Power BI Desktop to end support for Windows 8.1, new features unveiled

At the beginning of last year, Microsoft ended extended support for Windows 8.1 - almost a decade after the operating systemlaunched. Today, as part of its monthly feature summary for Power BI Desktop, the tech giant has also revealed that support for the data analytics service on Windows 8.1 will be ending on January 31, 2024.

Aside from this announcement, a bunch of new features have been unveiled for Power BI Desktop this month, including on-object interaction, a new 'Apply All Slicers' button for reports, several connector updates, and more. A couple of recently introduced enhancements have hit general availability, including Power BI's integration with PowerPoint, and Multiple Audiences for Power BI org apps - which was previewed back in August.

Moreover, the third-party visuals highlighted this time around from AppSource include Financial Reporting Matrix v7.0, Acterys Variance, Feature Summary for Drill Down Combo PRO, and Gantt Chart by MAQ Software. Aside from that, two new visuals have also been released in the store, including Horizontal Bullet Chart with Label and Banzae BI Dashboard.

The full list of changes is as follows:

• Reporting
  • Apply all slicers button, Clear all slicers button, and Optimization presets update
  • Format Pane – new styling
  • On-object interaction (Opt-in)
  • Visual container improvements
• Data Connectivity
  • Google BigQuery, Google BigQuery Azure AD (Connector Update)
  • Azure Databricks, Databricks (Connector Update)
  • Dremio Cloud (Connector Update)
  • FactSet RMS (Connector Update)
  • SurveyMonkey (Connector Update)
• Service
  • Storytelling in PowerPoint
  • Power BI org app Multiple Audiences
  • Announcing new Scanner API scenarios
  • Email Subscriptions
• Mobile
  • Discover external orgs content in your mobile app
  • Grant access on the go
• Visualizations (third-party visuals)
  • New visuals in AppSource
  • Financial Reporting Matrix v7.0
  • Acterys Variance
  • Feature Summary for Drill Down Combo PRO
  • Gantt Chart by MAQ Software (PREMIUM)

The January 2024 release for Power BI Desktop for Report Server will essentially be the last one to support Windows 8.1, after which only Windows 10 and newer versions will be supported. Notably, security updates will continue to be shipped to Windows 8.1 users of Power BI Desktop until January 2025.