Marco Russo compares and contrasts:
What is the right choice between Direct Lake and Import mode in Power BI?
At SQLBI, we do not publish content until we have had enough time to experiment with and collect data about new features. We usually don’t break the news unless we have enough time to test a feature in preview and consider the released service solid enough. This did not happen with Direct Lake, and we have not published any Direct Lake content yet, but it seemed not urgent for reasons we will see soon. However, the feedback collected from many attendees of SqlBits 2024 and the first Microsoft Fabric Conference raised the alarm: too many people have an incorrect perception of Direct Lake, which should be addressed as soon as possible to avoid architectural mistakes and unnecessary additional implementation costs.
Click through for the tl;dr version, followed by the explanations.