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Category: Vectors

The State of Vector Indexes in SQL Server 2025

Published 2026-03-05 by Kevin Feasel

Rebecca Lewis separates marketing hype from reality:

Microsoft’s entire marketing pitch for SQL Server 2025 is ‘the AI-ready database.’ It went GA on November 18, 2025. We are now four months in. Here is what is actually GA, what is still behind a preview flag, and what that means if you are evaluating this for production.

Read on for a list, as well as a summary of Erik Darling’s great work on the topic.

My take on this is that vector indexes are where columnstore indexes were in SQL Server 2012: a neat idea, but not ready for prime time. It took until 2016 before columnstore indexes were actually worthwhile (primarily, the introduction of clustered columnstore indexes and ability to rebuild indexes), so we’ll see if it takes as long for vector indexes to get all of the necessary functionality.

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Performing Log Shipping between SQL Server Versions

Published 2026-02-10 by Kevin Feasel

Greg Low answers a question:

One of the discussion lists that I participate in, had a brief discussion the other day about whether or not it’s possible to perform log shipping between differernt versions of SQL Server.

Specifically, can you do log shipping between SQL Server 2017 and SQL Server 2025?

Because the question was not in the header, it does not violate Betteridge’s Law of Headlines. Well done, Greg.

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Vectors and Columnstore Indexes

Published 2025-12-30 by Kevin Feasel

Niko Neugebauer continues a series on columnstore indexes:

In this post we are going to test one of the more promising technologies in SQL Server-based offerings – Vector data types and its relationship with the Columnstore Indexes. The tests I am running right now are executed against SQL Server 2025 RTM, the latest and greatest SQL Server version available to customers. Given that some parts of the SQL Server 2025 were delivered as a Preview Features, the current situation might change in the future for SQL Server 2025 (at least, Half-precision float support should evolve into the fully supported feature, in my opinion). At very least, I do expect reasonably fast evolution of the space on Azure SQL Database & Azure SQL Managed Instance.

This seems like more pain than joy, which is the unfortunate reality of v1 features in SQL Server anymore.

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