M365 & Power Platform Integrations

Business Central in the Microsoft ecosystem

Microsoft 365 integrations

Excel integration

The most frequently used integration. Two key features:

Feature	What It Does	Direction
Edit in Excel	Open a BC list page in Excel, edit data, publish changes back	Two-way
Export to Excel	Download data as a static Excel file	One-way (read only)

Edit in Excel keeps a live connection to Business Central. Changes in Excel are pushed back to BC when you click Publish. This is powerful for bulk edits — updating 200 item prices in Excel is faster than opening 200 item cards.

💡 Exam tip: Edit in Excel vs Export to Excel

The exam tests this distinction:

• Edit in Excel = live connection, two-way, changes flow back to BC
• Export to Excel = static snapshot, one-way, no connection back to BC

When the question asks about “updating data using Excel,” the answer is Edit in Excel. When it asks about “creating a report or analysis,” Export to Excel is sufficient.

OneDrive integration

Business Central can store and retrieve files using OneDrive for Business:

• Attach files to records — drag and drop files onto customer cards, vendor cards, items
• Open in OneDrive — BC-generated reports can be saved to OneDrive automatically
• Share links — share BC documents via OneDrive links instead of email attachments

Enable OneDrive integration in BC Admin Center > OneDrive Setup or via Assisted Setup.

Outlook integration

The Business Central add-in for Outlook lets users:

• View BC customer/vendor details from an email (e.g., open an email from a vendor and see their balance, recent invoices)
• Create sales quotes or purchase orders directly from an email
• Log email interactions against BC records

Raj receives an email from a vendor about a price change. Without leaving Outlook, he opens the BC add-in, sees the vendor’s current purchase prices, and creates a purchase order — all from the email window.

Teams integration

Business Central cards and tabs in Microsoft Teams:

• Paste a BC link in Teams chat → it unfurls as a rich card showing record details
• Add a BC tab to a Teams channel → team members see a live BC page within Teams
• Share records → send a customer card or sales order as a Teams message

This lets Olivia share a customer’s overdue invoices in the Finance team channel without everyone needing to log into BC.

Word integration

Word layouts for reports (covered in Core Setup Essentials) are the primary Word integration. You can also:

• Generate documents from Word templates linked to BC data
• Use mail merge with BC contacts for letters and marketing materials

Power Platform integrations

Power BI

Business Central has a built-in Power BI connector and pre-built reports:

Feature	What It Does
Embedded Power BI	Show Power BI reports directly inside BC Role Centres and pages
BC connector for Power BI	Connect Power BI Desktop to BC data via API
Pre-built reports	Out-of-box dashboards for finance, sales, purchasing

Olivia doesn’t need a separate BI tool for basic reporting — Power BI visuals appear right in her Accountant Role Centre.

Power Automate

Power Automate flows extend BC workflows beyond what native workflows can do:

Use Case	What Power Automate Adds
Multi-system approvals	Route approvals through BC + SharePoint + Teams
External notifications	Send SMS, post to Slack, update CRM when BC events occur
Data sync	Sync BC customers with external systems on a schedule
Document processing	Auto-process incoming invoices via AI Builder

BC fires events that Power Automate can listen to (new customer created, invoice posted, payment received). Flows can also trigger BC actions (create a sales order, update a vendor).

Power Apps

Custom apps built in Power Apps can connect to Business Central data:

• Mobile apps for warehouse workers (scan barcodes, update inventory)
• Customer-facing portals (check order status, view invoices)
• Approval apps with custom UI

💡 Exam context: Power Platform depth

The MB-800 exam tests Power Platform integrations at the use case level, not the configuration level. You need to know:

• When to recommend Power BI (reporting and analytics)
• When to recommend Power Automate (cross-system automation, complex workflows)
• When to recommend Power Apps (custom mobile or web interfaces)

You do NOT need to know how to build Power BI reports, create Power Automate flows, or develop Power Apps. That’s PL-300, PL-400 territory.

Dynamics 365 integrations

Business Central can integrate with other Dynamics 365 apps:

D365 integrations with Business Central

D365 App	Integration Purpose	Key Data Exchanged
Dynamics 365 Sales	CRM-to-ERP sync	Customers, contacts, sales orders, invoices, product availability
Dynamics 365 Field Service	Service-to-ERP sync	Work orders, inventory consumption, invoicing

These integrations use Dataverse as the synchronisation layer. The exam may ask about use cases (when to recommend the integration) but not the technical sync configuration.

Copilot in Business Central

Business Central includes AI-powered Copilot features:

• Marketing text generation — AI-generated product descriptions
• Bank reconciliation assistance — Copilot suggests matches between bank statement lines and ledger entries
• Chat with Copilot — natural language queries about BC data (“Show me overdue invoices”)
• Sales line suggestions — Copilot suggests items based on the customer’s purchase history

These are relatively new features. The exam may reference them in the context of the audience profile (“configure role centres including adapting insights, cues, action tiles, reports, charts, and utilise copilots inside Business Central”).

Question

What's the difference between Edit in Excel and Export to Excel?

Click or press Enter to reveal answer

Answer

Edit in Excel maintains a live two-way connection — changes in Excel are published back to BC. Export to Excel creates a static one-way snapshot with no connection back.

Click to flip back

Question

What does the Business Central Outlook add-in do?

Click or press Enter to reveal answer

Answer

It shows BC customer/vendor details from an email, lets you create sales quotes or purchase orders directly from Outlook, and log email interactions against BC records — all without leaving Outlook.

Click to flip back

Question

When would you recommend Power Automate over native BC workflows?

Click or press Enter to reveal answer

Answer

When you need cross-system automation (BC + SharePoint + Teams), external notifications (SMS, Slack), data sync with external systems, or AI-powered document processing. Native workflows handle standard BC-only approvals.

Click to flip back

Knowledge check

Knowledge Check

Olivia needs to update prices for 300 items in Business Central. Each item needs a different price. What's the most efficient approach?

AOpen each item card and update the price manually — 300 timesBUse Edit in Excel to open the items list, update all prices in the spreadsheet, and publish back to BCCExport to Excel, update prices, then import the file as a configuration packageDUse Power Automate to bulk-update prices from an Excel file

Check Answer

Knowledge Check

Sam wants the finance team at Nordic Manufacturing to see Power BI dashboards showing cash flow and revenue trends directly inside Business Central. Where should these dashboards appear?

AIn a separate Power BI workspace that users access via a browser tabBEmbedded in the Accountant Role Centre using the built-in Power BI integrationCAs a custom page built with Power Apps and embedded in BCDIn a Teams channel tab linked to Power BI

Check Answer

🎬 Video coming soon

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Congratulations! You’ve completed Domain 1: Set Up Business Central. You now know how to create companies, migrate data, secure users, configure essentials, set up dimensions, build approval workflows, and leverage Microsoft integrations.

Next up: Domain 2 begins with the financial engine — General Ledger Setup.