Module 5
8 min read

Publishing & Sharing

Publish and share your Power BI reports

What You'll Learn

  • Publish reports to Power BI Service
  • Share with others
  • Set up refresh schedules
  • Embed in apps

Publishing to Service

Steps:

  1. Save your .pbix file
  2. Home > Publish
  3. Sign in (if needed)
  4. Select workspace
  5. Wait for upload
  6. Open in Service (link appears)

Done! Report is in cloud.

Workspaces

My Workspace: Your personal space

Shared Workspaces: Team collaboration

Creating workspace: Power BI Service > Workspaces > Create

Requires: Power BI Pro or Premium

Sharing Options

Share Link

Quick sharing:

  • Share > Copy link
  • Send link to users
  • They need permissions

Use for:

  • Quick sharing
  • Internal users
  • Simple access

App

Professional distribution:

  • Package multiple reports
  • Controlled experience
  • Better for end users

Create app: Workspace > Create app

Embed

In SharePoint, Teams, website:

  • Get embed code
  • Paste in site
  • Users see live report

Use for:

  • Intranet portals
  • Team sites
  • Public websites (with Premium)

Permissions

Viewer

Can:

  • View reports
  • Filter data
  • Export data

Cannot:

  • Edit reports
  • Change data

Contributor

Can:

  • Create reports
  • Edit existing
  • Publish

Admin

Can:

  • Everything
  • Manage workspace
  • Delete reports

Data Refresh

Schedule automatic refresh:

  1. Power BI Service
  2. Dataset > Settings
  3. Scheduled refresh
  4. Set frequency (up to 8x/day with Pro)
  5. Set time

Requires:

  • Gateway (for on-premises data)
  • Or cloud data sources

Row-Level Security

Limit what users see:

Example: Salespeople only see their region

Setup:

  1. Modeling > Manage roles
  2. Create role: "East Region"
  3. Filter: [Region] = "East"
  4. In Service: Assign users to roles

Monitoring Usage

Power BI Service:

  • View count
  • Unique users
  • Performance metrics

Workspace > Usage metrics

Track:

  • Most viewed reports
  • Popular pages
  • User engagement

Best Practices

Publishing:

  • Test thoroughly first
  • Use descriptive names
  • Add description
  • Set refresh schedule

Sharing:

  • Share apps, not workspaces
  • Document for users
  • Provide training
  • Monitor usage

Security:

  • Use RLS when needed
  • Don't over-share
  • Review permissions regularly

Try This Exercise

Publish your first report:

  1. Create simple report in Desktop
  2. Publish to My Workspace
  3. Open in Service
  4. Share with yourself (test)
  5. Set up daily refresh
  6. View usage metrics after a week

Next Module Preview

Module 6 covers Real-World Projects - build complete dashboards from scratch!

Congratulations!

You now know how to publish and share Power BI reports professionally!

Tip: Publishing is easy. Good sharing strategy takes planning!

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