Replication Agent Executables Concepts
Applies to: 
SQL Server
Azure SQL Managed Instance
Replication agents can be controlled programmatically in the following ways:
Using the managed agent programming interfaces in the Microsoft.SqlServer.Replication Namespace.
Invoking agent executable files from the command prompt with a supplied set of parameters.
Directly invoking replication agents from the command prompt enables agents to be programmatically accessed from command-line scripting in batch files. When an agent is invoked from the command prompt, it runs under the Microsoft Windows security account of the user that invoked the agent or started the batch file.
Instances of the following replication agents can be run using executable files.
When invoking replication agents, you can use performance profiles to automatically pass a defined set of parameters to the agent executable. For more information, see Replication Agent Profiles.
Examples
The following examples show how to invoke replication agents from the command prompt. Replication agents can also be invoked using Replication Management Objects (RMO). For more information, see Synchronize Subscriptions (Replication).
Note
Line breaks in these examples were added to improve readability. In a batch file, commands must be made in a single line.
Running the Snapshot Agent
This example batch file invokes the Snapshot Agent from the command prompt to generate a snapshot for the AdvWorksSalesOrdersMerge publication. (The scripts below use the path to SQL Server 2016 (13.x) files (version 130). You should adjust the scripts to point to the files for your version of SQL Server.)
REM -- Declare variables
SET Publisher=%InstanceName%;
SET PublicationDB=AdventureWorks2022;
SET Publication=AdvWorksSalesOrdersMerge;
REM --Start the Snapshot Agent to generate the snapshot for AdvWorksSalesOrdersMerge.
"C:\Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server\130\COM\SNAPSHOT.EXE" -Publication %Publication%
-Publisher %Publisher% -Distributor %Publisher% -PublisherDB %PublicationDB%
-ReplicationType 2 -OutputVerboseLevel 1 -DistributorSecurityMode 1 ;
Running the Distribution Agent
This example batch file invokes the Distribution Agent from the command prompt to continuously replicate changes from the AdvWorksProductTran publication to a push subscriber.
REM -- Declare the variables.
SET Publisher=%instancename%;
SET Subscriber=%instancename%;
SET PublicationDB=AdventureWorks2022;
SET SubscriptionDB=AdventureWorks2022Replica;
SET Publication=AdvWorksProductsTran;
REM -- Start the Distribution Agent with four subscription streams.
REM -- The following command must be supplied without line breaks.
"C:\Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server\130\COM\DISTRIB.EXE" -Subscriber %Subscriber%
-SubscriberDB %SubscriptionDB% -SubscriberSecurityMode 1 -Publication %Publication%
-Publisher %Publisher% -PublisherDB %PublicationDB% -Distributor %Publisher%
-DistributorSecurityMode 1 -Continuous -SubscriptionType 0 -SubscriptionStreams 4 ;
Running the Merge Agent
This example batch file invokes the Merge Agent from the command prompt to synchronize a pull subscription to the AdvWorksSalesOrdersMerge publication.
REM -- Declare the variables.
SET Publisher=%instancename%;
SET Subscriber=%instancename%;
SET PublicationDB=AdventureWorks2022;
SET SubscriptionDB=AdventureWorks2022Replica;
SET Publication=AdvWorksSalesOrdersMerge;
REM --Start the Merge Agent with concurrent upload and download processes.
REM -- The following command must be supplied without line breaks.
"C:\Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server\130\COM\REPLMERG.EXE" -Publication %Publication%
-Publisher %Publisher% -Subscriber %Subscriber% -Distributor %Publisher%
-PublisherDB %PublicationDB% -SubscriberDB %SubscriptionDB% -PublisherSecurityMode 1
-OutputVerboseLevel 2 -SubscriberSecurityMode 1 -SubscriptionType 1 -DistributorSecurityMode 1
-Validate 3 -ParallelUploadDownload 1 ;