News

Microsoft Releases SharePoint Server Subscription Edition

• By Kurt Mackie
• November 05, 2021

The new subscription model for on-premises SharePoint Server is here.

SharePoint Server Subscription Edition became generally available this week, after being in preview since July. Customers install it on their own server hardware, but Microsoft leases it via a subscription.

Details about the subscription, its costs and its support model weren't mentioned in the announcement and seem to be unavailable. General Microsoft documents on SharePoint Server Subscription Edition, though, are published here.

Subscription-Based App Servers
This product release marks a new phase in how Microsoft licenses its application servers. Current SharePoint Server users can only purchase the latest SharePoint Server products by subscription now. There's no "SharePoint Server 2022" product as might be expected.

Moreover, the next Exchange Server, Skype for Business Server and Project Server products (yet to be announced) are also designated to be sold by subscription. Microsoft had described this shift of its new application server products to a subscription model last year in October. 

It's possible to upgrade from SharePoint Server 2019 or SharePoint Server 2016 to the SharePoint Server Subscription Edition.

SharePoint Ignite Improvements
Microsoft also this week published a bunch of SharePoint and Microsoft 365 product announcements associated with its Ignite online event. It consists of features both large and small from Microsoft's product roadmap listings.

That announcement didn't mention the SharePoint Server Subscription Edition product, but it did describe the latest OneDrive, Microsoft Lists, Office.com and Microsoft Teams features that have arrived or are coming.

Included in that announcement were some SharePoint Admin Center details, namely:

• Ability to rename a SharePoint Online tenant URL name (preview).
• OneDrive sync reports now support Mac devices.
• IT pros can manage Teams and channel-connected team sites.
• Migration Manager now has file scanning for Box online storage moves.
• SharePoint Server workflows can be migrated to Power Automate directly.

On the security side, sensitivity labels are getting "more granular" at the preview stage. It's possible to use a label that requires multifactor authentication, for instance. Microsoft is also previewing new "Data Access Governance rights" to monitor sharing activities.

Overall, SharePoint users are getting faster upload (5x) and download (10x) speeds, Microsoft indicated, presumably referring to the SharePoint Online service. SharePoint Online stores 100 petabytes per month of data. Microsoft has more than 200 datacenters across 34 countries for its SharePoint Online service.