“With our migration to PaaS, we got what we wanted: greater scalability, reliability, security, agility in managing our IT infrastructure—and greater peace of mind—all without the cost and hassle of doing this ourselves,” 

Daniel Engberg, Head of AI, Data, and Platforms at Scandinavian Airlines System  

Migrate to Microsoft Azure

Boost productivity and enable innovation.

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This blog post will guide you through several best practices our customers employed when faced with the SQL Server end-of-support moment. Customers have three choices for handling their out-of-support SQL Server workloads: moving or updating to Azure, upgrading to SQL Server 2022, or getting Extended Security Updates (ESUs) for additional preparation time. 

Migrate and modernize to Azure, a smooth path, a more powerful destination 

Migrating to a cloud platform is an essential step on the journey to modernization, and there are many choices. What makes SQL Server and Microsoft Azure SQL unique is that it’s built on the same engine, no matter where you deploy, which means you can build on your existing SQL experience while gaining the layered security, intelligent threat detection, and data encryption that Azure provides. 

Modernizing to Microsoft Azure SQL Managed Instance offers cost savings, scalability, security, seamless migration, productivity, and always up-to-date features. Some of the recent product highlights include Azure SQL Managed Instance Next-gen General Purpose, now in public preview, which supports twice as many Azure VMs configurations, making migration and modernization faster and easier than ever before for a larger number of customer scenarios. Customers can experience the full capabilities of managed SQL Server in the cloud at no cost for the initial 12 months with access to a General Purpose instance capable of accommodating up to 100 databases, along with 720 vCore hours of compute per month (non-accumulative) and 64 GB of storage through Azure SQL Managed Instance Free Tier, now in public preview. 

Modernizing your SQL Server workloads to Azure also presents a chance to utilize cutting-edge innovation like Microsoft Copilot. Microsoft Copilot in Azure has extended its capabilities to Microsoft Azure SQL Database with new skills designed to enhance the management and operation of SQL-based applications.  

Extending end-of-support time

If you are ready to move to the cloud but feel challenged to upgrade or modernize before the end of the support timeline, Extended Security Updates are available for free in Azure for SQL Server 2014 and 2012 and Windows Server 2012. Secure your workloads for up to three more years after the end of the support deadline by migrating applications and SQL Server databases to Microsoft Azure Virtual Machines. Free Extended Security Updates are available for Azure Virtual Machines including Microsoft Azure Dedicated Host, Microsoft Azure VMWare Solution, Nutanix Cloud Clusters on Azure, and Microsoft Azure Stack (Microsoft Azure Stack Hub, Microsoft Azure Stack Edge, and Microsoft Azure Stack HCI). Combining Extended Security Updates in Azure with Azure Hybrid Benefit further reduces your costs. With these pricing advantages, AWS is up to five times more expensive than Azure for SQL Server and Windows Server end-of-support workloads. 

In-place upgrade to SQL Server 2022 

Another way to stay protected is to upgrade your SQL Server to SQL Server 2022, the most Azure-enabled release yet. Get more out of your data with enhanced security, industry-leading performance and availability, and business continuity through Azure. 

SQL Server 2022 is the most Azure-enabled release of SQL Server, with continued innovation across performance, security, and availability. Gain deeper insights, predictions, and governance from your data at scale. Take advantage of enhanced performance and scalability with built-in query intelligence. 

Stay protected on-premises or in multi-cloud environments with Azure Arc 

Just as with SQL Server 2012, Extended Security Updates for SQL Server 2014 offers an enhanced cloud experience through Microsoft Azure Arc. First year coverage from Extended Security Updates started on July 10, 2024. With this more customer-centric approach, security updates will be natively available in the Microsoft Azure portal through Azure Arc. This also provides Azure benefits and flexible subscription billing for SQL Server 2014 workloads on-premises or in multi-cloud environments. 

We’re continuing to enhance the capabilities Azure Arc offers to Extended Security Updates. Just recently, physical-core licensing with unlimited virtualization was released for SQL Server 2012 and 2014 ESUs. For customers who need to maximize database performance or require security isolation and better resource management, physical core licensing provides a more cost-effective way to leverage Extended Security Updates via Azure Arc. 

Also, if you enabled ESU subscription in your production environment managed through Azure Arc, you can enable SQL Server ESU subscription in the non-production environment for free, through SQL Server Developer Edition or an Azure dev/test subscription. 

We encourage all our customers running SQL Server 2014, Windows Server 2012, and Windows Server 2012 R2 to start planning for the end of support. We have migration resources, best practices, and more, as well as a rich ecosystem of partners ready to help. To get started, please visit the following pages to learn more. 

