IBM DB2 Database No No Yes Yes
IBM Netezza No No No No
Impala No No No No
Microsoft Exchange No No No No
Microsoft Exchange Online No No No No
MySQL Database No No Yes Yes
OData Feed Yes Yes Yes Yes
ODBC Yes No Yes Yes
OLE DB Yes No Yes Yes
Oracle Database No No Yes Yes
PostgreSQL Database No No Yes No
Power BI service No No No No
Projectplace No No No No
R Script No No No No
Salesforce Objects No No No No
Salesforce Reports No No No No
SAP Business Warehouse server No No Yes No
SAP HANA Database No No Yes Yes
SharePoint File (on-premises) Yes No No Yes
SharePoint Folder (on-premises) Yes No No Yes
SharePoint List (on-premises) Yes No No Yes
SharePoint Online File No No No No
SharePoint Online Folder No No No No
SharePoint Online List No No No No
Smartsheet No No No No
Snowflake No No No No
Spark No No No No
Sybase Database No No Yes Yes
Teradata No No Yes Yes (2)
Vertica No No No No
Web (3) Yes No Yes Yes
appFigures (Beta) No No No No
Common Data Service (Legacy) No No No No
Dynamics 365 for Customer Insights (Beta) No No No No
Dynamics 365 for Financials (Beta) No No No No
GitHub (Beta) No No No No
IBM Informix database (Beta) No No No No
MailChimp (Beta) No No No No
Microsoft Azure Consumption Insights (Beta) No No No No
Mixpanel (Beta) No No No No
Planview Enterprise One - CTM (Beta) No No No No
Planview Enterprise One - PRM (Beta) No No No No
QuickBooks Online (Beta) No No No No
SparkPost (Beta) No No No No
SQL Sentry (Beta) No No No No
Stripe (Beta) No No No No
SweetIQ (Beta) No No No No
Troux (Beta) No No No No
Twilio (Beta) No No No No
tyGraph (Beta) No No No No
Visual Studio Team Services (Beta) No No No No
Webtrends Analytics (Beta) No No No No
Zendesk (Beta) No No No No
Other data sources available but not listed above No No No No

(1) For Azure Analysis Services data source, you must have multifactor authentication (MFA) disabled for the credentials being used to connect to the data source. If you need multifactor authentication enabled for your environment, review Microsoft Entra Conditional Access as an option to disable multifactor authentication for the credentials used in the data source.

(2) Using LDAP authentication with Teradata (enabled in Power BI Desktop by using the Command Prompt command 'setx PBI_EnableTeradataLdap true') is not supported for model refresh.

(3) Power BI Report Server has a limitation when using web data: only data files from web can be refreshed. Data based on Page or By example aren't refreshable. This limitation is because the M expressions created with Web.BrowserContents and Web.Page can't be refreshed. Power BI Report Server can only refresh Web.Contents data sources.

List of supported authentication methods for DirectQuery

Power BI Report Server does not support OAuth-based authentication for DirectQuery.

Note

Power BI DirectQuery reports must include "Encrypt=True;TrustServerCertificate=True" as part of the connection string on data sources, or apply the "PBI_SQL_TRUSTED_SERVERS" environment variable on their Power BI Report Server.

Data source Anonymous Authentication Key Authentication Username and Password Windows Authentication Integrated Windows Authentication
SQL Server Database No No Yes Yes Yes
SQL Server Analysis Services No No Yes Yes Yes
Azure SQL Database No No Yes No No
Azure Analysis Services database No No Yes (1) No No
Azure Synapse Analytics (formerly SQL Data Warehouse) No No Yes No No
Oracle Database No No Yes Yes Yes
SAP Business Warehouse server No No Yes No No
SAP HANA Database No No Yes Yes Yes (2)
Teradata No No Yes Yes Yes

(1) For Azure Analysis Services data source, you must have multifactor authentication (MFA) disabled for the credentials being used to connect to the data source. If you need multifactor authentication enabled for your environment, review Microsoft Entra Conditional Access as an option to disable multifactor authentication for the credentials used in the data source.

(2) SAP HANA supports DirectQuery with Integrated Windows Authentication only when using it as a relational database in the published Power BI Desktop file (.pbix).

Now that you've connected to your data source, create a Power BI report using data from that data source.

More questions? Try asking the Power BI Community