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Run SQL Server on your favorite platform

It's all about choice. Now, you can get SQL Server 2017's industry-leading performance and security on Windows, Linux, and Docker containers.

What you'll love about SQL Server 2017

Your choice of language and platforms

Build modern applications using the language of your choice, on-premises and in the cloud, now on Windows, Linux and Docker containers.

Industry-leading performance

Take advantage of breakthrough scalability, performance, and availability for mission-critical, intelligent applications and data warehouses.

The IT Resource Kit titled Get Started with Azure SQL.

Least vulnerable database

Protect data at rest and in motion with the least vulnerable database over the last seven years in the NIST vulnerabilities database.1

Real-time intelligence

Gain transformative insights for your business with real-time analytics at up to 1M predictions/second.

SQL Server news

Introducing SQL Server 2022

Azure-enabled with continued performance and security innovation, SQL Server 2022 provides a modern data platform to transform your business.

Gartner Magic Quadrant for Cloud Database Management Systems

Read Gartner’s assessment of the cloud DBMS landscape and learn why Microsoft has been recognized as a leader.

Azure Synapse Analytics

Azure Synapse Analytics is a limitless analytics service that brings together data integration, enterprise data warehousing, and big data analytics.

Get started with the latest version of SQL Server

Use your existing SQL experience in the cloud

Get to know the features and benefits of Azure SQL

Compare Microsoft SQL Server versions

Feature availability

  • not supported Not supported
  • supported Fully supported
Pricing and licensing overview
Features
SQL Server 2017
SQL Server 2016
SQL Server 2014
SQL Server 2012 SQL Server 2008 R2
Performance
In Memory OLTP
Supported
Supported
Supported
Not Supported
Not Supported
In-Memory ColumnStore
Supported
Supported
Supported
Supported
Not Supported
Real Time Operational Analytics
Supported
Supported
Not Supported
Not Supported
Not Supported
Buffer Pool extension to SSD
Supported
Supported
Supported
Not Supported
Not Supported
Adaptive Query Processing2
Supported
Not Supported
Not Supported
Not Supported
Not Supported
Availability
Always On2
Supported
Supported
Supported
Supported
Not Supported
Basic Availability Groups
Supported
Supported
Not Supported
Not Supported
Not Supported
Security
Transparent data encryption2
Supported
Supported
Supported
Supported
Supported
Backup encryption support
Supported
Supported
Supported
Not Supported
Not Supported
Encryption at rest and in motion
Supported
Supported
Not Supported
Not Supported
Not Supported
Dynamic Data Masking and Row Level Security
Supported
Supported
Not Supported
Not Supported
Not Supported
Separation of duties
Supported
Supported
Supported
Supported
Not Supported
Cloud-readiness
Backup to Azure
Supported
Supported
Supported
Supported
Not Supported
Disaster recovery to Microsoft Azure
Supported
Supported
Supported
Not Supported
Not Supported
Optimized virtual machine images in Azure gallery
Supported
Supported
Supported
Supported
Not Supported
Stretch Database
Supported
Supported
Not Supported
Not Supported
Not Supported
Management and programmability
Runs on Linux and Docker Containers
Supported
Not Supported
Not Supported
Not Supported
Not Supported
Temporal tables
Supported
Supported
Not Supported
Not Supported
Not Supported
JSON support
Supported
Supported
Not Supported
Not Supported
Not Supported
Graph data support
Supported
Not Supported
Not Supported
Not Supported
Not Supported
BI and analytics
Integration services managed as a server
Supported
Supported
Supported
Supported
Not Supported
PolyBase for T-SQL query across Hadoop
Supported
Supported
Not Supported
Not Supported
Not Supported
Tabular BI semantic model2
Supported
Supported
Supported
Supported
Supported
Master data services2
Supported
Supported
Supported
Supported
Supported
Data quality services2
Supported
Supported
Supported
Supported
Not Supported
In-database advanced analytics
Supported
Supported
Not Supported
Not Supported
Not Supported
End-to-end Mobile BI on any device
Supported
Supported
Not Supported
Not Supported
Not Supported

SQL 2017 Features

  • #1 in price and performance—with massive scale

    SQL Server consistently leads in the TPC-E OLTP workload, the TPC-H data warehousing workload, and real-world application performance benchmarks. Get record-breaking performance now on Windows and Linux.