Learn More 

• Why migrate Windows Server and SQL Server to Azure: ROI, innovation, and free offers 
• Get the full ROI and TCO reports from IDC: The Business Value of Microsoft Azure SQL Database and Azure SQL Managed Instance Workload and The Business Value of Microsoft Azure for SQL Server and Windows Server Workloads 
• Previous announcement on SQL Server 2014 End-of-Support moment: Protect SQL Server 2014 workloads with Azure flexibility – Microsoft SQL Server Blog

The post Modernize Microsoft SQL Server 2014 workloads with Azure appeared first on Microsoft SQL Server Blog.

During recent years, Azure has undergone significant evolution, marked by groundbreaking innovations like Microsoft Fabric and Azure Data Lake Storage. As we continue this journey, it remains imperative to keep evolving our approach on hybrid data storage, ensuring optimal empowerment for our SQL Server customers in leveraging the best from Azure.

Retirement of SQL Server Stretch Database 

On November 16, 2022, the SQL Server Stretch Database feature was deprecated from SQL Server 2022. For in-market versions of SQL Server 2019 and 2017, we had added an improvement that allowed the Stretch Database feature to stretch a table to an Azure SQL Database. Effective July 9, 2024, the supporting Azure service, known as SQL Server Stretch Database edition, is retired. Impacted versions of SQL Server include SQL Server 2022, 2019, 2017, and 2016.  

In July 2024, SQL Server Stretch Database will be discontinued for SQL Server 2022, 2019, 2017, and 2016. We understand that retiring an Azure service may impact your current workload and use of Stretch Database. Therefore, we kindly request that you either migrate to Azure or bring their data back from Azure to your on-premises version of SQL Server. Additionally, if you’re exploring alternatives for archiving data to cold and warm storage in the cloud, we’ve introduced significant new capabilities in SQL Server 2022, leveraging its data virtualization suite. 

The path forward 

SQL Server 2022 supports a concept named CREATE EXTERNAL TABLE AS SELECT (CETaS). It can help customers archive and store cold data to Azure Storage. The data will be stored in an open source file format named Parquet. It operates well with complex data in large volumes. With its performant data compression, it turns out to be one of the most cost-effective data storage solutions. Using OneLake shortcuts, customers then can leverage Microsoft Fabric to realize cloud-scale analytics on archived data.  

Our priority is to empower our SQL Server customers with the tools and services that leverage the latest and greatest from Azure. If you need assistance in exploring how Microsoft can best empower your hybrid data archiving needs, please contact us.

New solution FAQs

What’s CETaS? 

Creates an external table and then exports, in parallel, the results of a Transact-SQL SELECT statement. 

• Azure Synapse Analytics and Analytics Platform System support Hadoop or Azure Blob Storage.
• SQL Server 2022 (16.x) and later versions support CETaS to create an external table and then export, in parallel, the result of a Transact-SQL SELECT statement to Azure Data Lake Storage Gen2, Azure Storage Account v2, and S3-compatible object storage. 

What is Fabric? 

Fabric is an end-to-end analytics and data platform designed for enterprises that require a unified solution. It encompasses data movement, processing, ingestion, transformation, real-time event routing, and report building. Fabric offers a comprehensive suite of services including Data engineering, Data Factory, Data Science, Real-Time Analytics, Data Warehouse, and Databases. 

With Fabric, you don’t need to assemble different services from multiple vendors. Instead, it offers a seamlessly integrated, user-friendly platform that simplifies your analytics requirements. Operating on a software as a service (SaaS) model, Fabric brings simplicity and integration to your solutions. 

Fabric integrates separate components into a cohesive stack. Instead of relying on different databases or data warehouses, you can centralize data storage with Microsoft OneLake. AI capabilities are seamlessly embedded within Fabric, eliminating the need for manual integration. With Fabric, you can easily transition your raw data into actionable insights for business users. 

What is OneLake shortcuts?  

Shortcuts in OneLake allow you to unify your data across domains, clouds, and accounts by creating a single virtual data lake for your entire enterprise. All Fabric experiences and analytical engines can directly connect to your existing data sources such as Azure, Amazon Web Services (AWS), and OneLake through a unified namespace. OneLake manages all permissions and credentials, so you don’t need to separately configure each Fabric workload to connect to each data source. Additionally, you can use shortcuts to eliminate edge copies of data and reduce process latency associated with data copies and staging. 

