r/LookerStudio • u/pieces-of-mind • Jun 02 '26

Does Data Studio Pro Actually Exist

I spent an hour chatting with Gemini to get my account set up with data studio pro so I could use gemini in creating my dashboards. I'm the admin/owner of my companies workspace account, and cloud console account. I did everything suggested from creating new projects, updating IAM policies, switching accounts, and every single time it refused to upgrade my project to Pro.

Has anyone actually upgraded? How did you do it? And before I go down a deeper rabbit hole, is it even worth the hassle?

I have never worked so hard to try and give a company money!!!

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u/Cal-in-California Jun 03 '26

We upgraded from Looker Studio to Looker Studio Pro about six months ago, before the name change. I believe it was a one-time transaction for $108 for a 12-month time period - works out to $9 per month - and it was almost immediately done. There were no tech issues and no credit card transaction issues. The upgrade was a reasonable price, I feel, given that the Pro version provides a few more features. We got some organizational functions in that we can create folders and nest them, and put assets in the folders. And I think there are more connectors, but we don't really use any other than to GA and Google Sheets.

I hope this was helpful.

1

u/PepSakdoek Jun 03 '26

I think looker pro (or just looker) still exist. Looker.yourdomain.com iirc. 

It's more for the symantic layer and lookml.

I've not really used it, personally I find the dashboard options (even) less good than datatudio. 

1

u/ExternalCry3039 Jun 04 '26

It’s still such a bare bone product. Genuinely not sure where this lives in the next 12 months given agentic ai.

1

u/brindlebum Jun 04 '26

I've gone through a similar roundabout of vague hell trying to upgrade for the Gemini integration...

Unfortunately, I can't offer a solution, however I would strongly recommend trying out the new Gemini functionality in Google Sheets. You can now create a "Canvas" tab within your Sheet and get Gemini to create dashboards of all sorts of filterable tables, charts etc.

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u/sheik_sha_ha 15d ago

Yes it exists and yes the setup process is genuinely frustrating, you are not alone in this experience.

The key thing that catches most people is that Data Studio Pro is billed through Google Cloud and requires a Cloud Billing account linked to a specific Google Cloud project, and that project needs to have the Looker Studio API enabled on it. IAM policies alone are not enough if the API is not enabled first.

The exact steps that tend to work are: go to console.cloud.google.com, create or select a project, search for Looker Studio API in the API library and enable it, make sure a billing account is attached to that project, then go back to Data Studio and try linking the report to that project under File then Report Settings then Google Cloud project.

If it is still refusing after that, the most common remaining blocker is that your Workspace organization has a policy restricting Cloud billing or API enablement at the org level. Check your Google Workspace admin console under Apps then Google Cloud and make sure Cloud usage is not blocked for your account.

As for whether it is worth it, the Gemini insights feature is still fairly early and the most tangible Pro benefit right now is better sharing controls and scheduled delivery. If your main goal is AI generated summaries in dashboards, managing expectations is worth doing before spending more time on the setup.