    Highest performing data warehouses

    Get support for small data marts to large enterprise data warehouses while reducing storage needs with enhanced data compression. Scale to petabytes of data for enterprise-grade relational data warehousing—and integrate with non-relational sources like Hadoop.

  • Security and compliance

    Protect data at rest and in motion with a database that has the least vulnerabilities of any major platform for six years running in the NIST vulnerabilities database (National Institute of Standards and Technology, National Vulnerability Database, Jan 17, 2017). Security innovations in SQL Server 2017 help secure data for mission-critical workloads with a layers of protection security approach, adding Always Encrypted technology along with row-level security, dynamic data masking, transparent data encryption (TDE), and robust auditing.

  • High availability and disaster recovery

    Gain mission-critical uptime, fast failover, easy setup, and load balancing of readable secondaries with enhanced Always On in SQL Server 2017—a unified solution for high availability and disaster recovery on Linux and Windows. Plus, put an asynchronous replica in an Azure Virtual Machine for hybrid high availability.

  • Corporate business intelligence

    Scale your business intelligence (BI) models, enrich your data, and ensure quality and accuracy with a complete BI solution. SQL Server Analysis Services help you build comprehensive, enterprise-scale analytic solutions—benefiting from the lightning-fast performance of in-memory built into the tabular model. Reduce time to insights using direct querying against tabular and multidimensional models.

    End-to-end mobile BI on any device

    Gain insights and transform your business with modern, paginated reports and rich visualizations. Use SQL Server Reporting Services to publish reports to any mobile device—including Windows, Android, and iOS devices—and access reports online or offline.

    Simplify data big and small

    Combine relational data and big data with PolyBase technology that queries Hadoop using simple T-SQL commands. JSON support lets you parse and store JSON documents and output relational data into JSON files. Now in SQL Server 2017, manage and query graph data inside your relational database.

  • In-database advanced analytics

    Build intelligent applications with SQL Server Machine Learning Services using R and Python. Move beyond reactive and into predictive and prescriptive analytics by performing advanced analytics directly within the database. By using multi-threading and massively parallel processing, you’ll gain insights faster than using open source R and Python alone.

    Real-time hybrid transactional/analytical processing

    Combine in-memory columnstore and rowstore capabilities in SQL Server 2017 for real-time operational analytics—fast analytical processing right on your transactional data. Open up new scenarios like real-time fraud detection without impacting your transactional performance.

  •  

    Now on Windows, Linux, and Docker

     

    Develop once and deploy anywhere with our consistent experience from on-premises to cloud. Now with support for Windows and Linux as well as Docker containers.

     

    Consistent data platform from on-premises to cloud

     

    Get a consistent experience from on-premises to the cloud—letting you build and deploy hybrid solutions for managing your data investments. Benefit from the flexibility to run SQL Server workloads in Azure Virtual Machines, or use Azure SQL Database to scale and further simplify database management.

     

    Easy-to-use tools and connectors

     

    Use the skills you already have, along with familiar tools like Microsoft Entra ID (formerly Azure Active Directory) and SQL Server Management Studio, to manage your database infrastructure across on-premises SQL Server and Microsoft Azure. Apply industry-standard APIs across various platforms and download updated developer tools from Visual Studio to build next-generation web, enterprise, business intelligence, and mobile applications.

Available SQL Server 2017 editions

Enterprise

Access mission-critical capabilities to achieve unparalleled scale, security, high availability, and leading performance for your Tier 1 database, business intelligence, and advanced analytics workloads.