Shortcuts are objects in OneLake that point to other storage locations. The location can be internal or external to OneLake. The location that a shortcut points to is known as the target path of the shortcut. The location where the shortcut appears is known as the shortcut path. Shortcuts appear as folders in OneLake and any workload or service that has access to OneLake can use them. Shortcuts behave like symbolic links. They’re an independent object from the target. If you delete a shortcut, the target remains unaffected. If you move, rename, or delete a target path, the shortcut can break. 

Learn more 

• Stretch Database
• Deprecated database engine features in SQL Server 2022
• Install an on-premises data gateway
• SQL Server in Microsoft Fabric? Use CETaS to move data!
• OneLake shortcuts
• CREATE EXTERNAL TABLE AS SELECT (CETaS)

Microsoft Fabric

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The post Announcing the retirement of SQL Server Stretch Database appeared first on Microsoft SQL Server Blog.

• Change Data Capture (CDC) components by Attunity. This is an integrated extract, transform and load (ETL) feature in Enterprise editions of SQL Server 2016, 2017, 2019 and 2022. As an integrated feature, while such functionality will remain for the lifecycle of the SQL Server product, support for this feature will cease on December 13, 2025.
• Change Data Capture (CDC) service for Oracle by Attunity. This is a stand-alone feature in SQL Server Integration Services (SSIS) feature pack for SQL Server 2016, 2017 and 2019.   The support for CDC service for Oracle by Attunity will cease after December 13, 2025.

Customers using these two features are encouraged to modernize to Data Factory in Microsoft Fabric or Azure Data Factory. Customers can use incremental data loading capability from Azure Data Factory. Azure Data Factory can be used for on-premises data sources with a self-hosted integration runtime and is fully compatible with all impacted versions of SQL Server.

Data Factory in Microsoft Fabric enables you to move and transform data from various sources to various destinations. It’s a managed cloud service designed specifically for handling complex hybrid extract-transform-load (ETL), extract-load-transform (ELT), and data integration projects.

If you need any assistance as you plan your CDC modernization please contact Microsoft Support.

Learn more about Data Factory in Microsoft Fabric and Azure Data Factory:

• Incrementally copy data from a source data store to a destination data store—Azure Data Factory | Microsoft Learn
• Incrementally load data from Data Warehouse to Lakehouse—Microsoft Fabric | Microsoft Learn
• Data Pipeline Pricing and FAQ—Data Factory | Microsoft Azure
• Data Factory in Microsoft Fabric documentation—Microsoft Fabric | Microsoft Learn

Frequently Asked Questions

What’s Data Factory in Microsoft Fabric?

Data Factory in Microsoft Fabric is the next generation of Azure Data Factory which provides cloud-scale data movement and data transformation services that allow you to solve the most complex ETL scenarios. It’s intended to make your experience easy to use, powerful, and truly enterprise-grade.  Data Factory empowers you with a modern data integration experience to ingest, prepare and transform data from a rich set of data sources (for example, databases, data warehouse, Lakehouse, real-time data, and more). Whether you are a citizen or professional developer, you will be able to transform the data with intelligent transformations and leverage a rich set of activities. With Data Factory in Microsoft Fabric, we are bringing fast copy (data movement) capabilities to both dataflows and data pipelines. With Fast Copy, you can move data between your favorite data stores blazing fast. Most importantly, Fast Copy enables you to bring data to your Lakehouse and Data Warehouse in Microsoft Fabric for analytics.

What’s Azure Data Factory?

Azure Data Factory is a cloud-based data integration service that allows you to create data-driven workflows in the cloud for orchestrating and automating data movement and data transformation. It is a fully managed, serverless data integration solution for ingesting, preparing, and transforming all your data at scale. With Azure Data Factory, you can visually integrate data sources using more than 90 built-in, maintenance-free connectors. The service enables you to create and schedule data-driven workflows, called pipelines, that can ingest data from disparate data stores. You can build complex ETL processes that transform data visually with data flows or by using compute services such as Azure HDInsight Hadoop, Azure Databricks, and Azure SQL Database.

You can use Azure Data Factory to access and integrate data from on-premises data sources. One way to do this is by using a self-hosted integration runtime, which acts as a bridge between your on-premises data sources and the cloud-based Azure Data Factory service. This allows you to create data-driven workflows that can ingest data from your on-premises data stores and move it to the cloud for further processing and transformation.

How fast can I ingest data in Fabric data pipelines?

