SQL Azure Pricing Dropped

To meet evolving customer needs across both ends of the database size spectrum, we are lowering the price of SQL Azure and introducing a 100MB database option.

Customers will realize 48% to 75% savings for databases larger than 1GB. The 100MB DB option enables customers to get started using SQL Azure at half of the previous price, while still providing the full range of features including: high availability, fault tolerance, self-management, elastic scale-out, on-premises connectivity, and full Service Level Agreement. Full details on our new pricing can be found here.

Today’s price reductions and new entry-level database option are the result of both customer feedback and evolving usage patterns. Specifically, two usage patterns have emerged in the last 18 months. First, many projects start small but need to quickly grow in size. To promote this pattern, we are passing along better economies of scale and options for larger deployments. As your database grows, the price per GB will decline significantly. Second, many cloud adopters and customers with smaller workloads want an inexpensive option for modest usage. Just as we made a 150GB option available for customers with large database needs, we are providing the same level of choice at the other end of the spectrum with the 100MB option for smaller database needs. Today’s announcement is another step in our ongoing journey to help customers with a variety of scenarios embrace Cloud Computing.

The chart below provides a side by side comparison of the cost savings as cloud deployments grow and database sizes increase. Be sure to check out our pricing calculator and pricing page for additional details.

You can start building your application on it in some simple and easy to do steps:

1. Setup an Account:

Set up an account and obtain a free subscription for accessing the online portals for Windows Azure an SQL Azure. You can sign up and get the trial from https://www.windowsazure.com/en-us/pricing/free-trial/.

Note: With the new capping functionality available you are assured that no charging is happening once your trial offer has expired and if you have an MSDN subscription then you have even more benefits which can be found at https://aka.ms/mbl-azure/benefits.

2. Create your First application and Deploy it on the Windows Azure Platform:

Download the tools and learn how to create an application using .NET, JAVA, Node.js or PHP and deploy it on Windows Azure at https://aka.ms/mbl-azure/first-app.

When all steps are executed successfully you should have running your first application on the Windows Azure Platform.