Microsoft Makes Massive Changes to PowerApps - Interlink Cloud Blog

Written by Sarah Bunt | Jun 20, 2022 4:00:00 AM

PowerApps is a low code/no code suite of apps, services, connectors, and data platforms that provides a rapid application development environment to build custom apps for your business needs.

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Using PowerApps, you can quickly build custom business apps that connect to your business data stored either in the underlying data platform (Microsoft Dataverse - formerly Common Data Service) or in various online and on-premises data sources (SharePoint, Excel, Office 365, Dynamics 365, SQL Server, and so on).

Apps built using PowerApps provide rich business logic and workflow capabilities to transform your manual business processes to digital, automated processes. In addition, apps built using PowerApps have a responsive design and can run seamlessly in a browser or on mobile devices (phone or tablet). PowerApps "democratizes" the custom business app building experience by enabling users to build feature-rich, custom business apps without writing code.

PowerApps also provides an extensible platform that lets pro developers programmatically interact with data and metadata, apply business logic, create custom connectors, and integrate with external data.

There are two major types of PowerApps:

Canvas Apps: Design and build a business application from a canvas in Microsoft PowerApps without writing code in a traditional programming language. Design the application by dragging and dropping elements onto a canvas, the designer has complete control over app layout.
Model-driven Apps: Design is a component-focused approach to app development based on data models and business processes. Unlike canvas app development where the designer has complete control over application layout, with model-driven apps much of the layout is determined for you and largely designated by the components you add to the application.

PowerApps has four major ways to license the functionality:

1) Included – Office 365 – using PowerApps within the context of Office 365 is included in the service at no additional charge. Qualifying licenses for PowerApps include Business Premium, Business Essentials, F1 Plan, and the E1-E5 Enterprise Plans.

Custom apps are limited to Canvas Apps and Standard Connectors only

2) Included – Dynamics 365 Enterprise Applications – using PowerApps within the context of Dynamics 365 is included in the service at no additional charge. Qualifying licenses include Sales, Customer Service, Field Service, Retail, for Talent, Business Central, and more.

Custom apps can be Canvas or Model and Premium and Custom connectors are included

3) Per User Per App (2 App Package) – for clients who have a small number of PowerApps in their organization. This is typically the plan that companies will utilize when they are getting started with PowerApps that are outside of the included options listed above.

Cost is $5 per month per user and includes access to 1 PowerApp application and 1 custom portal
- Includes access to 1 custom portal, Custom apps can be Canvas or Model and Premium and Custom Connectors are included
- Licenses are stackable. So, a single user who needs access to three unique PowerApps, would need to have two of these license plans purchased for them

4) Per User Unlimited Apps – is for clients with a large number of PowerApps that an individual user needs to gain access to. Just doing the basic math, this option breaks even when a single user needs to access 8 or more PowerApps.

Cost is $20 per month per user and includes access to an unlimited number of PowerApp applications and Custom Portals
Custom apps can be Canvas or Model and Premium and Custom Connectors are included

PowerApps Portals also have a separate licensing scheme which includes the following models:

Per Login model – Customers must purchase a package of logins. Packages start at 100 logins per month, the estimated price is $200 per month
Per page view model – Customers that have anonymous users will need to license by page view. Page views can be purchased at 100,000 page views per month, the estimated price is $100 per month

PowerApps does follow Microsoft’s standard Multiplexing rules. Basically, no matter how the user touches the data – whether directly in the PowerApps or through some kind of interface or Flow, they would still need to be licensed. So, putting an Excel data collection point on the front end of a PowerApp would still require the inputting user to be licensed.

Limits:

All of the PowerApps have limits on individual plans. Connect with us to help estimate your actual usage.
For example, on the Per User (2 Application plan), Daily API requests are limited to 1000, Common Data Service Capacity of 50MB, and Common Data File Capacity of 400MB.
For more details about the limits – see the Microsoft PowerApps and Flow Licensing Guide.

Transitions:

Great news for clients who got into using Flow (now Power Automate) and PowerApps early. Microsoft is offering two scenarios for transition.

Existing apps and flows will continue to work. Customers who have been using PowerApps or Power Automate with Office 365 using one or more of the listed Premium connectors will receive a transition period until October 1, 2020, or the expiration of their current Office 365 subscription term, whichever is longer. During the transition period, customers can continue to create additional apps and flows using these connectors.
In addition, apps and flows created prior to October 1, 2019, which are using the Premium connectors will receive an extended transition period until October 1, 2024. During this time, these qualifying apps and flows will be exempt from the Premium connector licensing requirements for the reclassified connectors.