Fabric Data Factory allows you to develop pipelines that maximize data movement throughput for your environment. These pipelines fully utilize the following resources:

• Network bandwidth between the source and destination data stores.
• Source or destination data store input/output operations per second (IOPS) and bandwidth This full utilization means you can estimate the overall throughput by measuring the minimum throughput available with the following resources:
  • Source data store
  • Destination data store
• Network bandwidth in between the source and destination data stores Meanwhile, we continuously work on innovations to boost the best possible throughput you can achieve. Today, the service can move 1 TB TPC-DI dataset (parquet files) into both Fabric Lakehouse table and Data Warehouse within five minutes—moving 1 billion rows under one minute; Please note that this performance is only a reference by running the above testing dataset. The actual throughput still depends on the factors listed previously. In addition, you can always multiply your throughput by running multiple copy activities in parallel. For example, using ForEach loop.

Where can I find more training resources to get started?

• Introduction to Azure Data Factory—Training | Microsoft Learn.
• Get started with Microsoft Fabric—Training | Microsoft Learn.
• Create your first Microsoft Fabric dataflow—Microsoft Fabric | Microsoft Learn.
• Create your first data pipeline to copy data—Microsoft Fabric | Microsoft Learn.

The post SQL Server Integration Services (SSIS) Change Data Capture Attunity feature deprecations appeared first on Microsoft SQL Server Blog.

SQL Server has brought reliability and security to mission-critical workloads for 30 years. SQL Server 2022, released November 2022, delivers performance enhancements as well as Azure connectivity for disaster recovery, analytics, and governance. Now customers like Mediterranean Shipping Company (MSC) are using SQL Server 2022 to expand their capabilities to better support a truly worldwide operation.

“Features like Query Store hints and the next generation of Intelligent Query Processing are awesome. The possibility of improving and maintaining great performance over time without code changes is getting better on every new SQL Server version“

—Javier Villegas: IT Director for DBA and BI Service, Mediterranean Shipping Company

We love delivering innovation with each new version of SQL Server. But all good things must come to an end: SQL Server 2014 has a ten-year product lifecycle, and after this time product support and regular security updates cease. SQL Server 2014 reached end of support on July 9, 2024.

The upcoming end-of-support milestones are an opportunity to evaluate your business needs and modernize your IT estate. To provide you with the flexibility to stay secure while you plan for the future, we are announcing a new option to help you manage this transition: SQL Server 2014 Extended Security Updates will offer up to three years of critical security updates. Extended Security Updates are free for workloads running in Azure. The updates will be offered for sale to use on-premises and in multicloud environments.

Just as with SQL Server 2012, Extended Security Updates for SQL Server 2014 offers an enhanced cloud experience through Azure Arc. Year 1 coverage from Extended Security Updates started on July 10, 2024. With this more customer-centric approach, security updates will be natively available in the Azure Portal through Azure Arc. This also provides Azure benefits and flexible subscription billing for SQL Server 2014 workloads on-premises or in multicloud environments.

Your options in end of support moments

Customers have multiple options for the SQL Server in their data estate that is nearing the end of support. These options include migrating or modernizing to Azure, upgrading to SQL Server 2022, or purchasing Extended Security Updates if more time is needed before the upgrade or migration.

Modernize to Azure for the latest database features

Modernize your SQL Server by migrating to the always up-to-date Azure SQL Managed Instance, which upgrades and patches automatically. Azure SQL Managed Instance is an intelligent cloud database service combining the broadest SQL Server engine compatibility—all the way back to SQL Server 2008—with the benefits of a fully managed database as a service. SQL Server licenses with Software Assurance are eligible for Azure Hybrid Benefit to help you reduce the costs of moving to Azure SQL Managed Instance.

Migrate to Azure, and get Extended Security Updates at no additional cost

If you are ready to move to the cloud but challenged to upgrade or modernize before the end of the support timeline, Extended Security Updates are available for free in Azure for SQL Server 2014 and 2012 and Windows Server 2012. Secure your workloads for up to three more years after the end of the support deadline by migrating applications and SQL Server databases to Azure Virtual Machines. Free Extended Security Updates are available for Azure Virtual Machines including Azure Dedicated Host, Azure VMWare Solution, Nutanix Cloud Clusters on Azure, and Azure Stack (Hub, Edge, and HCI). Combining Extended Security Updates in Azure with Azure Hybrid Benefit further reduces your costs. With these pricing advantages, AWS is up to five times more expensive than Azure for SQL Server and Windows Server end-of-support workloads.

