Forum Discussion
Hyper-V Server 2022
Free 'Microsoft Hyper-V Server' product update
Since its introduction over a decade ago in Windows Server 2008, Hyper-V technology has been, and continues to be, the foundation of Microsoft’s hypervisor platform. Hyper-V is a strategic technology for Microsoft. Microsoft continues to invest heavily in Hyper-V for a variety of scenarios such as virtualization, security, containers, gaming, and more. Hyper-V is used in Azure, Azure Local, Windows Server, Windows Client, and Xbox among others.
Starting with Microsoft Hyper-V Server 2019, the free ‘Microsoft Hyper-V Server’ product has been deprecated and is the final version of that product. Hyper-V Server 2019 is a free product available for download from the Microsoft Evaluation Center: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/evalcenter/evaluate-hyper-v-server-2019
Microsoft Hyper-V Server 2019 will continue to be supported under its lifecycle policy until January 2029, see this link for additional information: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/lifecycle/products/hyperv-server-2019.
While Microsoft has made a business decision to no longer offer the free 'Microsoft Hyper-V Server' product, this has no impact to the many other products which include the Hyper-V feature and capabilities. This change has no impact to any customers who use Windows Server or Azure Local.
For customers looking to do test or evaluation of the Hyper-V feature, Azure Local includes a 60-day free trial and can be downloaded here: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/azure-local/ . Windows Server offers a free 180-day evaluation which can be downloaded from the Evaluation Center here: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/evalcenter
Microsoft remains committed to meeting customers where they are and delivering innovation for on-premises virtualization and bringing unique hybrid capabilities like no other can combined with the power of Azure Arc. We are announcing that Microsoft Hyper-V Server 2019 was the last version of the free download product and that customers begin transitioning to one of the several other products which include Hyper-V or consider Azure.
Thank you,
Elden Christensen
Principal Group PM Manager
Windows Server Development Team
The business case for keeping Hyper-V Server is simple.
There are NO freeloaders using Hyper-V Server. Only customers.
Allow me to explain.
There's only two (practical) main OSes for VMs you can put on a Hyper-V Server.
Windows and Linux. (There are others sure, but they're a very small minority and for purposes here, can fall into the Linux camp)
***Anyone invested in ONLY a full Linux stack isn't going to be using a Microsoft Hypervisor.***
Especially since it's very difficult to manage without a Windows machine, EVEN with Windows Admin Center.
People use a Microsoft Hypervisor because they use Microsoft products SOMEWHERE.
If someone is putting only Linux on a Hyper-V Server, it's because they're using Windows and Hyper-V somewhere else and want to manage them using a common interface.
So I again assert, there are *no* freeloaders off Hyper-V Server.
The only use cases for a standalone Hyper-V Server are:
1. Test environments (Which are free anyway)
2. Low footprint/attack surface host installs that contain at least 1 Windows Server VM (Which cost wise can be replaced by Standard Server Core, but with a larger attack surface, and larger footprint)
3. Hyper-V hosts running Linux only that are being managed alongside other Hyper-V installs using Windows. Because again, nobody using ONLY LINUX would use a Microsoft Hypervisor. It just wouldn't make sense.
Case #3 is the only one being really killed here, since #2 can be replaced with Server Standard Core.
Azure Stack HCI doesn't make any sense in the context of Case #3. At present, these systems are a "free addition" to other uses of Hyper-V. Nobody is going to pay $10 per core to run just a bunch of free Linux Systems. All it does is deprive the admins who manage multiple systems of a Microsoft based unified way of managing Windows AND Linux systems together.
What this encourages instead is Admins finding a *different* way to have a unified infrastructure to manage their different systems. So instead of running Hyper-V for case #2, you get mass migrations OFF of case #2 to 3rd party alternatives so admins can have a unified infrastructure, OR Admins sucking it up and running Windows hosts on Hyper-V and Linux hosts on something else without a unified infrastructure.
So from a business position, it doesn't make any sense. It just makes customers angry for no benefit to anyone involved.
Microsoft already knows Linux use is HUGE since Azure uses more Linux than Windows right now.
So burning bridges with Mixed infrastructure environments will absolutely cost them tons of business.
If nothing else, it will cause massive distrust in the future of Hyper-V as anything other than a "cloud" hypervisor, seen as "unfit for local deployments."
I don't particularly care what decision Microsoft makes, as I'm happy to move to other Hypervisors. I've enjoyed having a Microsoft provided unified infrastructure. Being able to manage and backup hosts running Linux alongside my hosts running Windows has been fantastic. But there's no shortage of vendors willing to offer me a unified infrastructure. And if MS is intent on removing theirs because they can't see the business value of it, I can't see them being able to direct the future of virtualization very well.
athendrix I fully agree.
I myself have environments exactly as you described. So it's very good point - there are no freeloaders of hyper-v server. Running hyper-v for Linux only VMs is a nonsense. Linux admins have their own hypervisors.
I myself will survive the death of Hyper-V server SKU as well, because I will use core server instead. But as you said, hyper-v server SKU has smaller footprint and therefore it's a bit safer to use and makes more sence - it should be as thinner as possible and do one thing and one thing only - provision VM environment.
I'm also quite interested if there will be some sort of official statement from Microsoft.
Because I would love to hear the reasons behind this decision... and no, migrate to Azure should not be the ultimate answer
