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Composite models on SQL Server Analysis Services

Headshot of article author Jeroen ter Heerdt

We are excited to announce you can create composite Power BI models by connecting to SQL Server 2022 Analysis Services tabular models! SQL Server 2022 is available now for public preview and when you upgrade or deploy tabular models to SQL Server 2022 Analysis Services this DirectQuery connection becomes available in Power BI Desktop starting with May 2022 release. Existing or new tabular models hosted on SQL Server 2022 Analysis Services can be joined with other data in Power BI Desktop to create a composite model.

The ability to create a composite model leveraging one or more Power BI datasets or Azure Analysis Services models has been in preview since December 2020. In recent weeks we have made exciting updates to this feature, including controls for administrators to manage this feature and updating the required permissions to view reports built using this feature.

Keep in mind that you need to have a standard mode on-premises data gateway set up to have your reports successfully refresh in the Power BI service after publishing.

Learn more about this capability in this demo:

Please keep in mind that both the SQL Server 2022 release as well as the composite models on Power BI Datasets and Analysis Services feature are still in preview.

Read more about the improvements with SQL Server 2022 and Power BI in this blog.