MySQL licensing

Software Licensing
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Struggling to find clarity on the licence models for MySQL. It’s licenced by socket (1-4 or 5+). For deployment on ESX environments, I assume this refers to the physical host socket count. i.e. if you have a single VM with MySQL installed on an ESX cluster, all the sockets on all the hosts in the cluster need to be covered on a server by server basis

Am I right in thinking that way?

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Hi Ian,

Some question:

What version/edition of MySQL is being used. From what I know and researched on MySQL licensing, some of it is governed by GNU General Public Licensing. Some commercial licensing is governed by Oracle Premiere Support.

Pricing is “per Server”, for 2 classes: Servers with 1-4 Sockets, and Servers with 5+ Sockets

For pricing for 5+ Socket Servers, contact the MySQL Sales Team

Some helpful links: MySQL :: MySQL Products

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“Pricing is “per Server””

So what is the definition of a server in this instance?

Is it the ESX host? All ESX hosts in a cluster? or a VM?

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Hi Ian,

Since I am not a licensing expert in MySQL, I can only offer my opinion on how I understand it.

Pricing is “per Server”, for 2 classes:

  1. Servers with 1-4 Sockets
  2. For 5+ Socket Servers, [contact the MySQL Sales Team]

Some additional links for pricing: https://blogs.oracle.com/mysql/post/get-the-facts-mysql-licensing-and-pricing

I would reach out to the Oracle Sales team to understand how they measure the “per server” license metric.

The “per server” definition is not absolute with every publisher so I would ask for clarity from Oracle. I’m sure there are ITAM forum members that can explain it better than I can.

James