Standard

Find rich programming capabilities, security innovations, and fast performance for mid-tier applications and data marts. Easily upgrade to the Enterprise edition without having to change any code.

Express

Build small, data-driven web and mobile applications up to 10 GB in size with this entry-level database. Available for free.

Developer

Build, test, and demonstrate applications in a non-production environment with this full-featured edition of SQL Server 2017.

Compare SQL Server 2017 editions

View the comprehensive feature comparison of SQL Server 2017 editions for feature details and limitations.3

Compare SQL Server 2017 editions


Feature availability

 Not supported 

 Fully supported

Features

SQL Server 2017 Enterprise SQL Server 2017 Standard SQL Server 2017 Express SQL Server 2017 Developer
Scale
Maximum number of cores Unlimited 24 cores 4 cores Unlimited
Memory: Maximum buffer pool size per instance Operating system max 128 GB 1410 MB Operating system max
Memory: Maximum Columnstore segment cache per instance Operating system max 32 GB 352 MB Operating system max
Memory: Maximum memory-optimized data per database Operating system max 32 GB 352 MB Operating system max
Maximum database size 524 PB 524 PB 10 GB 524 PB
Production use rights
Unlimited virtualization, a software assurance benefit
Programmability
Programmability and developer tools: T-SQL, SQL CLR, Service Broker, JSON, XML, graph data support
OLTP performance
Advanced OLTP: in-memory OLTP, operational analytics[3]
Manageability: Management Studio, policy-based management
Basic high availability: two-node single database failover, non-readable secondary
Advanced high availability: Always On Availability Groups, multi-database failover, readable secondaries
Security
Advanced security: Always Encrypted Row-level security, data masking
Compliance reporting with SQL Server audit
Transparent data encryption
Data integration
Advanced data integration: fuzzy grouping and look ups
Data warehousing
Data marts and data warehousing: partitioning, data compression, change data capture, database snapshot
In-memory columnstore[3]
Adaptive Query Processing[6]
PolyBase[4],[5]
Enterprise data management: Master Data Services, Data Quality Services[5]
Business intelligence
Maximum memory utilized per instance of Analysis Services[5] Operating system max

Tabular: 16 GB

MOLAP: 64 GB

Operating system max
Maximum memory utilized per instance of Reporting Services[5] Operating system max 64 GB Express with Advanced Services: 4 GB Operating system max
Basic reporting and analytics[5]
Basic data integration: SQL Server Integration Services, built-in connectors
Basic corporate business intelligence: basic multi-dimensional models, basic tabular model, in-memory storage mode[5]
Mobile reports and KPIs[5]
Advanced corporate business intelligence: advanced multi-dimensional models, advanced tabular model, DirectQuery storage mode, advanced data mining[5]
Access to Power BI Report Server, a software assurance benefit
Advanced analytics
Basic Machine Learning integration: connectivity to open source Python and R, limited parallelism[5]
Advanced Machine Learning integration: full parallelism of R and Python analytics and the ability to run on GPUs[5]
Machine Learning for Hadoop/Spark and Machine Learning for Linux, a software assurance benefit
Hybrid cloud
Stretch Database[5]

How to license SQL Server

SQL Server licensing makes choosing the right edition simple and economical. Unlike other major vendors, there's no having to pay for expensive add-ons to run your most demanding applications—because every feature and capability is already built in.

Simple pricing metrics

Pay by processing power for mission-critical applications as well as business intelligence. Add self-service BI on a per user basis.

Flexibility and innovation

Cloud-optimized licensing with the ability to license virtual machines, and the flexibility to move from server to server, to hosters, or to the cloud, on the operating system of your choice.

Industry-leading TCO

Get outstanding value at any scale compared to all major vendors. The Enterprise edition offers all product features and capabilities with no costly add-ons required to run your most demanding applications.

For sales questions, contact a Microsoft representative at (800) 426-9400 in the United States or (877) 568-2495 in Canada.

