SQL Server Developer Edition – now free!

There was good news for data developers last week, as Microsoft announced that SQL Server Developer Edition will be available as a free download from now on. It's part of the Visual Studio Dev Essentials program, which I highly recommend signing up for (it's free!). You can grab SQL 2014 right now, and when 2016 is released later this year, it will be available too.

The Dev Essentials program also gives you $25 worth of Azure credits for 12 months – well worth joining for this alone.

I'm really happy to see Microsoft make this move and ensure that SQL Server is more readily available to developers. Not that it was expensive before, but removing any barriers to adoption can only help.