Microsoft Fabric Updates Blog

New Shortcut Type for Azure Blob Storage in OneLake shortcuts

• OneLake

• May 19, 2025 by Miquella de Boer 4,981 Views

We’re excited to announce a new shortcut type for Azure Blob Storage in Microsoft Fabric! As a key platform for storing unstructured data — from images and documents to logs and media — Azure Blob Storage plays a vital role in powering AI and advanced analytics solutions.

With this new shortcut type, you can easily connect to Blob data without moving or copying files, making it instantly accessible across Fabric. This streamlines data access, reduces duplication, and helps you unlock insights faster for your analytics and AI workloads.

Prerequisites

• A lakehouse in Microsoft Fabric, if you don’t have a lakehouse, create one by following these steps: Create a lakehouse with OneLake.
• An Azure Storage account with data in a container.

Create a shortcut

1. Open a lakehouse in Fabric.
2. Right-click on a directory in the Explorer pane of the lakehouse.
3. Select New shortcut.

Select a source

When you create a shortcut in a lakehouse, the New shortcut window opens to walk you through the configuration details.

1. On the New shortcut window, under External sources, select Azure Blob Storage (Preview).
2. Select Existing connection or Create new connection, depending on whether this Storage account is already connected in your OneLake.
   • For an Existing connection, select the connection from the drop-down menu.
   • To Create new connection, provide the following connection settings.

1. Select Next.
2. Browse to the target location for the shortcut.If you just used the storage account in the connection URL, all of your available containers appear in the left navigation view. If you specified a container in connection URL, only the specified container and its contents appear in the navigation view.Navigate the storage account by selecting a folder or clicking on the expansion arrow next to a folder.In this view, you can select one or more shortcut target locations. Choose target locations by clicking the checkbox next a folder in the left navigation view.
3. Select NextThe review page allows you to verify all of your selections. Here you can see each shortcut that will be created. In the action column, you can click the pencil icon to edit the shortcut name. You can click the trash can icon to delete shortcut.
4. Select Create.
5. The lakehouse automatically refreshes. The shortcut appears in the left Explorer pane.

We encourage you to try out the new Azure Blob Storage shortcut today and see how it can simplify your data workflows and accelerate your journey with Microsoft Fabric. Learn more in the OneLake shortcuts documentation .