What is Microsoft Dataverse?

Article • 06/21/2022 • 6 minutes to read

Dataverse lets you securely store and manage data that's used by business applications.
Data within Dataverse is stored within a set of tables. A table is a set of rows (formerly
referred to as records) and columns (formerly referred to as fields/attributes). Each
column in the table is designed to store a certain type of data, for example, name, age,
salary, and so on. Dataverse includes a base set of standard tables that cover typical
scenarios, but you can also create custom tables specific to your organization and
populate them with data by using Power Query. App makers can then use Power Apps
to build rich applications that use this data.

For information about purchasing a plan to use Dataverse, go to Pricing info.

Why use Dataverse?

Standard and custom tables within Dataverse provide a secure and cloud-based storage
option for your data. Tables let you create a business-focused definition of your
organization's data for use within apps. If you're not sure whether tables are your best
option, consider these benefits:

Easy to manage – Both the metadata and data are stored in the cloud. You don't
need to worry about the details of how they're stored.
Easy to secure – Data is securely stored so that users can see it only if you grant
them access. Role-based security allows you to control access to tables for
different users within your organization.
Access your Dynamics 365 Data – Data from your Dynamics 365 applications is
also stored within Dataverse, allowing you to quickly build apps that use your
Dynamics 365 data and extend your apps with Power Apps.
Rich metadata – Data types and relationships are used directly within Power Apps.
Logic and validation – Define calculated columns, business rules, workflows, and
business process flows to ensure data quality and drive business processes.
Productivity tools – Tables are available within the add-ins for Microsoft Excel to
increase productivity and ensure data accessibility.

More information: Why choose Dataverse?

Terminology updates
Responding to customer feedback and data from user research, effective November
2020 we're updating some terminology in Dataverse to be more intuitive and make its
usage more productive. The terminology updates are listed below, and we're in the
process of rolling them out across Microsoft Power Platform.

Legacy term Current term

Entity, entities Table, tables

Field, fields Column, columns

Attribute, attributes

Record, records Row, rows

Option set, multi select option sets Choice, choices

Picklist, picklists

Two Options Yes/No

 ７ Note

These terminology updates aren’t applicable to any APIs or messages in the

Dataverse web services. For example, the names of the messages
CreateEntityRequest and CreateAttributeRequest won't change.

Dynamics 365 and Dataverse

Dynamics 365 applications—such as Dynamics 365 Sales, Dynamics 365 Customer
Service, or Dynamics 365 Talent—also use Dataverse to store and secure the data they
use. This enables you to build apps by using Power Apps and Dataverse directly against
your core business data, which is already used within Dynamics 365, without the need
for integration.

Build apps against your Dynamics 365 data – Build apps quickly against your
business data within Power Apps or by using the extensible platform that lets pro
developers programmatically interact with data and metadata, apply business
logic, create custom connectors, and integrate with external data.

Manage reusable business logic and rules – Business rules and logic already
defined in your Dataverse tables are applied to apps created with Power Apps to
ensure data consistency, regardless of how your users access the data or which
app they use.

Reusable skills across Dynamics 365 and Power Apps – Users who are skilled in
Power Apps or Dynamics 365 can now take advantage of those skills across the
Dataverse platform. Creating tables, forms, and charts are now common tasks you
perform across your applications.

７ Note

Finance and Operations apps currently require the configuration of the Data
Integrator to make your business data from Finance and Operations apps
available in Dataverse.
Integrating data into Dataverse
Building an app typically involves data from more than one source. Although this can
sometimes be done at the application level, there are cases where integrating this data
into a common store allows for an easier app-building experience and a single set of
logic to maintain and operate over the data. Dataverse allows data to be integrated
from multiple sources into a single store, which can then be used in Power Apps, Power
Automate, Power BI, and Power Virtual Agents along with data that's already available
from the Dynamics 365 applications.

Scheduled integration with other systems – Data that's kept within another
application can be regularly synchronized with Dataverse to allow you to take
advantage of data from other applications in Power Apps.
Transform and import data using Power Query – Transforming data when
importing into Dataverse can be done through Power Query—a tool commonly
used across Excel and Power BI—from many online data sources.
One-time import of data – Simple import and export of Excel and CSV files can be
used for a one-time (or infrequent) import of data into Dataverse.

For more information about integrating data into the Dataverse, go to Add data to a
table in Dataverse by using Power Query.

Interacting with tables

When you develop an app, you can use standard tables, custom tables, or both.
Dataverse provides standard tables by default. These are designed, in accordance with
best practices, to capture the most common concepts and scenarios within an
organization.

For a full list of tables, see the entity reference.

You can extend the functionality of standard tables by creating one or more custom
tables to store information that's unique to your organization. More information: How
to create a custom table

Logic and validation

Tables within Dataverse can take advantage of rich server-side logic and validation to
ensure data quality and reduce repetitive code in each app that creates and uses data
within a table.

Business rules validate data across multiple columns and tables, and provide
warning and error messages, regardless of the app used to create the data. More
information: Create a business rule

Business process flows guide users to ensure they enter data consistently and
follow the same steps every time. Business process flows are currently only
supported for model-driven apps. More information: Business process flows
overview

Workflows allow you to automate business processes without user interaction.

More information: Workflows overview

Business logic with code supports advanced developer scenarios to extend the
application directly through code. More information: Apply business logic with
code

Security
Dataverse has a rich security model to protect the data integrity and privacy of users
while promoting efficient data access and collaboration. You can combine business
units, role-based security, row-based security, and column-based security to define the
overall access to information that users have in a Power Platform environment. More
information: Security in Dataverse in the Power Platform admin guide

Developer capabilities
In addition to the features available through the Power Apps portal, Dataverse
includes features for developers to programmatically access metadata and data to
create tables and business logic, in addition to interacting with data. More information:
Dataverse Developer Overview
Next steps
To get started using Dataverse:

Create a canvas app using a Dataverse database.

Create a custom table and then create a canvas app that uses the table.
Create a model-driven app built on Dataverse.
Use Power Query to connect to an online or on-premises data source and import
the data directly into Dataverse.

Privacy notice
With the Microsoft Power Apps common data model, Microsoft collects and stores
custom table and column names in our diagnostic systems. We use this knowledge to
improve the common data model for our customers. The table and column names that
app Creators create help us understand scenarios that are common across the Microsoft
Power Apps community and ascertain gaps in the service's standard table coverage,
such as schemas related to organizations. The data in the database tables associated
with these tables is not accessed or used by Microsoft or replicated outside of the
region in which the database is provisioned. Note, however, that the custom table and
column names may be replicated across regions and are deleted in accordance with our
data retention policies. Microsoft is committed to your privacy as described further in
our Trust Center .