Windows Server mixed licensing

Question

Hello everyone,

I hope you can help me answer some questions about licensing Windows Server in a virtualized environment, where VMs have a different Windows Server version than the Host. How would that work, licensing wise? From a technical point of view, I know for certain it works flawlessly.

Let's build an example:
1 physical server with 2 physical cpus that have 48 threads each, running Windows Server 2022
10 VMs, 4 running on Windows Server 2022, 4 running 2019 and 2 running 2016.

Would we have to have Standard Licenses for each Version? Would licensing the Host according to standard licensing rules (every CPU over a minimum of 8 cores, every server over a minimum of 16 cores, all physical cores in a host)
Would that only work with a Datacenter license?
Would that not work at all and would Microsoft like to see a Host for each Version?

Looking forward to hearing back from you all.

Answer 1

If using Standard license then the host will need to be licensed for each OS used. If using a (for example) a 2022 DataCenter host then you can utilize AVMA activation to where you could have guests ranging from 2012 R2 up to 2022 both Standdard and DataCenter editions.

Some general info

• Each host needs to be licensed.
• A minimum of 8 core licenses is required for each physical processor and a minimum of 16 core licenses is required for each server.
• Core licenses are sold in packs of two.
• Standard Edition provides rights for up to 2 Operating System Environments or Windows Servers containers with Hyper-V isolation when all physical cores in the server are licensed. For each additional 1 or 2 VMs, all the physical cores in the server must be licensed again.
• DataCenter Edition provides rights for unlimited Operating System Environments or Windows Servers containers with Hyper-V isolation when all physical cores in the server are licensed.
  AVMA keys can be used only when the host is DataCenter edition

https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-server/get-started/automatic-vm-activation

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