Ubuntu 24.04 VM with SQL Server 2025 Developer

Ubuntu 24.04 VM with Microsoft SQL Server 2025 Developer Edition by cloudimg

Microsoft SQL Server 2025 Developer Edition on Ubuntu 24.04 LTS, purpose built for Microsoft Azure and maintained by cloudimg. Developer Edition is the full Enterprise feature set, free for development and testing — perfect for building, prototyping, load-testing, and QA against the same engine you'd run in production.

What's New in Microsoft SQL Server 2025 (Developer)

• Native vector type and HNSW indexes — `VECTOR(N)` columns and approximate-nearest-neighbour search built into the engine for RAG and semantic search
• Native JSON_OBJECT / JSON_ARRAY / JSON_VALUE / JSON_PATH — first-class T-SQL JSON construction
• Native regex — REGEXP_LIKE, REGEXP_INSTR, REGEXP_SUBSTR, REGEXP_REPLACE
• Optimized locking — reduced lock memory, fewer escalations on concurrent OLTP
• Native AAD on Linux — Microsoft Entra ID authentication for Linux clients

Why Choose cloudimg?

• 24/7 Expert Support — guaranteed 24-hour response. support@cloudimg.co.uk
• Production Ready from Launch — pre-configured, security-patched, validated
• Azure Native Integration — Azure Linux Agent, cloud-init, Gen2 Hyper-V, TrustedLaunch
• Per VM SA + cloudimg Credentials — fresh strong passwords generated at first boot, written to /stage/scripts/mssql-credentials.log (mode 0600 root only)

Developer Edition — Full Enterprise Capabilities

• In-memory OLTP (Hekaton) — natively-compiled stored procedures, memory-optimized tables
• Always On Availability Groups with up to 8 readable secondaries
• Transparent Data Encryption (TDE), Always Encrypted, Row-Level Security
• Columnstore indexes, partitioning, backup compression
• Resource Governor with full workload isolation
• Native vector + HNSW, native JSON, native regex, optimized locking, AAD on Linux

Licensing — FREE for Dev/Test

Developer Edition is licensed by Microsoft for development and testing only — NOT for production. No product key, no BYOL step required. The cloudimg charge ($0.04 per vCPU/hour) covers packaging, security patching, image maintenance, and 24/7 expert support; the Microsoft SQL Server engine itself is free. For production, apply a Standard or Enterprise 2025 key with `sudo /opt/mssql/bin/mssql-conf set-edition`.

Recommended Virtual Machine Sizes

• Standard_B2s (2 vCPU, 4 GB RAM) — light dev/test
• Standard_D4s_v5 (4 vCPU, 16 GB RAM) — typical developer workstation backend
• Standard_D8s_v5 (8 vCPU, 32 GB RAM) — load testing and integration test environments