MI link support for multiple databases in an Always On availability group for SQL Server (Preview)
A simpler way to extend availability groups to Azure We are pleased to announce the preview of multi-database mode for Managed Instance link. The new mode lets you replicate multiple databases from an existing Always On availability group through a single link between SQL Server and Azure SQL Managed Instance. Managed Instance link uses distributed availability group technology to provide near-real-time replication between SQL Server and Azure SQL Managed Instance. It supports hybrid architectures, online migration, disaster recovery, and read-only workload offload. The link can be configured and managed through SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS), PowerShell, Azure CLI, and Azure APIs. Previously, each link supported one database. Customers with multi-database availability groups therefore had to split databases into separate availability groups and create a link for each database. Multi-database mode removes that limitation for supported SQL Server versions and editions, while the existing single-database mode remains available for earlier versions and other supported configurations. What you can do with multi-database link mode Migrate multiple databases to Azure SQL Managed Instance with minimal cutover downtime. Offload read-only workloads, including reporting and analytics, to the secondary replica. Use Azure SQL Managed Instance as a disaster recovery target for supported SQL Server versions. Start replication in either direction when the SQL Server version and Azure SQL Managed Instance update policy support that direction. Reverse primary and secondary roles through a planned failover. Build hybrid and multicloud topologies that place database groups where they are most useful. One link for an existing multi-database availability group If you already use an Always On availability group, multi-database link mode lets you extend the complete database group to Azure SQL Managed Instance without creating a separate availability group for every database. All databases in the link move together as one managed group. Databases on the primary are read-write, while their copies on the secondary are read-only. Use of your existing Always On AG listener endpoint is supported with multi-database mode MI link, allowing the link to remain operational after a local AG failover. Image 1: A multi-database Always On availability group replicated to Azure SQL Managed Instance through one Managed Instance link. The diagram illustrates the availability group relationship rather than a specific Azure SQL Managed Instance service-tier replica count. Managed Instance link is supported across all Azure SQL Managed Instance service tiers. Run multiple links in different directions A single SQL Server instance can participate in multiple links. Each link can carry a different availability group, and supported links can replicate in different directions at the same time. In the following example, AG1 (containing DB1, DB2, and DB3) replicates from SQL Server to Azure SQL Managed Instance through MI link 1. AG2 (containing DB4, DB5, and DB6) replicates from Azure SQL Managed Instance to SQL Server through MI link 2. Both links can operate at the same time between the two instances. Image 2: Two multi-database availability groups using separate links with opposite replication directions. Important: Database names must be unique in this configuration. A database cannot be renamed on the secondary while it is participating in replication to resolve a naming conflict. Replicate one availability group to multiple managed instances Multi-database mode also supports fan-out topologies. You can replicate multiple availability groups to one managed instance, or replicate the same availability group to different managed instances. For example, separate links can target managed instances in different Azure regions. Image 3: One multi-database availability group replicated through separate links to two Azure SQL managed instances. Preview requirements Requirement Details SQL Server SQL Server 2022 with CU27 or SQL Server 2025 with CU9 and above. Edition Enterprise or Developer edition. Standard edition supports basic availability groups with one database and is not supported for multi-database mode. Azure SQL Managed Instance Use a compatible update policy (2022 or 2025) matching your SQL Server version. SSMS SSMS 22.10.2 or later for the multi-database link capability. Automation Az module 16.3.0 or later and Az.Sql 7.1.0 or later, or the corresponding Azure APIs. Get started To evaluate multi-database mode during preview: Confirm that the SQL Server version, edition, servicing level, and Azure SQL Managed Instance update policy meet the preview requirements. Upgrade to SSMS 22.10.2 or later, or use a supported automation interface. Enable multi-database mode before creating a multi-database link. Create the link from the existing Always On availability group and validate synchronization for every database. Review the Azure documentation for multi-database Managed Instance link configuration, limitations, monitoring, failover, and cleanup guidance. Share your feedback We would love to hear about your experience with multi-database mode. Please share questions, feedback, and feature suggestions through the Managed Instance link feedback form.Stop defragmenting and start living: auto index compaction is now generally available
