Update January 2023

The Power BI Implementation Planning guidance will ultimately be replacing the Enterprise Deployment whitepaper. We’re adding subject areas to Power BI Implementation Planning as we complete them - it’s a huge task and will take a while. Check out this blog post for more info about it.

In the meantime, you might find some value from the whitepaper. Keep in mind that it hasn’t been updated since mid-2020. We have no plans to publish any updates to the whitepaper - so keep an eye on Power BI Implementation Planning. Also check out the Power BI Adoption Roadmap if you aren’t yet familiar with it.

Original post from May 2020

I’m really excited to announce that a new version of the Microsoft whitepaper “Planning a Power BI Enterprise Deployment” is now available.

This is version 3.1 of the whitepaper that I co-authored with Chris Webb. The previous version was from July 2018, so this update includes quite a lot of changes throughout.

Huge high-five to Meagan Longoria who was our tech reviewer again. She never fails to make my writing better.

Due to the breadth of updates, it would be impossible to list them all. Below is a recap of the most meaningful changes.

Section 1: Introduction

Added roadmap (release plan) references.

Clarified list of what is out of scope.

Section 2: Power BI Usage Scenarios

Improved the dataflows conversation.

Updated the near real-time scenario to use automated page refresh.

Section 3: Power BI Architectural Choices

New dataflows section.

Updated the Premium list of benefits quite a bit.

Redesigned the embedding conversation quite a bit (to focus on decision-making).

Section 4: Power BI Licensing and User Management

Added self-service purchasing.

Various rearranging, consolidations, simplifications.

Section 5: Power BI Source Data Considerations

Added dataflows conversation.

Section 6: Power BI Dataset Storage Options

Rearranged and expanded the summary at end of this section.

Mentioned large models.

Section 7: Power BI Data Refresh and Data Gateway

Added info re: use of clusters for load balancing and high availability.

Mentioned Power Platform Admin Center.

Included new set of gateway log files.

Added dataflow refresh (in addition to dataset refresh).

Section 8: Power BI Dataset and Report Development Considerations

Clarified source control/version control.

Added references to shared datasets.

Mentioned .pbids file.

Improved accessibility info.

Improved custom visuals info.

Section 9: Power BI Collaboration, Sharing and Distribution

Changes related to new workspace experience.

Added shared and certified datasets.

New decision tree on using apps, workspaces, or sharing.

Added deployment pipeline info.

Section 10: Power BI Administration

New tenant setting recommendations.

Added managing protection metrics.

Added managing custom help menus.

Added managing workspaces.

Added managing dataflow settings.

Added managing custom branding.

Mentioned new activity log and new PowerShell modules.

Updated installers and applications section.

Section 11: Power BI Security and Data Protection

Added sensitivity labels and Microsoft Information Protection.

Updated workspace roles for the new workspace experience.

Mentioned use of Azure Premium Files.

Section 12: Power BI Deprecated Items

Various additions.

Section 13: Support, Learning, and Third-Party Tools

Various additions.

And for the astute reader…there’s a section missing you say? Yes there is. The old Section 12 was “Power BI Limits + Feature Comparisons.” We decided that this level of detail wasn’t best included in a whitepaper like this, and we thought the information was probably rarely used anyway. So, it was eliminated so we could devote time elsewhere.

Hope you enjoy reading the new whitepaper!