Microsoft has recently published the 2021 release wave 1 plan for Dynamics 365 Business Central. The plan details the new features to be released from April 2021 to September 2021.
Dynamics 365 Business Central provides a comprehensive business solution designed for small and medium-sized organisations. For the upcoming wave 1 release, Microsoft has invested in delivering faster productivity, simplified administration, improved collaboration with Microsoft Teams and improved features for some of the most requested areas for improvement.
Below, we have listed the features and enhancements planned for Dynamics 365 Business Central in the release wave 1 plan.
Administration
| Feature | Enabled for | General availability |
| Schedule the installation of per-tenant extensions using the Automation API | Users, automatically | Apr 2021 |
| System requirement for the database relaxed to compatibility mode | Admins, makers, marketers, or analysts, automatically | Apr 2021 |
| Improve the reliability of the database export operation for larger databases with more companies | Admins, makers, marketers, or analysts, automatically | Apr 2021 |
| Improvements for the delegated administrators | Admins, makers, marketers, or analysts, automatically | Apr 2021 |
| Reassign an environment from one Azure Active Directory organization to another (through Microsoft Support) | Admins, makers, marketers, or analysts, automatically | Apr 2021 |
Application
Better with Microsoft 365
| Feature | Enabled for | General availability |
| Look up Business Central contacts from within Microsoft Teams | Users, automatically | Apr 2021 |
| Support cloud printing using Microsoft Universal Print | Users, automatically | Apr 2021 |
| Enablement of Word merge in Business Central | Users, automatically | Apr 2021 |
| Editing in Excel more reliably | Users, automatically | Apr 2021 |
Country and Regional
| Feature | Enabled for | General availability |
| Country and regional expansion – Greece | Users, automatically | Apr 2021 |
| Country and regional expansion – India | Users, automatically | Apr 2021 |
| Country and regional expansion – Romania | Users, automatically | Apr 2021 |
| Country and regional expansion – Turkey | Users, automatically | Apr 2021 |
| Moving the tracking of custom declarations (RU) into an extension | Users, automatically | Apr 2021 |
| Country/regional expansion – Algeria | Admins, makers, marketers, or analysts, automatically | Jul 2021 |
| Country/regional expansion – Bangladesh | Admins, makers, marketers, or analysts, automatically | Jul 2021 |
| Country/regional expansion – Egypt | Admins, makers, marketers, or analysts, automatically | Jul 2021 |
| Country/regional expansion – Kenya | Admins, makers, marketers, or analysts, automatically | Jul 2021 |
| Country/regional expansion – Lebanon | Admins, makers, marketers, or analysts, automatically | Jul 2021 |
| Country/regional expansion – Malta | Users, automatically | Jul 2021 |
| Country/regional expansion – Morocco | Admins, makers, marketers, or analysts, automatically | Jul 2021 |
| Country/regional expansion – Nigeria | Admins, makers, marketers, or analysts, automatically | Jul 2021 |
| Country/regional expansion – Qatar | Admins, makers, marketers, or analysts, automatically | Jul 2021 |
| Country/regional expansion – Saudi Arabia | Admins, makers, marketers, or analysts, automatically | Jul 2021 |
| Country/regional expansion – Sri Lanka | Admins, makers, marketers, or analysts, automatically | Jul 2021 |
| Country/regional expansion – Tunisia | Admins, makers, marketers, or analysts, automatically | Jul 2021 |
Power Platform
| Feature | Enabled for | General availability |
| Virtual tables for Microsoft Dataverse | Admins, makers, marketers, or analysts, automatically | TBC |
| Synchronize item availability from Business Central to Dynamics 365 Sales | Users, automatically | Apr 2021 |
| Enable Power BI connector to work with Business Central APIs, instead of with web services only | Users, automatically | May 2021 |
Modern Clients
| Feature | Enabled for | General availability |
| Client performance improvements | Users, automatically | Apr 2021 |
| Usability enhancements for the Business Central web client | Users, automatically | Apr 2021 |
| Enable cloud printing on mobile app (phone and tablet) and from Microsoft Teams app | Users, automatically | Apr 2021 |
| Users can change the assigned printer before printing a report | Users, automatically | Apr 2021 |
Modern Development Tools
| Feature | Enabled for | General availability |
| Partners can add keys (indexes) to base tables and table extension tables | Admins, makers, marketers, or analysts, automatically | Apr 2021 |
| Use one-dimensional barcodes in reports (Business Central online) | Admins, makers, marketers, or analysts, automatically | Apr 2021 |
| Interface – handling removed enum extension value | Admins, makers, marketers, or analysts, automatically | Apr 2021 |
| Interface – obsolete support | Admins, makers, marketers, or analysts, automatically | Apr 2021 |
| Return record link instead of name when using lookups | Admins, makers, marketers, or analysts, automatically | Apr 2021 |
| Returning complex types | Admins, makers, marketers, or analysts, automatically | Apr 2021 |
| Additional dimensions in Item Tracking as foundation for vertical solutions | Admins, makers, marketers, or analysts, automatically | Apr 2021 |
| Improved extensibility of reservation management | Admins, makers, marketers, or analysts, automatically | Apr 2021 |
| New AL objects Entitlement, PermissionSet, and PermissionSetExtension | Users by admins, makers, or analysts | Apr 2021 |
| Report extensibility | Admins, makers, marketers, or analysts, automatically | Apr 2021 |
| Extension validation on upgrade | Admins, makers, marketers, or analysts, automatically | Apr 2021 |
Onboarding
| Feature | Enabled for | General availability |
| Getting started checklists for guided and faster initial setup | Users, automatically | Apr 2021 |
| Improved company setup experience | Users, automatically | Apr 2021 |
| In-app contextual help improvements | Users, automatically | Apr 2021 |
| Improve the experience of getting started with Power BI | Users, automatically | Apr 2021 |
| Install and uninstall AppSource apps using the Business Central admin center API | Admins, makers, marketers, or analysts, automatically | May 2021 |
| Support for migrating data from earlier on-premises versions of Business Central to 2021 release wave 1 (v.18) | Admins, makers, marketers, or analysts, automatically | May 2021 |
Product Spotlight: Continia Document Capture