Executive summary Automatic index compaction is a built-in MSSQL database engine feature that compacts indexes in background and with minimal overhead. Now you can: Stop using scheduled index maintenance jobs. Reduce storage space consumption and save costs. Improve performance by reducing CPU, memory, and disk I/O consumption. Automatic index compaction is now generally available in Azure SQL Database, Azure SQL Managed Instance with the always-up-to-date update policy, and SQL database in Fabric. Index maintenance without maintenance jobs Enable automatic index compaction for a database with a single T-SQL command: ALTER DATABASE [database-name] SET AUTOMATIC_INDEX_COMPACTION = ON; Once enabled, you no longer need to set up, maintain, and monitor resource intensive index maintenance jobs, a time-consuming operational task for many DBA teams today. As the data in the database changes, a background process consolidates rows from partially filled data pages into a smaller number of filled up pages, and then removes the empty pages. Index bloat is eliminated – the same amount of data now uses a minimal amount of storage space. Resource consumption is reduced because the database engine needs fewer disk IOs and less CPU and memory to process the same amount of data. By design, the background compaction process acts on the recently modified pages only. This means that its own resource consumption is much lower compared to the traditional index maintenance operations (index rebuild and reorganize), which process all pages in an index or its partition. For a detailed description of how the feature works, a comparison between automatic index compaction and the traditional index maintenance operations, and the ways to monitor the compaction process, see automatic index compaction in documentation. Let the numbers speak As auto index compaction becomes generally available, it is already enabled in more than 6 million databases worldwide, most of them from Microsoft internal customers who helped validate the feature during preview. Hundreds of external customers also enabled auto compaction during preview and have been enjoying the benefits, with zero issues reported. Looking at our worldwide telemetry data for a 28-day window, automatic index compaction freed up approximately 14.3 petabytes of space in data files by consolidating 547.5 trillion rows on fewer pages, saving resources and improving query performance. Looking at the space freed up per database, the benefits range from a few megabytes per day for databases with already dense pages, to more than 500 gigabytes per day for databases that have gone through one-time extensive data modifications. Compaction in action To see the effects of automatic index compaction, we wrote a stored procedure that simulates a write-intensive OLTP workload. Each execution of the procedure inserts, updates, deletes, or selects a random number of rows, from 1 to 100, in a 50,000-row table with a clustered index. We executed this stored procedure using a popular SQLQueryStress tool, with 30 threads and 400 iterations on each thread. We measured the page density, the number pages in the leaf level of the table’s clustered index, and the number of logical reads (pages) used by a test query reading 1,000 rows, at three points in time: After initially inserting the data and before running the workload. Once the workload stopped running. Several minutes later, once the background process completed index compaction. Here are the results: Before workload After workload After compaction Logical reads 25 🟢 1,610 🔴⬆️ 35 🟢⬇️ Page density 99.51% 🟢 52.71% 🔴⬇️ 96.11% 🟢⬆️ Pages 962 🟢 4,394 🔴⬆️ 1,065 🟢⬇️ Before the workload starts, page density is high because nearly all pages are full. The number of logical reads required by the test query is minimal, and so is its resource consumption. The workload leaves a lot of empty space on pages and increases the number of pages because of row updates and deletions, and because of page splits. As a result, immediately after workload completion, the number of logical reads required for the same test query increases more than 60 times, which translates into a higher CPU and memory usage. But then within a few minutes, automatic index compaction removes the empty space from the index, increasing page density back to nearly 100%, reducing logical reads by about 98% and getting the index very close to its initial compact state. Less logical reads means that the query is faster and uses less CPU. All of this without any user action. With continuous workloads, index compaction is continuous as well, maintaining higher average page density and reducing resource usage by the workload over time. The T-SQL code we used in this demo is available in the Appendix. Conclusion Automatic index compaction delegates a routine database maintenance operation to the database engine itself, letting administrators and engineers focus on more important work without worrying about index maintenance. Making this feature generally available doesn’t mean that we stop working on it. Your feedback during preview helped us find new opportunities to fine-tune the compaction process. We thank you for that feedback and look forward to announcing new improvements in auto index compaction in the future. Appendix Here is the T-SQL code we used to demonstrate automatic index compaction. The type of executed statements and the number of affected rows is randomized to better represent an OLTP workload. While the results demonstrate the effectiveness of automatic index compaction, exact measurements may vary from one execution to the next. /* Enable automatic index compaction */ ALTER DATABASE CURRENT SET AUTOMATIC_INDEX_COMPACTION = ON; /* Reset to the initial state */ DROP TABLE IF EXISTS dbo.t; DROP SEQUENCE IF EXISTS dbo.s_id; DROP PROCEDURE IF EXISTS dbo.churn; /* Create a sequence to generate clustered index keys */ CREATE SEQUENCE dbo.s_id AS int START WITH 1 INCREMENT BY 1; /* Create a test table */ CREATE TABLE dbo.t ( id int NOT NULL CONSTRAINT df_t_id DEFAULT (NEXT VALUE FOR dbo.s_id), dt datetime2 NOT NULL CONSTRAINT df_t_dt DEFAULT (SYSDATETIME()), u uniqueidentifier NOT NULL CONSTRAINT df_t_uid DEFAULT (NEWID()), s nvarchar(100) NOT NULL CONSTRAINT df_t_s DEFAULT (REPLICATE('c', 1 + 100 * RAND())), CONSTRAINT pk_t PRIMARY KEY (id) ); /* Insert 50,000 rows */ INSERT INTO dbo.t (s) SELECT REPLICATE('c', 50) AS s FROM GENERATE_SERIES(1, 50000); GO /* Create a stored procedure that simulates a write-intensive OLTP workload. */ CREATE OR ALTER PROCEDURE dbo.churn AS SET NOCOUNT, XACT_ABORT ON; DECLARE @r float = RAND(CAST(CAST(NEWID() AS varbinary(4)) AS int)); /* Get the type of statement to execute */ DECLARE @StatementType char(6) = CASE WHEN @r <= 0.15 THEN 'insert' WHEN @r <= 0.30 THEN 'delete' WHEN @r <= 0.65 THEN 'update' WHEN @r <= 1 THEN 'select' ELSE NULL END; /* Get the maximum key value for the clustered index */ DECLARE @MaxKey int = ( SELECT CAST(current_value AS int) FROM sys.sequences WHERE name = 's_id' AND SCHEMA_NAME(schema_id) = 'dbo' ); /* Get a random key value within the key range */ DECLARE @StartKey int = 1 + RAND() * @MaxKey; /* Get a random number of rows, between 1 and 100, to modify or read */ DECLARE @RowCount int = 1 + RAND() * 99; /* Execute a statement */ IF @StatementType = 'insert' INSERT INTO dbo.t (id) SELECT NEXT VALUE FOR dbo.s_id FROM GENERATE_SERIES(1, @RowCount); IF @StatementType = 'delete' DELETE TOP (@RowCount) dbo.t WHERE id >= @StartKey; IF @StatementType = 'update' UPDATE TOP (@RowCount) dbo.t SET dt = DEFAULT, u = DEFAULT, s = DEFAULT WHERE id >= @StartKey; IF @StatementType = 'select' SELECT TOP (@RowCount) id, dt, u, s FROM dbo.t WHERE id >= @StartKey; GO /* The remainder of this script is executed three times: 1. Before running the workload using SQLQueryStress. 