Announcing general availability of PowerApps

We introduced the public preview of PowerApps in April 2016. In the six months since, over 124,000 users from 46,000 organizations in 143 countries have created web and mobile apps using PowerApps. We thank all of our preview users for their invaluable feedback, which has helped shape PowerApps into a better product.

Today, we are very happy to announce the general availability of PowerApps. PowerApps is ready for production use, across 6 regions and in 42 languages, with the 99.9% SLA customers expect from a Microsoft service.

In this release, we are pleased to announce a lot of new capabilities, and here are the key new features.

PowerApps SharePoint: fully integrated with SharePoint lists

In August, we started rolling out the preview of PowerApps integrated in SharePoint Online modern lists. You can create an app right from the command bar of a SharePoint Online custom list. That app then appears as a custom view of your SharePoint Online list, and users can access it both from the web as well as from the SharePoint Mobile app. This experience is now available to all SharePoint Online users. PowerApps also supports connecting to on-premises SharePoint lists for SharePoint 2013 and 2016 using the on-premises data gateway. Learn more about creating apps from SharePoint Online modern lists.

 

General availability of Common Data Service

With the general availability of PowerApps, Common Data Service is also now ready for global production use. Common Data Service is included as part of PowerApps plans and is the unifying backbone for your business data across PowerApps, Microsoft Flow, and pro-development tools. It provides an instantly available and scalable data store and a common data model with standard entity schema and behavior. It also provides a powerful data access layer with support for data import and export, security, and integration with Microsoft Office for Excel and Outlook. We’ll soon provide a software development kit (SDK) for professional development scenarios. We’ve incorporated lot of feedback from our preview users as well as from customers who are building business apps using Dynamics 365 and Office 365. You can learn more about the new features and the roadmap for Common Data Service in Arif’s blog post.

 

Introducing Dynamics 365 Home: the new way to discover and open apps

Starting today, your users will find and run the apps you publish with PowerApps at home.dynamics.com. When you share apps with a user or a security group, they won’t automatically be added to the user’s app list anymore. Instead, in addition to using the link from the sharing email, users can access all their apps from the Microsoft AppSource organization gallery, which is fully integrated in Dynamics 365 Home as well as in PowerApps Mobile.

In Dynamics 365 Home, you can pin the apps you use frequently. This change de-clutters the app list and lets you see only the apps you care about, a key piece of feedback from our preview. In general, Dynamics 365 Home provides a unified experience of navigating a wide range of business applications — not only the solutions offered by Microsoft, but also those of our partners as well as custom business applications developed with PowerApps. You can learn more about Dynamics 365 Home in Ryan’s blog post.

As we now have a different place where users of PowerApps can go to find all their business apps, we used the opportunity to focus the powerapps.com portal on app creation. We de-cluttered the app list to focus on apps you can edit. Read more about changes to powerapps.com and the app sharing experience in Linh’s blog post.

 

PowerApps environments: space to store, manage, and share your data, apps, and flows

Last week, we introduced PowerApps environments, which serve as containers for your business data, apps, and flows. You can create environments in specific regions, and all your data and apps are stored in that region. You can create and use different environments for different teams or departments in your company or for the different global branches of the company. You can also separate development, test, and production environments for change and application lifecycle management. This ability to separate out environments and move apps between them has been another common request from our partners and users. Learn more about environments in James’s blog post.

 

Introducing the PowerApps Admin Center: get visibility, manage security, and set data policies

Another key feedback from our preview has been around access control and policies. The PowerApps Admin Center enables admins to create and manage environments, manage permissions that determine who can create apps and flows, manage user roles and permissions for data access, and set up data policies to help prevent loss of business data. Environment admins can manage permissions and policies for their environments and Office 365 global administrators can manage all environments and set up policies for the entire organization. Learn more about admin center in Manas’s blog post.

 

General availability of On-premises data gateway

On-premises data gateway enables your applications and workflows to securely connect to on-premises data, so that you can benefit from your existing on-premises investments without the need to move any data. You can install a single gateway to manage multiple on-premises connections across the entire business platform – including PowerApps, Microsoft Flow and Power BI. On-premises data gateway is now generally available for use in PowerApps and Microsoft Flow. Learn how to install and manage an on-premises data gateway for use with PowerApps.

 

Preview of PowerApps for Windows 10 Mobile

We’re also excited to announce the PowerApps for Windows 10 Mobile app. We’ve had many requests for a Windows Phone app. With this addition, you can run apps built using PowerApps natively across Windows, Windows Phone, iOS, Android, and web browsers. PowerApps for Windows 10 Mobile will be available in the Store as a preview later this week.

 

Tons of other improvements

In addition to these key features, we’ve made tons of other improvements that address feedback from our preview users. Here are a few noteworthy ones:

• You can open and run not only PowerApps itself much faster but also apps that you and others create. Performance will remain a key focus, so this is only the beginning.
• All PowerApps experiences (powerapps.com, PowerApps Studio, and PowerApps Mobile) are localized in 42 languages.
• More easily select a control in PowerApps Studio with the newly added breadcrumb bar.
• Support for building apps in different languages/locales.
• Improved keyboard navigation and screen reader support.
• The phone apps for Android and Windows now support the back button on those devices.
• You can better organize and de-clutter your app list in PowerApps Mobile and see better diagnostics and error information as you run an app.

 

Available with Office 365 and Dynamics 365 plans

PowerApps will be included with Dynamics 365 and in the subscriptions of millions of Office 365 Enterprise, Business Premium and Essentials users. We also have two dedicated plans for PowerApps, one for business users and the other for app makers and admins. You can find details about these plans on our pricing page. All of our existing preview users receive a six-month free trial for our highest tier plan, PowerApps Plan 2, as a special thank you. In addition, we understand the need for individual developers to create apps without being on any of the paid plans. We’re working through this scenario; stay tuned.

 

Partner directory and showcase

In addition to customers, we've seen our partner ecosystem deeply engage with PowerApps and Microsoft Flow during the preview. In a solution catalog we’re also launching today, you can find solutions that our partners have built for assisted sales, employee onboarding, quality control, and many more. You can also view our partner directory and sign up as a partner here.

 

Join us for the webinar this Thursday, 3rd November

We will be hosting a webinar this Thursday to walk you through the new features and answer your questions. The recording will be available later for on-demand viewing at the same link if you can’t join the session live.

When: November 3, 2016  10:00 AM – 11:00 AM PST

Register here: https://info.microsoft.com/US-PowerBI-WBNR-FY17-11Nov-03-AnnouncingPowerAppsgeneralavailability271671.html 

 

Once again, we want to thank all of our users and partners who’ve helped steer our development efforts so far. Your feedback has been invaluable! But we’re just getting started. Please keep the feedback flowing. We’re building this for you and driving our development decisions based on your guidance.

Finally, as always, you can get answers to your questions, report issues, and submit ideas at the PowerApps community.

 

The PowerApps team