Announcement: Amazon RDS for SQL Server ending support for Microsoft SQL Server 2016

Microsoft is ending extended support for SQL Server 2016 on July 14, 2026[1]. Once SQL Server 2016 extended support ends, Microsoft will stop issuing security updates. We recommend that you upgrade your Amazon RDS for SQL Server 2016 database instance(s) to a newer major version. Refer RDS SQL Server documentation for details on scheduling an upgrade [2]. A list of your RDS database instance(s) running SQL Server 2016 in can be found in the 'Affected resources' tab of your AWS Health Dashboard.

You can upgrade your SQL Server 2016 instances to SQL Server 2017, 2019, or 2022. We recommend that you thoroughly test the upgraded database instance to verify your applications work correctly before upgrading your production databases.

Key timelines:

• Starting January 15, 2026, Amazon RDS will begin disabling the creation of new RDS SQL Server 2016 database instances.
• Between July 14, 2026 and Sep 7, 2026, any remaining instances that have not upgraded will be upgraded to SQL Server 2019 (latest minor version available) in the specified maintenance window.
• Starting Sep 8, 2026, any remaining instances on SQL Server 2016 will be upgraded to SQL Server 2019 (latest minor version available) regardless of instances’ scheduled maintenance window.

You can restore a SQL Server 2016 database backup to any major version supported on Amazon RDS SQL Server. For more information on restoring a database in RDS see here [3].

If you have any questions, contact AWS Support through AWS Premium Support [4] or via the RDS community forum [5].

[1] https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/lifecycle/products/sql-server-2016 [2] https://docs.aws.amazon.com/AmazonRDS/latest/UserGuide/USER_UpgradeDBInstance.SQLServer.html [3] https://docs.aws.amazon.com/AmazonRDS/latest/UserGuide/SQLServer.Procedural.Importing.html [4] https://aws.amazon.com/support [5] https://forums.aws.amazon.com/forum.jspa?forumID=60