2. Immediately after the workload stops running. 3. Once automatic index compaction completes several minutes later. */ /* Monitor page density and the number of pages and records in the leaf level of the clustered index. */ SELECT avg_page_space_used_in_percent AS page_density, page_count, record_count FROM sys.dm_db_index_physical_stats(DB_ID(), OBJECT_ID('dbo.t'), 1, 1, 'DETAILED') WHERE index_level = 0; /* Run a test query and measure its logical reads. */ DROP TABLE IF EXISTS #t; SET STATISTICS IO ON; SELECT TOP (1000) id, dt, u, s INTO #t FROM dbo.t WHERE id >= 10000 SET STATISTICS IO OFF;
Public Preview: Performance monitoring for Azure SQL
Today we're excited to announce the public preview of performance monitoring for Azure SQL. Performance monitoring gives you deep visibility into the health and performance of your SQL estate, built directly into the Azure SQL platform. It works across: Azure SQL Database Azure SQL Managed Instance (coming soon) SQL Server on Azure Virtual Machines SQL Server enabled by Azure Arc Microsoft collects performance-related telemetry, runs the pipeline, and stores the data for you. There's nothing you need to deploy and nothing to operate. You get direct query access to your telemetry. And in Fabric Database Hub, you get prebuilt dashboards and a single view of your whole estate. Why we built this Monitoring SQL performance at scale often meant building and running your own monitoring stack. Before you could effectively answer, "which of my databases need attention right now?", you typically had to: Deploy and configure a collection resource, such as a watcher or an agent Build a telemetry pipeline to move the data Provision a data store, and then pay for it, secure it, and keep it running Build dashboards on top of all of it Repeat for every new server, database, or region That's a lot of work before you see your first chart. And every step is another thing that can break, drift, or quietly stop collecting data. Customers are also turning to AI to make sense of their database estate. They want an AI agent that can spot a performance problem, explain what's causing it, and recommend a fix. But an AI agent is only as good as the data it can reach. It operates best with one consistent source of performance data across every database, not a patchwork of tools and data stores. We heard this feedback loud and clear from customers. You told us you love having at-scale dashboards, query-level visibility, and ownership of your performance data. You also told us that setting up a telemetry stack was time consuming, scale limits got in the way, and running the data store added operational burden and cost overhead. One customer put it simply: They wanted to spend less time managing their telemetry infrastructure and more time managing and improving their databases. Performance monitoring keeps the parts you valued and removes the infrastructure you had to manage. No infrastructure to manage With performance monitoring, you don't need to: Create or manage watcher resources or collection agents Build or operate telemetry pipelines Provision, size, or pay for your own data store Worry about scale limits on how many targets you can monitor It's all managed by Microsoft. Telemetry is collected close to the database engine and sent to a Microsoft-managed telemetry pipeline and data store. Access to that data is governed by Azure role-based access control (RBAC), so people only see telemetry for the resources they already have access to. Key capabilities Consistent telemetry across your SQL estate Performance monitoring collects the same core set of performance data across every supported SQL deployment, whether it runs in Azure, on-premises, or in another cloud. That means one mental model and one set of dashboards, instead of a different tool for every flavor of SQL. The preview collects performance-related telemetry including: CPU and memory utilization Wait statistics Active sessions Storage I/O and database storage utilization Performance counters Client connections Database properties Availability group, replica, and database replica health Prebuilt dashboards in Fabric Database Hub Performance monitoring comes with prebuilt dashboards in Fabric Database Hub, so you can see performance at a glance without building anything yourself. The dashboards are designed to quickly answer two questions: Are my databases healthy? Which ones need my attention? From there, you can drill into resource usage, waits, and session activity to understand what's driving a change in performance. Query your telemetry directly Your telemetry is available through a Microsoft-managed, RBAC-governed Azure Data Explorer endpoint. You can connect from the Azure Data Explorer web UI and query it with Kusto Query Language (KQL). You don't need to create or pay for your own Azure Data Explorer cluster. This opens a lot of options: Build your own reports and dashboards Connect tools you already use, such as Grafana or Power BI Give an AI agent access to investigate performance across your estate Here's a quick example that ranks the resources you can see by 95th-percentile CPU over the last hour: SqlServerCPUUtilization | where SampleTimeUTC > ago(1h) | summarize AvgCPU = round(avg(AvgCPUPercent), 1) , P95CPU = round(percentile(AvgCPUPercent, 95), 1) by ResourceID, ResourceTypeK | top 10 by P95CPU desc To get started, see Query performance monitoring telemetry. The article includes the schema, connection steps, and a set of ready-to-run starter queries. See your entire database estate in Fabric Database Hub Performance monitoring is integrated with Fabric Database Hub, where you can see your entire database estate from Azure in one place, including: Azure SQL Azure Database for PostgreSQL Azure Cosmos DB Fabric Database Hub is built for when you need to look across all your databases, not just one at a time. With Fabric Database Hub, you can: Use prebuilt performance dashboards for your SQL resources