Stay protected on-premises or in multicloud environments

Another way to stay protected is to upgrade your SQL Server to SQL Server 2022, the most Azure-enabled release yet. Get more out of your data with enhanced security, industry-leading performance and availability, and business continuity through Azure.

Customers who cannot meet the end-of-support deadline and have Software Assurance or subscription licenses will have the option to buy Extended Security Updates to get three more years of security updates.

For SQL Server 2012, Windows Server 2012/R2, and starting this year SQL Server 2014, customers can protect their workloads with Extended Security Updates enabled by Azure Arc. With Azure Arc, organizations will be able to activate and seamlessly deploy Extended Security Updates in on-premises or multicloud environments, right from the Azure portal.

Extended Security Updates for SQL Server enabled by Azure Arc provide visibility of your entire SQL estate, automate repeatable updates and patches, and can enhance security and data governance with Azure services. It is offered as a monthly subscription which will automatically stop when you migrate or upgrade—pay only for what you need. Planned pricing* of SQL Server 2014 Extended Security Updates enabled by Azure Arc* 

Get started planning Windows Server 2012 and SQL Server 2014 end of support

We encourage all our customers running SQL Server 2014, Windows Server 2012, and 2012 R2 to start planning for the end of support. We have migration resources, best practices, and more as well as a rich ecosystem of partners ready to help. To get started, please visit the following pages to learn more:

• Azure migration and modernization center with resources for every stage of your cloud migration.
• What are Extended Security Updates for SQL Server? Covering more details on Extended Security Updates and your options.
• SQL Server and Windows Server Extended Security Updates resource page.
• Extended Security Updates enabled by Azure Arc with details on how to get started with this option.

*Use United States as an example; Actual launch pricing might vary.

** For customers who sign up after the end of support dates  (July 9, 2024), you will receive a one-time bill-back charge from the start of the Extended Security Updates year to your actual start date.

*** Include workloads running on Azure Virtual Machines, Azure Dedicated Host, Azure VMWare Solutions, Nutanix Cloud Clusters on Azure, and Azure Stack Hub/Edge/HCI. Learn more about your options.

The post Protect SQL Server 2014 workloads with Azure flexibility appeared first on Microsoft SQL Server Blog.

Customers trust Windows Server and SQL Server for their business-critical workloads. With SQL Server, customers like Itaú Unibanco are taking advantage of the built-in intelligence, industry-leading performance, and security across both structured and unstructured data. Similarly, customers like CadDo are combining SQL Server 2019 with Windows Server 2019 to take advantage of advanced multi-layer security, hybrid capabilities, and enhancements to modernize applications with containers. In March of 2021, we announced Windows Server 2022 in preview, which thousands of customers are already previewing for their workloads.

While new innovations keep lighting up in the latest releases of SQL Server and Windows Server, support for older versions along with security updates will eventually end. This can lead to the potential for compliance gaps for workloads that still rely on these versions and create missed opportunities to apply innovation to business-critical workloads. SQL Server 2012 and Windows Server 2012, and 2012 R2 End of Extended support is approaching:

• SQL Server 2012 Extended Support will end on July 12, 2022.
• Windows Server 2012 and 2012 R2 Extended Support will end on October 10, 2023.

SQL Server 2022

Learn more about the latest version of SQL.

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In addition to the great features included in SQL Server and Windows Server, today we are announcing new benefits giving customers more flexibility and choice for modernization, so they stay secure while modernizing their entire IT estate. These benefits include SQL Server 2012 Extended Security Updates, Windows Server 2012 and 2012 R2 Extended Security Updates, and one additional year of extended support for Windows Server and SQL Server 2008 and 2008 R2 only on Azure.

Migrate to Azure, run securely with free Extended Security Updates

Customers can migrate applications and SQL Server databases to Azure Virtual Machines, and get free Extended Security Updates for three years after end of support, only in Azure. Customers can combine this with Azure Hybrid Benefit to save big on Azure by using existing on-premises SQL Server and Windows Server licenses on the cloud with no additional cost. These offers make Azure the most cost-effective place to run SQL Server and Windows Server. In fact, AWS is five times more expensive than Azure for SQL Server and Windows Server.

