In our previous article 7 ways to optimize your Azure costs today, we shared with you some of the options available to save costs on Microsoft Cloud. Today we want to talk about another option that adds to this list: Using your on-premises licenses with Azure Hybrid Benefit.
Taking advantage of this special licensing offer is one of the easiest ways to lower your cost of ownership on Azure.
How?
Bringing both your Windows and SQL Server licenses with Software Assurance (SA) to Azure will allow you to save up to 85% compared to pay-as-you-go pricing.
With Azure Hybrid Benefit organizations can use their existing licenses covered by SA or other subscriptions in Azure, when moving Windows Server or SQL Server on-premises workloads.
Don’t double your costs
Some of the cost-related concerns that come when migrating servers include paying double for your cloud and on-premises licenses during the migration process, plus the added security and infrastructure costs.
Nevertheless, when using Azure Hybrid Benefit, you pay only for the additional infrastructure. While working with other cloud providers will require you to repurchase your Windows Server license and pay for both cloud and on-premise licenses.
This offer also allows you to use existing Linux workloads on Azure while paying only for your virtual machine infrastructure costs.
*Note: Moving Windows and SQL Server workloads to Azure comes with three years of free security updates after the end of support.
Windows Server savings
Just as the mentioned above about Linux, when moving your Windows Server to Azure the only costs you will have to worry about are the virtual machine infrastructure costs. The Windows Server license would be covered by SA.
*Note: Software Assurance is only available as part of a commercial licensing agreement. Read more details about Software Assurance here.
SQL Server savings
With Azure Hybrid Benefit, customers with SA can use their on-premises licenses when running SQL Server on Azure Virtual Machines.
Only with this offer customers can leverage existing SQL Server licenses in both IaaS and PaaS environments.
To learn more details about this offer, please read this article written by Microsoft.
There are multiple ways your organization can optimize its Azure costs. Our team of certified experts is here to help you make the most of your Microsoft technologies while optimizing spending.