Get estate-wide visibility into health and performance across database types Investigate root cause and query performance across many databases Use AI-assisted analysis to find and explain issues faster Build Real-Time Dashboards on top of your performance telemetry Performance monitoring data flows into Fabric Database Hub automatically. There's no separate onboarding step to connect the two. To learn more about Fabric Database Hub, click here. Getting started How you turn on performance monitoring depends on the resource type. Resource type How monitoring is enabled in preview Step-by-step guidance Azure SQL Database Add an extended property to each database you want to monitor. Performance monitoring for Azure SQL Database Azure SQL Managed Instance (coming soon) Coming soon Coming soon SQL Server on Azure VMs Turn on a feature flag in the SQL IaaS Agent extension. Performance monitoring for SQL Server on Azure VMs SQL Server enabled by Azure Arc On by default once the server is connected to Azure Arc. Monitor SQL Server enabled by Azure Arc To view performance monitoring data, you need: The Reader role, or a role with higher privileges, on each subscription that contains the resources you want to query. The Microsoft.AzureArcData resource provider registered on the subscription. Availability Performance monitoring is available in public preview in the following Azure regions: Americas: Brazil South, Canada Central, Canada East, Central US, East US, East US 2, North Central US, South Central US, West Central US, West US, West US 2, West US 3 Europe, Middle East, and Africa: France Central, North Europe, Norway East, South Africa North, Sweden Central, Switzerland North, UAE North, UK South, UK West, West Europe Asia Pacific: Australia East, Central India, Japan East, Korea Central, Southeast Asia Learn more Query performance monitoring telemetry Fabric Database Hub Monitor SQL Server enabled by Azure Arc Supplemental Terms of Use for Microsoft Azure PreviewsUnlocking More Power with Flexible Memory in Azure SQL Managed Instance
Service updates Sep 28th 2026. Business Critical: locally redundant and zone-redundant instances. Flexible memory is generally available (GA) for the Business Critical service tier. Aug 17th 2026. Next-gen General Purpose: zone-redundant instances. Flexible memory for the Next-gen General purpose tier is in public preview. May 6th 2026. Next-gen General Purpose: locally redundant instances. Flexible memory for the Next-gen General purpose tier is generally available (GA) As data workloads grow in complexity and scale, so does the need for more adaptable and performant database infrastructure. That’s why we’re excited to introduce a new capability in Azure SQL Managed Instance: Flexible Memory, now generally available. What Is Flexible Memory? Flexible Memory allows you to customize the memory-to-vCore ratio in your SQL Managed Instance, enabling finer control over both performance and cost based on your workload requirements. This capability is part of the next-generation General Purpose and Business Critical tiers. It introduces a memory slider, which enables you to scale memory independently within supported limits - without changing the number of vCores. The memory slider is currently available only on premium-series hardware. Why It Matters Traditionally, memory allocation in SQL Managed Instance was fixed per vCore. With Flexible Memory, you can now: Increase memory beyond the default allocation Optimize for memory-intensive workloads without overprovisioning compute Pay only for what you use - additional memory is billed per GB/hour This flexibility is especially valuable for scenarios like analytics, caching, or workloads with large buffer pool requirements. How It Works Memory scales based on the number of vCores and the selected hardware tier: Hardware Tier Memory per vCore (GB) Standard-series 5.1 Premium series 7–12 Premium series (memory-optimized) Up to 13.6 You can select from predefined memory ratios (e.g., 7, 8, 10, 12 GB per vCore) depending on your configuration. For example, a 10 vCore instance can be configured with 70 GB to 120 GB of memory. One of the most powerful aspects of the Flexible Memory feature is the ability to select from a range of memory-to-vCore ratios. These “click stops” allow you to tailor memory allocation precisely to your workload’s needs - whether you’re optimizing for performance, cost, or both. The table below outlines the available configurations for Premium Series hardware, showing how memory scales across 16 vCore sizes: vCores Available Ratios Total Memory Options (GB) 4 7, 8, 10, 12 28, 32, 40, 48 6 7, 8, 10, 12 42, 48, 60, 72 8 7, 8, 10, 12 56, 64, 80, 96 10 7, 8, 10, 12 70, 80, 100, 120 12 7, 8, 10, 12 84, 96, 120, 144 16 7, 8, 10, 12 112, 128, 160, 192 20 7, 8, 10, 12 140, 160, 200, 240 24 7, 8, 10, 12 168, 192, 240, 288 32 7, 8, 10, 12 224, 256, 320, 384 40 7, 8, 10, 12 280, 320, 400, 480 48 7, 8, 10 336, 384, 480 56 7, 8 392, 448 64 7 448 80 7 560 96 5.83 560 128 4.38 560 Pricing model Flexible Memory introduces a usage-based pricing model that ensures you only pay for the memory you actually consume beyond the default allocation. This model is designed to give you the flexibility to scale memory without overcommitting on compute resources - and without paying for unused capacity. How it works: Default memory is calculated based on the minimum memory-to-vCore ratio Billable memory is the difference between your configured memory and the default allocation. Billing is per GB/hour, so you’re charged only for the additional memory used over time. Let’s take an example of SQL Managed Instance running on premium series hardware with 4 vCores and 40GB of memory. Configuration Value vCores 4 Configured Memory 40 GB Default Memory (4 × 7 GB) 28 GB Billable Memory 12 GB Billing Unit Per GB/hour Charged For 12 GB of additional memory Management Experience Changing memory behaves just like changing vCores: Seamless updates via Azure Portal, PowerShell, SDK or API Failover group guidance remains the same Upgrade secondary first Configurations between primary and secondary should match Adjusting the memory is fully online operation, with a short failover at the very end of it. The operation will go through the process of allocating the new compute with specified configuration, which takes approximately 60 minutes, with new faster management operations. API Support Flexible Memory