O365 licence, database size and multiple environments

[descstep]

Our development team wants to start in PowerApps application development.

We have O365 E3 licenses so the basic PowerApps ("free") : we will limit ourselves to building canvas applications without Premium connectors (like CDS, SLQ, etc.).

A few months ago, we had a database capacity of 10 GB in our O365 tenant : we were able to create 3 environments for DEV, TEST and PROD, 1 GB per environment minimum (we chose to separate and reserve the default environment for individual and personal productivity).

My questions :

1. Is it now mandatory to acquire licenses to have storage for creating environments like DEV, TEST and PROD? (I think so)
2. With 8 licenses, I’ll get 3 GB of storage (8 x 400 MB) So I’ll be able to create my 3 environments. But what can I do with 1 GB: create 2 applications, 10 applications, 100 applications?
3. Is this development model (3 environments+default), without acquiring a Power App license for everyone, viable?

Thanks for your help

[UdayAdhikari]

Note: As a best practice, for all licensing conversation I encourage you to engage your Microsoft contact but let me answer the questions based on what I know as I do get into these conversation a lot as a consultant.

Responses to your questions:

1) Is it now mandatory to acquire licenses to have storage for creating environments like DEV, TEST and PROD? (I think so)

Short answer is, Yes! Long answer.... If is my understanding that you will need at least one per app or per user plan (you can purchase CDS DB separately so this may not be a requirement) and purchase CDS DB storage as needed to create additional environments (1 GB per env.)

2) With 8 licenses, I’ll get 3 GB of storage (8 x 400 MB) So I’ll be able to create my 3 environments. But what can I do with 1 GB: create 2 applications, 10 applications, 100 applications?

400 MB is actually CDS file capacity not CDS DB for per app plan. So, for 8 licenses, depending on whether you have per app plan (50 MB CDS DB/license) or per user plan (250 MB CDS DB/license) you can do the math and that much capacity/space you have today. As for your second question, what can you do with 1 GB CDS DB capacity - it really depends on what type of apps you are creating and where data is being stored. As you know, canvas apps can use data source outside of CDS so you can create more canvas app vs model-driven app which used CDS as data store. You could archive data from CDS to other cloud cheaper storage to keep CDS DB utilization low so you can continue to build apps without having to purchase more capacity.

3) Is this development model (3 environments+default), without acquiring a Power App license for everyone, viable?

Definitely until your apps/flows start using premium connectors.

Please refer to this licensing details if you haven't yet:

Microsoft Power Apps and Power Automate Licensing Guide

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