Azure VMware Solution – Extended Security Updates & Azure Hybrid Benefit

I get this question regularly. “Does Azure VMware Solution provide the same benefits that come with moving workloads to Azure”.  Short answer, yes!

Azure VMware Solution is Azure! Therefore, benefits you get uniquely with Azure apply to AVS. 

Windows Server Extended Security Updates

You may be aware that you can get extended support for select Windows Server versions by migrating those workloads to Azure.   Because AVS is Azure, those same benefits apply to Azure VMware Solution. Great use case is migrate those workloads quickly to AVS, make sure you get the extended security updates, then work through the process of upgrades those OSes or moving the workloads to other Azure services. 

To get the security updates on AVS you would follow the same process you would for on-premises VMs.  Don’t get tricked by the title, Register for Extended Security Updates for non-Azure servers and obtain your Multiple Activation Key.  Just treat the VMs running on AVS the same way you would on-premises VMs.

Licensing Azure VMware Solution & Azure Hybrid Benefit

The entire VMware software stack which is needed to run Azure VMware Solution is included in the price per node.  But the cluster still needs to be licensed for the Microsoft (and other) workloads.  Because AVS is Azure, the Azure Hybrid benefit can be applied to the AVS (ESXi) Hosts to license the OSes running on them, or just the workloads themselves.