SQL Server pricing

SQL Server pricing
SQL Server 2017 editions Ideal for … Licensing model Channel availability Open no level price (US$)
Enterprise Comprehensive, mission-critical performance for demanding database and business intelligence requirements. Provides the highest service and performance levels for Tier-1 workloads.[7] Per core[8] Volume licensing, hosting $14,256[9]
Standard - per core Core data management and business intelligence capabilities for non-critical workloads with minimal IT resources. Per core[8] Volume licensing, hosting $3,717[9]
Standard - server + CAL Core data management and business intelligence capabilities for non-critical workloads with minimal IT resources. Server + CAL[10] Volume licensing, hosting, retail FPP $931[9]
Developer Full-featured version of SQL Server software that allows developers to cost-effectively build, test, and demonstrate applications based on SQL Server software. Per user Free download Free
Web Secure, cost effective and highly scalable data platform for public web sites. Available to third party software service providers only. Not applicable Hosting only See your hosting partner for pricing
Express Free entry-level database that's ideal for learning, as well as building desktop and small server data-driven applications of up to 10 GB. Not applicable Free download Free

Pay-as-you-go pricing

Pricing and licensing overview
Editions
Monthly rate (US$)
Hourly rate (US$)
Standard - per core

$73

$0.100

Enterprise – per core

$273.75

$0.375

How to buy SQL Server

Connect with a Microsoft solution provider

Whether you're evaluating business needs or ready to buy, a Microsoft certified solution provider will guide you every step of the way. 

Contact your Microsoft account representative

Call your account manager or contact your regional Microsoft office for further details.

Buy online at the Microsoft Store

SQL Server 2017 Standard edition is available to buy online. Easily upgrade to Enterprise edition for comprehensive high-end datacenter capabilities.

Featured SQL Server resources

The IT Resource Kit titled Get Started with Azure SQL.

Azure SQL resource kit

Get the resources and information you need to start your SQL Server migration. Utilize your existing on-premises SQL Server skills and plan your successful deployment to Azure SQL with this resource kit.

The white paper titled SQL Server performance: faster querying with SQL Server.

SQL Server technical e-books

Get the technical resources, documentation, and code samples you need to support all areas of your data estate—from discovery and research to implementation and maintenance.

The e-book titled Cloud Database Migration Simplified.

Cloud Database Migration Simplified e-book

Help your organization improve cost-efficiency, agility, and scalability by migrating to the cloud. Use this guide to help with planning and implementing your end-to-end database migration strategy, as well as tools to make your migration faster and easier.

  • [1] According to the National Institute of Standards and Technology, SQL Server has had the fewest security vulnerabilities over the past seven years when compared with other major database vendors.
  • [2] SQL Server Enterprise edition only.
  • [3] In-memory OLTP and in-memory columnstore are limited to the amount of memory specified by edition in the Scale Limits section. Columnstore and Real-time Operational Analytics are also limited to two degrees of parallelism (two cores/query) in SQL Server Standard edition and one degree of parallelism (one core/query) in SQL Server Web and Express editions.
  • [4] Scaling out queries using PolyBase requires using SQL Server Enterprise edition as a head node.
  • [5] Certain features including SQL Server Reporting Services, SQL Server Analysis Services, Machine Learning Services, PolyBase, and Stretch Database are not available in SQL Server 2017 on Linux.
  • [6] Interleaved Execution is available in all editions.
  • [7] Customers who require a massively parallel processing data warehouse now have access to a parallel data warehouse through their Enterprise Edition core licenses with Software Assurance. Parallel data warehouse is part of the Microsoft Analytics Platform System.
  • [8] Editions sold in the per-core licensing model are sold as 2 core packs.
  • [9] Pricing represents open no level (NL) estimated retail price. For your specific pricing, contact your Microsoft reseller.
  • [10] Client access licenses (CALs) are required for every user or device accessing a server in the Server + CAL licensing model. See the product use rights for details.

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