Can we configure 3 node SQL failover cluster instance having SQL standard edition on 2 nodes and enterprise edition on 1 node?

Question

We have 2 node SQL FCI with standard edition and we want to add 3rd node, can we achieve this by adding 3rd node as enterprise edition?

Answer 1

@Akshay Dattatraya Thosar

No, you cannot add a third node to a two-node SQL Server Failover Cluster Instance (FCI) with a different edition of SQL Server. All nodes in a SQL Server FCI must be running the same edition of SQL Server.

Here is a notes from Microsoft document-

Reference document- https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/sql/sql-server/failover-clusters/install/create-a-new-sql-server-failover-cluster-setup?view=sql-server-ver16&redirectedfrom=MSDN

Hope this help!

Thank you.

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Answer 2

Hi @Akshay Dattatraya Thosar,

The SQL Server edition you are installing must match across all the nodes in a SQL Server failover cluster instance. When you add a new node to an existing SQL Server failover cluster instance, make sure that you specify that the edition matches the edition of the existing failover cluster instance.

Regards，

Zoe Hui

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