Public Preview: Customizing RAM per vCore with additional memory

June 2025

Public Preview: Customizing RAM per vCore with additional memory
A new customizable memory option helps you optimize costs in Azure SQL Managed Instance. Now you can independently configure RAM from the vCores, helping you to save on compute and licensing costs. Previously, increasing memory meant adding more vCores—a step that often leads to higher costs because of the need for additional licenses. With this new capability, you can now adjust the memory/vCore ratio to better suit your workload requirements, optimizing your Azure SQL Managed Instance configuration. This feature is available exclusively in the Next-gen General Purpose tier for premium-series hardware.

Generally Available: Migration service support for Azure Database for PostgreSQL 17
The migration service in Azure Database for PostgreSQL now simplifies the process of moving your PostgreSQL databases to Azure with support for PostgreSQL 17. The migration service offers migration options from various PostgreSQL-supported sources, including migrating from a cloud service, from an on-premises environment, or from a virtual machine in Azure

Public Preview: Azure SQL updates for mid-June 2025
In mid-June 2025, the following updates and enhancements were made to Azure SQL:
Data virtualization for Azure SQL Database empowers you to harness the full potential of SQL to query CSV, Parquet, and Delta Lake files stored in Azure Data Lake Storage Gen2 or Azure Blob Storage. This functionality enables seamless integration and analysis of data from diverse sources, all while preserving the data's original format and location.

Adjust RAM per vCore in Azure SQL Managed Instance for better cost-efficiency.

Generally Available: Azure SQL updates for mid-June 2025
In mid-June 2025, the following updates and enhancements were made to Azure SQL:

• Increase the resiliency of your General Purpose Azure SQL Managed Instance using zone redundancy.
• Improve your operational efficiency with faster management operations of Azure SQL Managed Instance.
• Do more with your Azure SQL Managed Instance Business Critical instances with greatly improved log rate.
• Apply the reservation discount for a 1-year or 3-year reservation of a zone-redundant Azure SQL Managed Instance in the Business Critical tier to both standard compute and the zone-redundancy add-on.

Generally Available: Azure SQL Managed Instance faster management operations
You can now create and update your Azure SQL Managed Instance with improved speed and precision. The new faster management operations experience enhances elasticity by enabling you to provision any configuration of your instance in under 30 minutes—whether it uses default or custom settings. Update and scaling operations are similarly accelerated, completing in less than 60 minutes compared to the previous four-hour process.

These improvements result from refinements to the underlying virtual cluster processes, such as virtual machine group creation, virtual machine group resizing, and resource allocation, which have been seamlessly incorporated into the Azure platform. This means you can closely align your database setup with your workload requirements—rapidly scaling out during peaks and efficiently scaling back during quieter periods to manage costs and maintain performance. Additionally, Azure SQL Managed Instance now offers enhanced compatibility with CI/CD pipelines and environment scripting through its expedited creation process.

The faster management operations experience is fully integrated across all Azure SQL Managed Instance service tiers and is generally available at no extra charge or configuration effort.

Public Preview: Azure Functions enables OpenTelemetry support
We're announcing significant improvements to OpenTelemetry support in Azure Functions, expanding on the limited preview announced last year.

These enhancements deliver better observability, improved performance, and more detailed insights into your function executions, helping you diagnose issues faster and optimize your applications more effectively. These updates make it easier to monitor and troubleshoot your serverless apps with clearer, more relevant insights.

Generally Available: Kubernetes v1.31 and v1.32 available as Long Term Support versions in AKS
Kubernetes versions 1.31 and 1.32 are now available in all regions as Long term Support (LTS) versions. Every Kubernetes version supported by community is now LTS compatible.

Generally Available: Azure Linux now also supports AKS LTS with Kubernetes v1.28 & above
Azure Linux now also supports AKS LTS starting with Kubernetes version 1.28 and above. This means you can now pair a stable, enterprise-grade node operating system with the extended lifecycle benefits of AKS LTS — providing a consistent, secure, and well-maintained platform for your container workloads.

