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Environment Variable Licensing in Canvas Apps

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Posted on by Community Power Pla... Microsoft Employee

I've been unable to find a concrete answer to this online. I know Environment Variables are a preview feature right now, but does anyone know if they will eventually require a Premium license?

I currently have a Canvas app that uses environment variables, and it does properly work without a premium license. I'm concerned with the fact that they read environment variables through the Common Data Service.

Does anyone know if Environment Variables are supposed to be considered a premium connection/feature? Or should they be included in an Office 365 Power Apps license?

Thanks!

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Pstork1 69,649 Most Valuable Professional on at

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My expectation is that they will not require premium licensing if they don't in Preview. There is at least one other standard feature in Power Automate, Approvals, that uses CDS in the background. So the fact that it uses CDS doesn't automatically mean it will be premium.

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Community Power Pla... Microsoft Employee on at

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Thank you, that's reassuring. I'm finding that app users are being prompted to start a premium trial if an app uses environment variables, but that they can still use the app after their trial is disabled, which isn't what I'd expect.

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KoenReynaert 30 on at

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The PowerApp license designation changes from "Standard" to "Premium" when I add the "Environment Variable Values" to my Canvas app.
During adding, It doesn't show explicitly this is a premium connector. I didn't found any info about the premium license requirment in blogs/examples where theu describe the environment variables.
Is this normal?

Situation: The PowerApp is located in a solution from a non-default environment. The environment is not coupled to Teams.

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Pstork1 69,649 Most Valuable Professional on at

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Environment variables themselves aren't premium. But there is a known issue at the moment that the only way to access them directly in a Power App is by adding a connector to CDS, which is premium. The workaround is to call a Flow to access the values and then return them to Power Apps. Power Automate flows have direct access to environment variables as dynamic content as a standard feature.

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KoenReynaert 30 on at

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Thx for feedback.
After moving some app configuration parameters from a SP list to environment variables, I'll store it back in a SP list. A flow less to maintain.

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