News & Opinion
What’s New in SQL Server 2025
This year’s release of Microsoft’s enterprise-grade relational database focuses on the most highly requested features from customers. Highlights include:
- Tooling support for SSMS like adding the debugger back in and executing the query where your cursor is on
- Production DBA enhancements like the ability to restore a single table from backup, and automatic background corruption checks
- New investments in SQL Server Reporting Services, like a report viewer for .NET Core
- T-SQL enhancements like DISTINCT support in STRING_AGG and enhanced NoSQL support
Microsoft’s Corporate Vice President of Azure Data, Rohan Kumar, explained in an interview for the Data Exposed podcast, “For years, we’ve been telling folks to post their feature requests at feedback.azure.com, and to upvote the features they found most compelling. We’ve heard their requests loud and clear, and we’re proud to announce that SQL Server 2025 delivers on what customers have really been asking for.”
This approach marks quite the departure from the last few versions, in which the flagship features like Machine Learning Services, Ledger (blockchain-ish history), and Big Data Clusters have suffered from dramatic adoption problems. “We learned from our mistakes, and we know database engine competition is tougher than ever,” Rohan explained in the podcast. “We know we can’t afford to just slap AI on it and call it a day.”
When asked about pricing and feature limitations on Standard Edition, Rohan couldn’t promise anything, but he did say, “We’ve heard from customers loud and clear that SQL Server price increases have to stop, and that today’s hardware has outpaced our restrictions on Standard Edition. We’ll have information closer to release, and I think customers will be very excited about our willingness to compete.”
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That video spells out their commitment to helping out daily DBA chores. I had felt that they had given up on that sort of thing, after letting us down with lackluster improvements and running around with OpenAI
APRIL FOOLS!!!!!!!!
Surely an April Fool! Nice one Brent!
Wow. I should have known by the Humor tag.
Nice surprise for April 1st. Great video that is super helpful.
“We’ve heard their requests loud and clear, and we’re proud to announce that SQL Server 2025 delivers on what customers have really been asking for.” This is what the marketing pukes say all the time while ignoring what people demand. I think they are preparing for government work.
“We learned from our mistakes”
???
Cruel!
How popular will Brent be at Micro$oft after they read that?
Nice troll, Mr. O!
Brent, you make me laugh! Happy April Fools’ Day!
Rohan really captures the frustration a lot of us DBAs are feeling when it comes to SQL version changes.
You had me up until “restore a single table from backup.” Happy April Fools. 🙂
It was April 2nd in NZ when I got that email, I had hope for just a few seconds.
Well played!
I would laugh but “just slap AI on it and call it a day” is like valid business strategy for all of Fortune 500s. Tough times.
I almost stood up and applauded then I read the comments
Hee hee
[…] What’s New in SQL Server 2025 (Brent Ozar) […]
Ahh… hehe… you got me there Brent 😀
I really got psyched thinking this is awesome, with all the goodies you mentioned and specially since the company I work for is planning to move away from SQL Server mainly due to licensing costs.
I thought I gotta check the intervew and happily clicked the link, had to wait for the youtube commercial and finely got rickrolled… haha… I burst out laughing by myself…
Well played Mr. Ozar, well played!
I was like “Rohan’s back?” then checked the date ?
Hee hee! I edited the blog post template to show exact dates for this reason, heh.
I knew it was fake on the first bullet, because SSMS is not part of SQL Server any more, and the only things they add to it are for Azure.
Heh – I’d say that’s not really fair because they’re adding Copilot support, but, uh… the default for that is to use LLMs in Azure, which you get billed for, so, uh… yeah.
Damnit, I read this today and didn’t notice the date. You had me so excited lol. The hardware limitations is true though…
Heh heh heh…
Hahaha
I can’t believe I fell for this April’s fool’s joke in the middle of May
heh heh heh