is fully supported via API (the minimal API version that can be used is 2024-08-01) and Azure Portal. Here’s a sample API snippet to configure memory: { "properties": { "memorySizeInGB": 96 } } Portal support Summary The new Flexible Memory capability in Azure SQL Managed Instance empowers you to scale memory independently of compute, offering greater control over performance and cost. With customizable memory-to-vCore ratios, a transparent pricing model, and seamless integration into existing management workflows, this feature is ideal for memory-intensive workloads and dynamic scaling scenarios. Whether you're optimizing for analytics, caching, or simply want more headroom without overprovisioning vCores, Flexible Memory gives you the tools to do it - efficiently and affordably. Next Steps Review the Documentation: Explore detailed configuration options, supported tiers, and API usage. Additional memory Management operations overview Management operations duration Test Your Workloads: Use the memory slider in the Azure Portal, PowerShell, SDK or API to experiment with different configurations. Learn more What is Azure SQL Managed Instance Try Azure SQL Managed Instance for free Next-gen General Purpose – official documentation Analyzing the Economic Benefits of Microsoft Azure SQL Managed Instance How 3 customers are driving change with migration to Azure SQL Accelerate SQL Server Migration to Azure with Azure ArcPublic Preview: Zone-Redundant Next-Gen General Purpose for Azure SQL Managed Instance
Customers no longer need to choose between the latest General Purpose architecture and zone-level resiliency. With the public preview of zone redundancy for Next-Generation General Purpose Azure SQL Managed Instance, organizations can now take advantage of all the benefits of Next-Generation General Purpose while meeting strict high availability and compliance requirements through Availability Zone protection. When Next-Generation General Purpose became generally available, it introduced a modernized General Purpose architecture delivering improved performance, greater scalability, enhanced flexibility, and better price-performance for Azure SQL Managed Instance workloads. Since then, customers have increasingly adopted the architecture to modernize SQL workloads, consolidate databases, and optimize total cost of ownership. Today, we're extending those benefits to customers who require zone-level resiliency. With zone redundancy now available in public preview, customers can realize all the advantages of Next-Generation General Purpose while meeting the same zone-level availability requirements previously available only with Classic General Purpose. This milestone brings full high-availability parity between Classic General Purpose and Next-Generation General Purpose, removing one of the last major reasons for customers to remain on the previous architecture. Closing the last major gap Zone redundancy has consistently been one of the most requested capabilities for Next-Generation General Purpose. Since its introduction, Next-Generation General Purpose has provided substantial improvements in scalability and flexibility, including support for up to 128 vCores, up to 32 TB of storage, up to 500 databases per instance, configurable IOPS, and flexible memory sizing. Customers can optimize resources for their workload requirements while continuing to benefit from the simplicity and compatibility of Azure SQL Managed Instance. With today's announcement, these capabilities can now be combined with zone-level resiliency, enabling customers to deploy highly available business-critical workloads on the latest General Purpose architecture without compromise. In addition, the flexible memory option for zone-redundant Next-Generation General Purpose instances is also available in public preview, providing even greater flexibility to balance performance requirements and infrastructure costs. Built-in high availability, now with Zone-level protection Azure SQL Managed Instance has always been designed for high availability. Next-Generation General Purpose delivers built-in high availability through its distributed architecture, leveraging Service Fabric together with fault domains and update domains to minimize the impact of hardware failures, software updates, and planned maintenance events. This architecture enables applications to remain available even during infrastructure events and maintenance operations. As a result, single-zone deployments provide a 99.99% availability SLA. For organizations with more demanding availability requirements, zone redundancy distributes service components across multiple Availability Zones within a region. This provides protection against zone-level failures and increases the availability SLA to 99.995%. While many workloads are well served by single-zone deployments, organizations in regulated industries and mission-critical environments often require zone-redundant architectures as part of compliance, operational resilience, or business continuity requirements. With today's preview, these customers can now adopt Next-Generation General Purpose without sacrificing those requirements. Regional availability Zone redundancy for Next-Generation General Purpose is available in public preview in all regions where the underlying ESAN infrastructure supports zone-redundant deployments. For the latest list of supported regions, check out the documentation page containing the regions where Elastic SAN is currently available and the supported redundancy options. Regions that do not yet support ESAN-based zone redundancy are not included in the preview at this time. Additional regions will become available as platform support expands. Upgrading existing deployments Whether you are already running Next-Generation General Purpose or remain on Classic General Purpose, adopting zone-redundant Next-Generation General Purpose is designed to be straightforward and transparent. Enable zone redundancy on existing Next-gen General Purpose instances Customers already running Next-Generation General Purpose can enable zone redundancy directly on existing instances and immediately benefit from enhanced resiliency and a higher availability SLA. Move from classic General Purpose zone-redundant to Next-generation General Purpose zone-redundant Customers currently running Classic General Purpose with zone redundancy can migrate to Next-Generation General