Azure SQL Managed Instance Scaling

Question

Hi,
We are in the process of migrating our on prem SQL Dbs into Azure SQL Managed instance.

a couple of queries:

1) Does Azure SQ Managed Instance support Pause/Resume or allocate/deallocate just like VM. we want to reduce our running costs for Managed instance.
2) Does SQL MI supports scale up and scale down via automated scripts?
3) Can SQL MI be scales across service tiers i.e There are some days with peak loads. on these days, i want to scale up from General to Businesss tier. on the other days, i want to scale down to General.

Please help with the above.

thanks

Answer 1

@Biju Mathew Thank you for your interest in Azure SQL Managed Instance.
Let me answer your questions one by one.

1) Does Azure SQ Managed Instance support Pause/Resume or allocate/deallocate just like VM. we want to reduce our running costs for Managed instance.

No, it is not possible to Pause/Resume SQL Managed Instance.
If you have workloads that are completely inactive for extended periods of time, please consider SQL Azure Database Serverless instead

2) Does SQL MI supports scale up and scale down via automated scripts?

Yes, you can use PowerShell, CLI or Rest API to manage scaling.
There are some Runbooks already available on the gallery. Please check this article for a sample.

3) Can SQL MI be scales across service tiers i.e There are some days with peak loads. on these days, i want to scale up from General to Businesss tier. on the other days, i want to scale down to General.

Yes, you can switch between General and Business Critical tiers.
However please be aware that the scaling operation could take a while depending on the amount of data you have across all databases in the Managed Instance.

Do let us know if you have further questions.

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