frequently asked questions
Answers to what we get asked most.
Power BI Basics
The Microsoft Power BI service (app.powerbi.com) is the Software as a Service (SaaS) part of Power BI. Compared to the Power BI Desktop application, it's more constrained in its ability to transform and model data — instead it offers features like collaboration, dashboards, and dataflows. Desktop and service are complementary and frequently used together.
Power BI Report Server is an on-premise alternative to the Power BI service, giving organizations greater control over their data. It only supports a limited feature set, so it's typically used only when specific requirements demand it.
Licensing
Anyone with access to Microsoft AppSource can download a free version of our visuals — usually limited in data or features.
Beyond the free version, we offer 1-month full-featured trial licenses in two ways: purchase a Microsoft Managed Service Plan on AppSource (the first month is free, with no charge if you cancel within it), or contact us directly for an Enterprise trial key.
Business licenses are purchased on Microsoft AppSource as Managed Service Plans, which vary by number of users and price per user, available as annual or monthly subscriptions.
Every user with access to a report that includes the visual — viewer or editor — needs a license, assigned through the Microsoft 365 Admin Center. Business licenses include the full, unrestricted feature set and always update automatically to the newest AppSource version.
The Enterprise license is available exclusively as an annual subscription. It lets you provide and manage the visual as an organizational visual across your entire Power BI environment — no need to manage individual user access — with custom billing tailored to your organization.
If you license through a Microsoft AppSource plan, Microsoft tracks user counts via the Microsoft 365 Admin Center. If you purchase a license directly from us, we don't track users in your organization at all — that's why we only offer enterprise-wide licenses with unlimited users for direct purchases.
License keys purchased directly from SCvation have no user limit, since we only sell enterprise-wide licenses. For AppSource plans, the limit depends on which plan you purchased — if you reach it, you can switch to a plan with a higher user limit.
Conceptually, yes — think of it as hosting the custom visual yourself in your Power BI environment. Organizational AppSource is a built-in Power BI feature that lets organizations provide custom visuals in addition to the public AppSource. A Power BI administrator uploads the visual package — provided by SCvation, or downloaded from Microsoft AppSource — in the Power BI Admin Portal.
Paste your license key into the "License key" field in the visual's "License" section of the Power BI formatting pane. If valid, you'll see the license type and expiry date appear, and the key field clears itself.
In every pricing model, a user is anyone with access to the report — viewer or editor. If you're licensing a visual for use in your reports, every person with access to that report needs a license.
Versions & Updates
New releases are generally available on public AppSource first — if you source the visual from there, it updates to the newest version automatically.
If you use it as an organizational visual, we create a custom package for your organization with every release and deliver it directly. It always has the same functionality as the AppSource version — but with your license key embedded, so you don't have to enter it per instance — and you decide when to upload the new version to your organizational AppSource.
If sourced from AppSource, only the latest version is ever available. With an organizational visual, you can test a new version separately before uploading it to your organizational store — we deliver the new version directly, and you decide when to update. Note that only one version of a visual can run in your organizational AppSource at a time; updating changes it across all reports.
We never publish changes that could break existing reports. New features and bug fixes are pushed to the public AppSource and applied automatically to reports sourcing from there. If you use an organizational visual, a Power BI administrator has to manually update it with the new package we provide — giving you the chance to test first. Either way, no action is required in your reports themselves.
If you source a visual directly from us as an organizational visual, you can test the new version before publishing it. Import the package we deliver through the Power BI Desktop client — with developer mode enabled, so it isn't overwritten by the version currently on public AppSource.
