How to sign up for Power BI Service if I don't have a work or school account?

Jeong Hoon Kim 20 Reputation points
2025-01-17T13:10:09.7066667+00:00

Hello team,

I am currently following the Data Analyst Career Path and trying to finish the module "Create dashboards in Power BI" which is under learning path "Manage workspaces and datasets in Power BI". I got stuck in unit 9 of this module where there is an exercise in a lab which requires access to Power BI Service.

Since I do not have a work / school account, I can't access Power BI Service in the lab environment. I tried signing up for both a trial Microsoft365 account and an Office 365 E5 account as a work around as suggested in this article, however both options give me errors when signing up and I can't proceed.

I also tried setting up a M365 Developer account as suggested in the module but this also doesn't seem to work. My associated Microsoft 365 personal account after registering for a M365 Developer account is still recognised as a personal account by Power BI Service.

Screenshot 2025-01-17 at 13.50.52

Is there any way to work around this problem? I would really like to finish this module.

Regards,

JH

Microsoft Power Platform Training
Microsoft Power Platform Training
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Accepted answer
  1. Rakesh Gurram 11,890 Reputation points Microsoft Vendor
    2025-01-17T17:06:39.8533333+00:00

    Hi Jeong Hoon Kim,

    Thank you for reaching out to us on the Microsoft Q&A forum.

    From the details you shared, it appears that regional restrictions may be affecting your ability to access the Power BI Service with your personal account.

    To address this, we recommend reaching out to your admin or IT team to request a Power BI Pro license, which will grant you access to the Power BI Service. Once the license is assigned, you should be able to proceed with the module.

    Alternatively, if feasible, you could ask a colleague with the required credentials to share their access with you to help you complete the module.

    In the meantime, you can continue using Power BI Desktop, which is free and offers full functionality for creating dashboards and reports locally.

    Please reach out to us if you have any other queries.

    If the information is helpful, please Accept Answer & Upvote so that it would be helpful to other community members.

    1 person found this answer helpful.

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