Purpose while preserving zone-level resiliency and gaining access to the latest platform architecture, resource flexibility, and scalability improvements. This provides a natural modernization path for existing deployments and allows customers to standardize on the future architecture of the General Purpose tier. Online operation with a short failover Enabling zone redundancy or migrating between architectures is performed as an online management operation. During most of the operation, Azure SQL Managed Instance provisions and synchronizes the new infrastructure while the existing deployment continues serving application traffic. Near the end of the operation, a brief failover occurs as client connections are switched from the existing infrastructure to the newly provisioned environment. For more information about management operations, expected behavior, and application connectivity considerations, see management operations overview article. Protecting workloads beyond a single region For customers running in regions where zone redundancy is not currently available, or for customers seeking protection from broader regional outages, Failover Groups remain the recommended solution. Failover Groups enable disaster recovery across Azure regions by maintaining a secondary managed instance and providing automatic or manual failover capabilities when needed. This approach helps organizations meet business continuity objectives even when Availability Zone protection is unavailable or when protection from regional outages is required. Optimize disaster recovery costs with License Free failover rights Customers implementing disaster recovery through Failover Groups can further optimize costs through Azure SQL License Free failover rights. When the secondary managed instance is maintained exclusively for standby disaster recovery purposes and is not used for read-only workloads, SQL Server licensing costs do not apply to the secondary environment. Customers pay only for the compute resources required to maintain disaster recovery readiness, helping reduce overall total cost of ownership. Planning costs The Azure SQL Managed Instance pricing page and Azure Pricing Calculator have been updated to include the latest zone-redundant Next-Generation General Purpose offerings. These tools can help customers evaluate deployment options, compare availability architectures, and estimate costs associated with zone redundancy and disaster recovery configurations. Get started Zone redundancy for Next-Generation General Purpose marks the completion of an important milestone in the evolution of Azure SQL Managed Instance. Customers can now combine the performance, scalability, flexibility, and operational advantages of Next-Generation General Purpose with zone-level resiliency and a 99.995% availability SLA. Whether deploying new workloads, enabling zone redundancy on existing Next-Generation General Purpose instances, or modernizing Classic General Purpose deployments, organizations now have a clear path to adopting the latest General Purpose architecture without compromise. Learn more What is Azure SQL Managed Instance Availability through local and zone redundancy - Azure SQL Managed Instance Flexible memory - Azure SQL Managed Instance Next-gen General Purpose – official documentation Try Azure SQL Managed Instance for free Accelerate SQL Server Migration to Azure with Azure Arc Analyzing the Economic Benefits of Microsoft Azure SQL Managed Instance How 3 customers are driving change with migration to Azure SQLGenerally Available: Azure SQL Managed Instance Next-gen General Purpose
Overview Next-gen General Purpose is the evolution of General Purpose service tier that brings significantly improved performance and scalability to power up your existing Azure SQL Managed Instance fleet and helps you bring more mission-critical SQL workloads to Azure. We are happy to announce that Next-gen General Purpose is now Generally Available (GA) delivering even more scalability, flexibility, and value for organizations looking to modernize their data platform in a cost-effective way. The new #SQLMINextGen General Purpose tier delivers a built-in performance upgrade available to all customers at no extra cost. If you are an existing SQL MI General Purpose user, you get faster I/O, higher database density, and expanded storage - automatically. Summary Table: Key Improvements Capability Current GP Next-gen GP Improvement Average I/O Latency 5-10 ms 3-4 ms 2x lower Max Data IOPS 30-50k 80k 60% better Max Storage 16 TB 32 TB 2x better Max Databases/Instance 100 500 5x better Max vCores 80 128 40% better But that’s just the beginning. The new configuration sliders for additional IOPS and memory provide enhanced flexibility to tailor performance according to your requirements. Whether you require more resources for your application or seek to optimize resource utilization, you can adjust your instance settings to maximize efficiency and output. This release isn’t just about speed - It’s about giving you improved performance where it matters, and mechanisms to go further when you need them. Customer story - A recent customer case highlights how Hexure reduced processing time by up to 97.2% using Azure SQL Managed Instance on Next-gen General Purpose. What’s new in Next-gen General Purpose (Nov 2025)? 1. Improved baseline performance with the latest storage tech Azure SQL Managed Instance is built on Intel® Xeon® processors, ensuring a strong foundation for enterprise workloads. With the next-generation General Purpose tier, we’ve paired Intel’s proven compute power with advanced storage technology to deliver faster performance, greater scalability, and enhanced flexibility - helping you run more efficiently and adapt to growing business needs. The SQL Managed Instance General Purpose tier is designed with full separation of compute and storage layers. The Classic GP version uses premium page blobs for the storage layer, while the Next-generation GP tier has transitioned to Azure’s latest storage solution, Elastic SAN. Azure Elastic SAN is a cloud-native storage service that offers high performance and excellent scalability, making it a perfect fit for the storage layer of a data-intensive PaaS service like Azure SQL Managed Instance. Simplified Performance Management With ESAN as the storage layer, the performance quotas for the Next-gen General Purpose tier are no longer enforced for each database file. The entire performance quota for the instance is shared across all the database files, making performance management much easier (one fewer thing to worry about). This adjustment brings the General Purpose tier into alignment with the Business Critical service tier experience. 