End of support is an opportunity to plan for modernizing applications. Conveniently, with Extended Security Updates, customers can continue to protect these applications while they modernize. Azure offers several modernization options such as:

• Azure Automanage for Azure Virtual Machines to simplify IT operations.
• Azure VMware Solutions to seamlessly move VMware-based workloads from your datacenter to Azure and integrate your VMware environment with Azure.
• Azure Virtual Desktop to modernize Windows Server RDS-based VDI environments.
• Azure App Service and Azure Kubernetes Service for application modernization.
• Azure SQL Managed Instance, a PaaS service for SQL Server databases that makes patching and upgrades a thing of the past.
• Azure Purview to map, catalog, understand, classify, and manage your operational and analytical data—whether on-premises, across your multi-cloud environment, or within SaaS applications; while in preview, Azure Purview has free scanning and classification for on-premises SQL Server
• The Azure Migration and Modernization Program (AMMP) offers customers proactive best practice guidance, direct access to Azure engineers, tools, and subsidized partner services so customers can accelerate progress and migrate with confidence whether they are early in the migration journey or scaling IT in the cloud.

Upgrade on-premises, stay protected with the latest release

With so many new enhancements in Azure for SQL Server and Windows Server, customers are already using the latest releases to modernize their IT estate. With that said, we understand that SQL Server and Windows Server run many business-critical applications that may take more time to modernize. We are glad to share that we have great options to plan SQL Server 2012 and Windows Server 2012 and 2012 R2 end of support.

Customers that need to remain on-premises for compliance can protect their workloads by upgrading to SQL Server 2022 and Windows Server 2019. Azure now offers application and data modernization options on-premises with Azure Arc. With Azure Arc, customers can take advantage of Azure innovation such as policy, governance, and security to manage their on-premises applications and data.

Customers that cannot meet the end of support deadline and have Software Assurance or subscription licenses under an enterprise agreement enrollment will have the option to buy Extended Security Updates to get three more years of security updates for SQL Server 2012, and Windows Server 2012 and 2012 R2.

Take advantage of Extended Security Updates only on Azure to protect your Windows Server and SQL Server 2008 and 2008 R2 for one additional year

SQL Server and Windows Server 2008 and 2008 R2 Extended Security Updates are coming to an end on July 12, 2022, and January 10, 2023, respectively. Many customers are taking advantage of Azure’s commitment to security and compliance and have moved to Azure to protect their 2008 and R2 workloads with free Extended Security Updates.

For those customers who need additional time to upgrade and modernize their SQL Server and Windows Server 2008 and 2008 R2 on Azure, we will now provide one additional year of Extended Security Updates only on Azure. This also applies to Azure Stack HCI, Azure Stack Hub, and other Azure products.

Get started planning Windows Server 2012 and SQL 2012 end of support

Starting today, we encourage all our customers running SQL Server 2012 and Windows Server 2012 and 2012 R2 to start planning for the end of support. We have migration resources, best practices, and more as well as a rich ecosystem of partners ready to help. To get started, please visit the following pages to learn more:

• Azure migration and modernization center with resources for every stage of your cloud migration.
• SQL Server and Windows Server Extended Security Updates resource page.

Frequently asked questions

What is the price for Windows Server and SQL Server 2012 Extended Security Updates?

• In Azure: Customers running SQL Server 2012 and Windows Server 2012 and 2012 R2 in Azure will get Extended Security Updates for free.
• On-premises: Customers with active Software Assurance or subscription licenses can purchase Extended Security Updates annually for 100 percent of the license cost of the latest version of SQL Server or Windows Server each year. Customers pay for only the servers they need to cover, so they can reduce costs each year as they upgrade parts of their environment.

What Azure resources can take advantage of free Extended Security Updates?

Free Extended Security Updates are available for Azure Virtual Machines including Azure Dedicated Host, Azure VMWare Solution, Azure Nutanix Solution, and Azure Stack (Hub, Edge, and HCI).

When can customers purchase Windows Server and SQL Server 2012 Extended Security Updates?

Extended Security Updates will be available for purchase at a later date, as we get closer to the end of extended support for SQL Server 2012 and Windows Server 2012/R2. For the latest details, please refer to additional frequently asked questions.

How will I obtain Windows Server and SQL Server 2012 Extended Security Updates? 

In Azure, you can obtain Windows Server Extended Security Updates automatically to your Azure virtual machine through Windows Server Update Service. 

Get your SQL Server Extended Security Updates in Azure by registering your subscription with the SQL Server IaaS Agent extension. Learn more about registering your SQL Server virtual machine with the IaaS Agent extension.

On-premises, your Windows Server Extended Security Updates will be delivered as any regular Windows Server Update.  

On-premises SQL Server Extended Security Updates can be obtained by connecting your SQL Server to Azure Arc.

The post Know your options for SQL Server 2012 and Windows Server 2012 End of Support appeared first on Microsoft SQL Server Blog.