Low severitygateway
Power BI Refresh Error:
Failed to add user to group. (-2147463168 PBIEgwService Performance Log Users)
What does this error mean?
Gateway installer failed to add the service account to the Performance Log Users group. The gateway works normally; only performance counters are affected.
Common causes
- 1The installer is not running with local administrator privileges
- 2Group Policy prevents modification of local security groups on the machine
- 3The gateway machine is a domain controller where local groups are managed differently
- 4The 'Performance Log Users' group does not exist (non-standard Windows configuration)
Beyond the docs
The official documentation does not cover this error — these are community-tested approaches.
- 1Run the gateway installer as a local Administrator (right-click → Run as administrator)
- 2If on a domain, ensure your account has local admin rights on the specific gateway machine (not just domain admin)
- 3Manually add the gateway service account to the 'Performance Log Users' group via Computer Management → Local Users and Groups
- 4If blocked by Group Policy, contact your AD administrator to grant the exception or add the account via GPO
- 5This error does not prevent the gateway from functioning — the gateway will work, only performance counter collection is affected