2. Resource flexibility and cost optimization The GA of Next-gen General Purpose comes together with the GA of a transformative memory slider, enabling up to 49 memory configurations per instance. This lets you right-size workloads for both performance and cost. Memory is billed only for the additional amount beyond the default allocation. Users can independently configure vCores, memory, and IOPS for optimal efficiency. To learn more about the new option for configuring additional memory, check the article: Unlocking More Power with Flexible Memory in Azure SQL Managed Instance. 3. Enhanced resource elasticity through decoupled compute and storage scaling operations With Next-gen GP, both storage and IOPS can be resized independently of the compute infrastructure, and these changes now typically finish within five minutes - a process known as an in-place upgrade. There are three distinct types of storage upgrade experiences depending on the kind of storage upgrade performed and whether failover occurs. In-place update: same storage (no data copy), same compute (no failover) Storage re-attach: Same storage (no data copy), changed compute (with failover) Data copy: Changed storage (data copy), changed compute (with failover) The following matrix describes user experience with management operations: Operation Data copying Failover Storage upgrade type IOPS scaling No No In-place Storage scaling* No* No In-place vCores scaling No Yes** Re-attach Memory scaling No Yes** Re-attach Maintenance Window change No Yes** Re-attach Hardware change No Yes** Re-attach Update policy change Yes Yes Data copy * If scale down is >5.5TB, seeding ** In case of update operations that do not require seeding and are not completed in place (examples are scaling vCores, scaling memory, changing hardware or maintenance window), failover duration of databases on the Next-gen General Purpose service tier scales with the number of databases, up to 10 minutes. While the instance becomes available after 2 minutes, some databases might be available after a delay. Failover duration is measured from the moment when the first database goes offline, until the moment when the last database comes online. Furthermore, resizing vCores and memory is now 50% faster following the introduction of the Faster scaling operations release. No matter if you have end-of-month peak periods, or there are ups and downs of usage during the weekdays and the weekend, with fast and reliable management operations, you can run multiple configurations over your instance and respond to peak usage periods in a cost-effective way. 4. Reserved instance (RI) pricing With Azure Reservations, you can commit to using Azure SQL resources for either one or three years, which lets you benefit from substantial discounts on compute costs. When purchasing a reservation, you'll need to choose the Azure region, deployment type, performance tier, and reservation term. Reservations are only available for products that have reached general availability (GA), and with this update, next-generation GP instances now qualify as well. What's even better is that classic and next-gen GP share the same SKU, just with different remote storage types. This means any reservations you've purchased automatically apply to Next-gen GP, whether you're upgrading an existing classic GP instance or creating a new one. What’s Next? The product group has received considerable positive feedback and welcomes continued input. The initial release will not include zonal redundancy; however, efforts are underway to address this limitation. Next-generation General Purpose (GP) represents the future of the service tier, and all existing classic GP instances will be upgraded accordingly. Once upgrade plans are finalized, we will provide timely communication regarding the announcement. Service update August 2026: Zone-redundancy for Next-gen General Purpose is now in preview. Conclusion Now in GA, Next-gen General Purpose sets a new standard for cloud database performance and flexibility. Whether you’re modernizing legacy applications, consolidating workloads, or building for the future, these enhancements put more power, scalability, and control in your hands - without breaking the bank. If you haven’t already, try out the Next-gen General Purpose capabilities for free with Azure SQL Managed Instance free offer. For users operating SQL Managed Instance on the General Purpose tier, it is recommended to consider upgrading existing instances to leverage the advantages of next-gen upgrade – for free. Welcome to #SQLMINextGen. Boosted by default. Tuned by you. Learn more What is Azure SQL Managed Instance Try Azure SQL Managed Instance for free Next-gen General Purpose – official documentation Analyzing the Economic Benefits of Microsoft Azure SQL Managed Instance How 3 customers are driving change with migration to Azure SQL Accelerate SQL Server Migration to Azure with Azure ArcAnnouncing Automatic Backup Immutability for Azure SQL Database and Azure SQL Managed Instance
Built-in protection for your most recent backups - enabled automatically Today, we're excited to announce General Availability of automatic backup immutability up to the most recent 7 days of point-in-time restore (PITR) backups in Azure SQL Database and Azure SQL Managed Instance, at no additional cost. With this release, up to most recent 7 days of backups are automatically protected with immutability by default, regardless of your configured PITR retention period. No configuration changes, policy creation, or administrative action are required. This enhancement provides an additional layer of protection for one of your most critical recovery assets - your backups. Why backup immutability matters Cyberattacks continue to evolve, with ransomware increasingly targeting not only production data, but also backup systems. Attackers understand that if backups can be deleted, modified, or corrupted, recovery becomes significantly more difficult and costly. Traditional backup strategies focus on creating recoverable copies of data. Modern cyber-resilience strategies go further by ensuring those backups themselves