What is the difference between Power BI Desktop and the Power BI Service?

Answer

Power BI consists of two primary components:

Power BI Desktop. It is an application used for data modeling and report creation.
Power BI Service. It is an online platform designed for sharing and collaboration.

You can use both components to connect to various data sources and create visualizations. Each has unique features that address different aspects of data analysis and reporting. For details on Power BI Desktop and the Power BI service, see Microsoft's What is Power BI article.

Power BI Desktop

You can use Power BI Desktop to build reports, model data, and manage connections. For more details, see Microsoft’s Get started with Power BI Desktop article.

Configure Data Source Settings.
Design the report.
Refresh the report.
Save the report as a.pbixfile.

Power BI Service

You can use the Power BI service to view, manage, and share reports online. For more details, see Microsoft’s Get started creating in the Power BI service article.

Create a Workspace for your reports.
Configure Data Source Settings to allow the service to refresh data.
Upload your Power BI report (.pbixfile) to the Workspace.
Manage Workspace permissions to give your team access to the Power BI report.