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Stop using Access-based apps in SharePoint Online

March 28, 2017
by Vlad Catrinescu
8 Comments

Microsoft announced today that Access Services in SharePoint are slowly going away in favor of Microsoft PowerApps! Starting in two months (June 2017), you will no longer be able to create Access-based apps in SharePoint Online, and you have until April 2018 to convert your existing Access apps to PowerApps or any other tool that fits your business needs.

Access SharePoint

To make the transitioning process smoother, Microsoft has added a feature in Office 365 allowing you to export your data from the Access app, to a SharePoint list from where you can take advantage of both PowerApps and Flow to build modern and mobile-ready business applications. You can find more information about the process here.

As for everyone who is running SharePoint On-Premises, not only will Access Services and Access Web Apps be supported for the remainder of your current SharePoint support timeline, but they will also be included in the next version of SharePoint Server!

For all those of you who think that SharePoint 2016 is the last version of SharePoint On-Premises, this blog post is another proof that there will be another version of SharePoint Server . An important note is that this does not affect the Desktop version of access, but simply Access Services in SharePoint!

I am wondering, how many of you use Access Services in SharePoint Online currently? If you use it simply type something in the comments! You can find the Original Announcement on the Microsoft Tech Community!

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8 Comments

  • March 31, 2017 at 3:46 pm
    Dana Kamp

    I’ve developed a couple things with Access Web Apps, and I am very disappointed to hear this. I’ve just started playing with PowerApps with SharePoint and it is clear that there is no way that it will be a viable replacement for what I’ve used the Access Web Apps for. For one, the 500 item limit in PowerApps makes it useless for databases with several thousand records. I don’t need my tool to run on a mobile device (it is strictly a office tool), and I don’t see how PowerApps can use data macros, etc. for bulk updating.

    Reply
  • April 1, 2017 at 6:24 pm
    David Remillard

    We built a fairly detailed app in Access in Office 365 for a custom art frame business. They use it to manage the process of building the frames from stage to stage on their shop floor. Seems like more than PowerApps could handle, but I’ve done very little testing of PowerApps.

    Reply
  • April 5, 2017 at 12:14 pm
    Jim Jacoby

    I tried a few times to create Access Webapps, but found response times to be too slow. In my experience it is much easier to have an Access front end with SharePoint lists as the back end. Security is also easier since I use SharePoint to control permissions.

    Reply
  • April 12, 2017 at 5:52 am
    Robert McCulloch

    Big disappointment. Absolutely great idea and well executed (credit where credit is due). I have two apps that run great and solved a lot of problems. Each have more that a million records and render quickly for reporting. Do that with SharePoint lists (5,000 max) or Power Apps (500 ea.). Personally I think Microsoft did the math on the resource use on the Azure cloud and killed the product. MS has always been stingy with resources. 5,000 limit on Power Apps. Please – what are you going to do with that other than sign up for the company lunch. I’m moving it all to Google’s Fushion Tables on the cloud (free). Based on Microsoft’s record abandoning their own products, I don’t think I would devote time to anything they create until it’s been in place and heavily supported for at least 5 years. I’m sure I’m not the only one who feels this way.

    Reply
  • April 17, 2017 at 4:18 pm
    Vladimir Bathory

    PowerApps and Flows are completely inadequate to replace Access Web Apps. This is a huge step backward in terms of scalability, performance, usability and flexibility. Please reconsider your decision. A better choice would be to actually enhance Access Web Apps to address its multiple shortcomings, mostly its limited UI. Another option is to support an Access Web Apps as a paid add-on if Azure resources are the primary driver for curtailing service.

    Reply
  • May 9, 2017 at 2:54 pm
    Karen

    This is most frustrating and disappointing!!! After almost 4 years of trying to get the buy-in for SharePoint from management, I finally got SharePoint online and now have two AWAs online in production that are working perfectly. Now I have to re-write 150 very customized forms? Not to mention all the macros and queries that make the apps work!!!!

    Reply
  • May 16, 2017 at 4:41 pm
    bob alston

    Just to confirm, does the deprecation of Access Services in Sharepoint, mean that you will no longer be able to use an Access front end connected to tables hosted in Sharepoint? I seem to see a lot of confusion about this.
    Bob

    Reply
  • November 17, 2017 at 2:31 am
    Charles Sorgie

    Will this in any way affect Access 2016’s ability to connect to a SharePoint Online list, delete its rows, and do a data import from Excel that would update that list?

    Reply

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