cannot be altered or removed during a protected period. Immutable backups help ensure that recovery points remain available when you need them most - even in the face of malicious actions, accidental deletion, or compromised administrative credentials. What is changing? Starting with this release: Up to the most recent 7 days of Azure SQL Database and Azure SQL Managed Instance PITR backups are automatically protected by immutability Protection is enabled by default for all databases, with no additional cost No configuration or onboarding is required Protection applies regardless of the database's configured PITR retention setting Because this capability is built directly into the Azure SQL backup service, customers automatically benefit from stronger protection without changing existing backup, restore, or operational workflows. Designed for modern cyber resilience Organizations across industries increasingly require stronger safeguards around backup data as part of broader cyber-resilience programs. Automatic backup immutability helps customers: Improve protection against ransomware attacks Reduce the risk of accidental backup deletion Strengthen recovery readiness Increase confidence that recent recovery points remain available during an incident Simplify adoption of immutable backup practices without additional deployment effort This capability is particularly valuable because the backups most often used during recovery operations are typically the most recent ones. Supporting compliance and governance requirements Many industries must maintain records in a protected, tamper-resistant manner to satisfy regulatory and governance requirements. Azure Storage immutable storage capabilities have been validated for compliance scenarios involving requirements such as: SEC Rule 17a-4(f) CFTC Rule 1.31(d) FINRA record-retention requirements These regulations commonly require records to be retained in a nonerasable, non-rewritable format for a defined period of time. Azure immutable storage uses a Write Once, Read Many (WORM) model that helps organizations meet these requirements. Azure SQL database backups leverage this WORM capability from Azure storage to achieve immutability for the backups. While compliance requirements vary by organization and jurisdiction, automatic backup immutability provides an additional foundational control that can support broader security, governance, and resilience objectives. No additional complexity One of our goals with this release is to deliver stronger security without increasing operational burden. You don't need to: Create immutability policies Configure storage accounts Manage retention locks Extract data The protection is integrated directly into the Azure SQL managed backup service and works automatically for all Azure SQL Database and Azure SQL Managed Instance databases. Pricing and Availability Automatic backup immutability up to the most recent 7 days of point-in-time restore (PITR) backups is available for all Azure SQL Database and Azure SQL Managed Instance databases. There is no additional cost to use this capability. The protection is built into the Azure SQL managed backup service and is automatically applied to the most recent 7 days of backups. No configuration, policy management, or separate licensing is required. By enabling immutable protection by default and at no additional charge, Azure SQL helps customers strengthen their cyber-resilience posture, improve protection against ransomware and accidental deletion, and gain the benefits of immutable backups without added operational complexity. Building on Azure SQL's data protection foundation Automatic backup immutability is the latest enhancement in Azure SQL's ongoing investment in data protection, security, and business continuity. By combining automated backups, point-in-time restore capabilities, geo-redundant backup options, soft delete protection for your Azure SQL logical server and now automatic backup immutability for recent backups, Azure SQL continues to help organizations strengthen their resilience against both operational accidents and modern cyber threats. This is just the beginning. Azure SQL hyperscale backup immutability and a host of other additional capabilities are coming soon. FAQs Q: What is changing? A: Microsoft Azure SQL will start protecting the short-term retention backups for all Azure SQL DB and Azure SQL managed instance databases with immutability to protect against ransomware attacks. Q: Are all my backups protected? A: In this release, up to most recent 7 days of short-term retention backups are immutable, regardless of the configured retention period. For example, if the configured retention period is 7 or less, then all the backups are immutable. If the configured retention period is 35 days, then the most recent 7 days of backups are immutable. Q: Is there any additional cost for this feature? A: No. Immutability for the backups is being provided as a security feature natively. Q: When will this be available? A: The code to enable immutable policy is already in progress in all Azure regions worldwide. In the next few weeks all backups will be on immutable storage. Q: Do I need to do anything to enable/configure immutability? A: No. There is no action needed on your end. The backups will automatically be immutable once the enablement is complete. Q: How can I verify if my backups are immutable? A: In a future release, immutability status will be exposed as a database property. Q: How can I get immutability for my backups beyond 7 days? A: In this release backups up to most recent 7 days are immutable. Immutability for additional retention period will be added in a future release. Limitations Immutability for Azure SQL hyperscale is not included in this release but will be available soon. Learn more To learn more about immutable storage concepts and WORM (Write Once, Read Many) protection in Azure, see: https://learn.microsoft.com/azure/storage/blobs/immutable-storage-overview We are excited to bring this protection to every Azure SQL Database and Azure SQL Managed Instance customer automatically, helping you improve backup security and recovery readiness with no additional effort. Documentation updates More details at https://aka.ms/auto-immutability Looking ahead We are just getting started on this journey of ransomware protection. Additional flexibility and configuration options coming in future releases.
