Windows Azure Guest OS Releases and SDK Compatibility Matrix
Updated: April 30, 2013
Microsoft has a new policy regarding Windows Azure Guest OS support. For more information see the Windows Azure Cloud Services Support Lifecycle Policy.
A short summary of the policy is that going forward
-
Microsoft will support the latest two families of the Guest OS. When a family is retired, users will have 12 months from the official retirement date to update to a newer supported Guest OS family.
-
Microsoft will support the latest version of each supported Guest OS family. When a version is retired, users will have 60 days from the official release date of the new version to update to a later version.
-
Microsoft will support the latest two versions of the Windows Azure SDK. This implies that later releases of a Guest OS will not be tested with retired versions of the Windows Azure SDK.
Additional information will be made available on this page in the coming months.
The following tables list the released Windows Azure guest operating system (Guest OS) versions and which Windows Azure SDK versions they are compatible with.
 Important |
|---|
| To ensure that your service works as expected, you must deploy it to Guest OS release that is compatible with the version of the Windows Azure SDK used to develop your service. If you do not, the deployed service may exhibit errors in the cloud that were not apparent in the development environment. |
When a new release of the Guest OS is published, it can take time to fully propagate across Windows Azure. If your service is configured to upgrade automatically, it will be upgraded sometime after the release date, and you’ll see the new Guest OS version listed for your service. If you are upgrading your service manually, the new Guest OS will be available to choose once the roll-out is complete.
For more information on OS update restarts, see this MSDN blog post titled Role Instance Restarts Due to OS Upgrades.
Subscribe to the Guest OS Update RSS Feed to receive notification when Microsoft modifies or releases a new Guest OS.
Guest OS Family 3 is substantially compatible with Windows Server 2012 and supports the .NET Framework 4.0 and 4.5.
 Warning |
|---|
| Currently, there are limitations moving from versions 1.x or 2.x to version 3.x. The same limitation applies moving from version 3.x to versions 2.x or 1.x. See Overview of Updating a Windows Azure Service for more information. |
| Guest OS | Release date | SDK Compatibility |
|---|---|---|
|
February 26, 2013 |
Windows Azure SDK version 1.8 (October 2012) and newer |
|
|
November 22, 2012 |
Windows Azure SDK version 1.8 (October 2012) and newer |
|
|
|
|
|
Guest OS Family 2 is substantially compatible with Windows Server 2008 R2 and supports the .NET Framework 3.5 and 4.0. The 2.11 release and later are substantially compatible with Windows Server 2008 R2 SP1.
| Guest OS | Release date | SDK Compatibility |
|---|---|---|
|
February 26, 2013 |
Windows Azure SDK version 1.3 (November 2010) and newer |
|
|
November 22, 2012 |
Windows Azure SDK version 1.3 (November 2010) and newer |
|
|
July 30, 2012 |
Windows Azure SDK version 1.3 (November 2010) and newer |
|
|
July 27, 2012 |
Windows Azure SDK version 1.3 (November 2010) and newer |
|
|
April 13, 2012 |
Windows Azure SDK version 1.3 (November 2010) and newer |
|
|
March 13, 2012 |
Windows Azure SDK version 1.3 (November 2010) and newer |
Guest OS Family 1 is substantially compatible with Windows Server 2008 SP2 and supports the .NET Framework 3.5 and 4.0.
| Guest OS | Release date | SDK Compatibility |
|---|---|---|
|
February 26, 2013 |
Windows Azure SDK version 1.8 (October 2012) and older |
|
|
November 22, 2012 |
Windows Azure SDK version 1.8 (October 2012) and older |
|
|
July 30, 2012 |
Windows Azure SDK version 1.7 (June 2012) and older |
|
|
July 27, 2012 |
Windows Azure SDK version 1.7 (June 2012) and older |
|
|
April 13, 2012 |
Windows Azure SDK version 1.7 (June 2012) and older |
|
|
March 13, 2012 |
Windows Azure SDK version 1.6 (November 2011) and older |
The following versions have been superseded by later versions. Superseded versions are still supported, but administrators can no longer choose them in the portal. The list below will not include versions that were released for automatic update, but which administrators could never choose manually. A Guest OS can be superseded for a number of reasons. If the patches in the new Guest OS are the same as the superseded one, then only the release number increments. For example, Windows Azure Guest OS 2.9 (Release 201112-02) was superseded by Windows Azure Guest OS 2.9 (Release 201112-03). If you are on a superseded Guest OS, Microsoft recommends that you upgrade to a non-superseded version, but will not force an upgrade.
