AWS EC2 to SQL Server Comparison

All Editions of the Microsoft SQL Server database are compatible and fully-integrated with Amazon Cloud hosting. We recommend to start with a SQL Server Edition that meets your current price-to-performance needs, and up-size incrementally to accommodate increasing performance and system availability needs. An incremental approach ensures that you only pay for what you need; with minimal engineering efforts required to migrate to a more scalable SQL Server database edition.

SQL Server Standard Edition 2019
(2008, 2008 R2, 2012, 2014, 2016, 2017, 2019)

Higher-end SQL Server database for building enterprise-scale Windows-based Smart Client applications, and massively scalable websites. SQL Server Standard includes support for Mirroring, and is suitable for applications with high availability needs.

SQL Server Express Edition 2019
(2008, 2008 R2, 2012, 2014, 2016, 2017, 2019)

Entry-level database capable of supporting smaller database applications with datastore capacities ranging from 1 GB to 10 GB. SQL Server Express can be hosted in the AWS Cloud at no-additional cost to the Microsoft Windows Server instance price on EC2.

SQL Server Web Edition 2019
(2008 R2, 2012, 2014, 2016, 2017, 2019)

Mid-level SQL Server database restricted to web facing applications, and available at a low-cost over the base windows server instance price on EC2. Web Edition provides unlimited database size, easy manageability, and is suitable for small to large-scale Smart Client and browser-based web applications.

SQL Server Enterprise Edition 2019
(2012, 2014, 2016, 2017, 2019)

High-end SQL Server database that provides “Always On” high availability, in-memory performance, enterprise scalability, self-service business intelligence and robust data quality. Enterprise Edition is suitable for more demanding database and business intelligence requirements.