Public Preview: Ubuntu 24.04 for AKS
Ubuntu 24.04 is now available on AKS in Kubernetes version 1.32 and above. Containerd 2.0 is enabled by default. AKS now supports Ubuntu 24.04 as a separate OS SKU, meaning that you can create new node pools or update existing node pools to Ubuntu 24.04 by setting the OS SKU to “Ubuntu2404”.

The default in Kubernetes version 1.33 remains Ubuntu 22.04. While testing Ubuntu 24.04, you can rollback to Ubuntu 22.04 by using the new OS SKU “Ubuntu2204”. This new functionality allows for more flexibility in testing and upgrading your OS versions without requiring a kubernetes version upgrade.

Public Preview: Azure Site Recovery Support for Virtual Machines with Ultra disks
Announcing the Public Preview of Azure Site Recovery (ASR) for Virtual Machines with Ultra disks. ASR provides seamless disaster recovery for Virtual Machines across Azure Regions and from on-premises to Azure, helping organizations maintain business continuity. It offers cost-effective replication, automated failover, and easy disaster recovery simulation, ensuring minimal production impact during disaster events. With built-in security, compliance support, and native integration with Azure services, ASR helps your organization stay resilient and minimize downtime.

Ultra Disks are the most performant block storage option for Azure virtual machines offering consistent low sub-millisecond latency, extremely high performance. This makes Ultra disk ideal for a broad spectrum of the most demanding enterprise production workloads, such as SAP HANA, top-tier databases, and transaction-heavy systems that require the highest levels of performance.

General Available: Microsoft Azure now available from new cloud region in Chile
The first cloud region in Chile is now available with Azure Availability Zones and provides organizations across the globe with access to scalable, highly available, and resilient Microsoft Cloud services, confirming its commitment to promoting cloud transformation and innovation in the country. The Chile Central region connects Chilean customers to the largest and trusted global cloud infrastructure, delivering the highest standards of security, privacy and regulatory-compliant data storage in the country.

General Available: Increased Disk Capacity for Azure VM Backup
Announcing the expansion of Azure VM Backup disk capacity. VMs can now be protected with individual disks up to 64 TB and a total of 512 TB per VM. This enables large disk support for business continuity and recovery from disasters or ransomware attacks.

Generally Available: Azure Red Hat OpenShift Version 4.17 Now Available with Enhanced Features

Azure Red Hat OpenShift version 4.17 is now available as an installation option. This latest release brings enhanced capabilities and improved performance for enterprise workloads running on the Azure cloud platform.

Additionally, Azure Red Hat OpenShift is now live in US Gov Arizona, expanding availability beyond US Gov Virginia. This helps customers in the government sector who require compliance with federal security and regulatory requirements. The Azure Resource Manager APIs and CLI are generally available in this region, with portal availability coming soon.

Public Preview: Continuous Performance Diagnostics for Linux VMs to Enhance VM Troubleshooting

Azure Monitor, Microsoft’s comprehensive solution for monitoring and optimizing cloud resources, is expanding its integrated diagnostics capabilities with the Public Preview of Continuous Performance Diagnostics for Linux VMs.

On-demand Performance Diagnostics has been available for Linux VMs, and this new capability bring Continuous Performance Diagnostics support to Linux, aligning with what is already available for Windows VMs. It provides continuous, actionable insights into high resource usage. Data is collected every 5 seconds and updates are uploaded every 5 minutes to your preferred storage account, whose retention policies you can customize according to your needs. This proactive approach to performance management empowers you to promptly diagnose performance issues as they arise due to high resource usage in your Azure VM, mitigating downtime and maximizing efficiency. The feature can be disabled at any time.

Elevate your troubleshooting experience with Azure Monitor and ensure optimal performance for your VMs. Seamlessly access continuous or on-demand insights, recommendations, and diagnostics data from Performance Diagnostics, all within your Azure Monitor workflow.