| Guest OS | Release date | SDK Compatibility |
|---|---|---|
|
January 30, 2013 |
Windows Azure SDK version 1.8 (October 2012) and newer |
|
|
January 30, 2013 |
Windows Azure SDK version 1.3 (November 2010) and newer |
|
|
February 17, 2012 |
Windows Azure SDK version 1.3 (November 2010) and newer |
|
|
February 7, 2012 |
Windows Azure SDK version 1.3 (November 2010) and newer |
|
|
January 30, 2013 |
Windows Azure SDK version 1.8 (October 2012) and older |
|
|
February 17, 2012 |
Windows Azure SDK version 1.6 (November 2011) and older |
|
|
February 7, 2012 |
Windows Azure SDK version 1.6 (November 2011) and older |
The following versions have been deprecated and are no longer supported.
|
Warning |
|---|
| Versions 3.0, 2.12 and 1.20 were deprecated on Dec 19th 2012 because they contain the issue outlined in KB Article 2749655 and Security Advisory 2749655. Please use a later active release of the same family. |
On October 3rd 2012, a number of Windows Azure Guest OSes were deprecated. Deployments using deprecated Guest OS versions may be force upgraded at any time. For more information see KB article 2749494 .
Windows Azure Guest OS 3.x
| Guest OS | Release date | SDK Compatibility |
|---|---|---|
|
October 26, 2012 |
Windows Azure SDK version 1.8 (October 2012) and newer |
|
|
|
|
|
Windows Azure Guest OS 2.x
| Guest OS | Release date | SDK Compatibility |
|---|---|---|
|
September 20, 2012 |
Windows Azure SDK version 1.3 (November 2010) and newer |
|
|
December 28, 2011 |
Windows Azure SDK version 1.3 (November 2010) and newer |
|
|
November 16, 2011 |
Windows Azure SDK version 1.3 (November 2010) and newer |
|
|
October 28, 2011 |
Windows Azure SDK version 1.3 (November 2010) and newer |
|
|
September 26, 2011 |
Windows Azure SDK version 1.3 (November 2010) and newer |
|
|
July 15, 2011 |
Windows Azure SDK version 1.3 (November 2010) and newer |
|
|
June 3, 2011 |
Windows Azure SDK version 1.3 (November 2010) and Windows Azure SDK version 1.4 (March 2011) |
|
|
May 4, 2011 |
Windows Azure SDK version 1.3 (November 2010) and Windows Azure SDK version 1.4 (March 2011) |
|
|
March 28, 2011 |
Windows Azure SDK version 1.3 (November 2010) and Windows Azure SDK version 1.4 (March 2011) |
|
|
February 15, 2011 |
Windows Azure SDK version 1.3 (November 2010) and Windows Azure SDK version 1.4 (March 2011) |
|
|
December 13, 2010 |
Windows Azure SDK version 1.3 (November 2010) |
|
|
November 22, 2010 |
Windows Azure SDK version 1.3 (November 2010) |
Windows Azure Guest OS 1.x
| Guest OS | Release date | SDK Compatibility |
|---|---|---|
|
September 20, 2012 |
Windows Azure SDK version 1.8 (October 2012) and older |
|
|
December 28, 2011 |
Windows Azure SDK version 1.6 (November 2011) and older |
|
|
November 16, 2011 |
Windows Azure SDK version 1.5 (September 2011) and older |
|
|
October 28, 2011 |
Windows Azure SDK version 1.5 (September 2011) and older |
|
|
September 26, 2011 |
Windows Azure SDK version 1.5 (September 2011) and older |
|
|
July 15, 2011 |
Windows Azure SDK version 1.5 (September 2011) and older |
|
|
June 3, 2011 |
Windows Azure SDK version 1.4 (March 2011) and older |
|
|
May 4, 2011 |
Windows Azure SDK version 1.4 (March 2011) and older |
|
|
March 28, 2011 |
Windows Azure SDK version 1.4 (March 2011) and older |
|
|
February 15, 2011 |
Windows Azure SDK version 1.4 (March 2011) and older |
|
|
December 13, 2010 |
Windows Azure SDK version 1.3 (November 2010) and older |
|
|
November 7, 2010 |
Windows Azure SDK version 1.3 (November 2010) and older |
|
|
October 1, 2010 |
Windows Azure SDK version 1.2 (June 2010) and older |
|
|
September 1, 2010 |
Windows Azure SDK version 1.2 (June 2010) and older |
|
|
July 20, 2010 |
Windows Azure SDK version 1.2 (June 2010) and older |
|
|
June 17, 2010 |
Windows Azure SDK version 1.2 (June 2010) and older |
|
|
April 30, 2010 |
Windows Azure SDK version 1.2 (June 2010) and older |
|
|
April 5, 2010 |
Windows Azure SDK version 1.1 (February 2010) and older |
|
|
January 30, 2010 |
Windows Azure SDK version 1.1 (February 2010) and older |
|
|
December 7, 2009 |
Windows Azure SDK version 1.0 (November 2009) |
See Also
