How to Share Power BI Reports Securely with Clients — Without Requiring Pro Licenses

If you’ve ever tried to share a Power BI report with someone outside your organization, you’ve probably run into the same frustrating limitations: either they need a Power BI Pro license, or you have to use risky workarounds like "Publish to Web" that compromise security and control.

The truth is, sharing reports with clients or external partners shouldn’t be this complicated. It should be secure, cost-effective, and easy to manage — and thanks to Power BI Embedded and solutions like the PowerBI Portal, it can be.

Why Sharing Reports with External Users Is a Challenge

Power BI was built with internal collaboration in mind. By default, sharing reports requires the recipient to have a Pro license or be covered under a Premium capacity. That’s fine for your internal teams — but if you’re working with clients, vendors, or partners who just need to view a dashboard once in a while, paying $10–$20/month per user makes little sense.

To make things worse, many teams end up using the "Publish to Web" option, which generates a public link that anyone can access — no login, no security, no tracking. It’s convenient, but it’s also a data governance nightmare.

The Smart Alternative: Power BI Embedded + PowerBI Portal

Power BI Embedded changes the game by letting you embed Power BI reports into your own application or portal — and manage access using your own authentication system. You only pay for the capacity you use, not per user, which is much more scalable if you’re serving dozens or hundreds of external viewers.

But even with Power BI Embedded, there’s still work to be done: managing user permissions, designing the interface, and integrating the whole experience with your brand.

That’s where the PowerBI Portal comes in.

The PowerBI Portal is a white-labeled web platform that lets you publish, organise, and share Power BI reports with external users — securely and without requiring them to have any Power BI license at all. Built on top of Power BI Embedded, it gives you full control over who sees what, when, and how.

How It Works

You connect your Power BI reports to the portal via a secure, embedded connection. Then, you define user groups, access rules, and content categories. Each client or partner can log in with their own credentials and see only the reports you’ve made available to them.

All of this happens in a fully branded, customizable environment that feels like an extension of your own platform.

Because PowerBI Portal uses Power BI Embedded, it benefits from dynamic capacity control — meaning you can scale up or down depending on usage. If no one is viewing reports, you’re not consuming capacity. This can lead to substantial savings compared to fixed licensing.

Real Security — Not Just a Link

With PowerBI Portal, you get true security features:

• Authentication: External users log in through a secure identity provider
• Authorization: You decide exactly which reports each user or group can access
• Row-Level Security: You can even restrict the data shown based on user context
• Audit & Tracking: Monitor who accessed which reports and when

This isn’t a workaround — it’s a proper enterprise solution, and it’s used by companies across industries who need to share insights externally without compromising control or budget.

When Does This Make Sense?

If you have:

• Clients who need regular access to reports
• A partner network that relies on shared analytics
• Sales teams or franchises accessing region-specific data
• Use cases where licensing each viewer is not scalable

Then PowerBI Portal, backed by Power BI Embedded, might be exactly what you need.

Want to See It in Action?

We’d be happy to show you how it works.

👉 Schedule a demo to explore how you can start sharing Power BI reports securely — and more affordably — today.