Azure Synapse Analytics is a powerful cloud-based platform that combines data integration, enterprise data warehousing, and data analytics. It provides organizations with the ability to create data pipelines from various sources and store data in SQL Pools for further analysis. However, before diving into the world of Azure Synapse Analytics, it is important to understand the pricing factors associated with this service.
Pre-Purchase Plans
Azure offers pre-purchase plans for Azure Synapse Analytics based on Synapse Commit Units (SCUs). By choosing these plans, customers can save up to 28% on their usage. These pre-purchased SCUs can be used for various Synapse services, including Azure Synapse Analytics Dedicated SQL Pool, Managed VNET, Pipelines, Serverless SQL Pool, Serverless Apache Spark Pool, and Data Flow.
Here is a table showcasing the pre-purchase plans for specific tiers and Synapse Commit Units (SCUs):
| Tier | Synapse Commit Units (SCUs) |
|---|---|
| Basic | 100 |
| Standard | 500 |
| Premium | 1000 |
Data Integration
When it comes to data integration, Azure Synapse Analytics pricing is applicable while running pipeline activities. The cost is calculated based on the integration runtime and data movement activities. Additionally, you also pay for data pipeline orchestration by activity run.
Data Flow Charges
Data Flows are an important part of data pipelines in Azure Synapse Analytics. They allow you to design various data transformations without writing any code. Azure charges for Data Flow cluster execution and debugging time per vCore-hour, which is prorated by the minute and rounded up.
Operation Charges
Data pipeline operations, such as create, read, update, delete, and monitoring, incur costs. The first 1 million operations per month are free, and after that, Azure charges $0.25 per 50,000 operations.
Data Warehouse
Azure Synapse Analytics provides two types of SQL resources: Serverless Pool and Dedicated Pool. Both options allow you to query data from a data lake or data warehouse using T-SQL. However, the pricing differs for each option.
Serverless Pool
Serverless SQL allows you to run T-SQL queries on data stored in a data lake. The pricing for Serverless SQL is based on the amount of data processed by each query. There is a minimum charge of 10 MB per query, rounded up to the nearest 1 MB. DDL statements, on the other hand, do not incur any cost.
Dedicated Pool
Azure Dedicated SQL is an enterprise data warehouse solution that utilizes distributed query engines for high-performance analytics. The pricing for Dedicated SQL is based on Data Warehousing Units (DWU). Here is a table showcasing the pricing for different DWU levels:
| DWU Level | Price |
|---|---|
| 100 | $1.00/hour |
| 500 | $5.00/hour |
| 1000 | $10.00/hour |
Big Data Analytics
For big data processing tasks, Azure Synapse Analytics offers Apache Spark pools. The pricing for Spark pools is charged per vCore-hour and rounded up to the nearest minute.
Log and Telemetry Analytics
Azure Synapse Analytics can be connected to an operational data store using Azure Synapse Link, enabling near real-time analytics. Currently, Synapse Link is available for Azure SQL database, SQL Server, Azure Cosmos DB, and Dataverse. The pricing for Azure Synapse Link for SQL is based on vCore hours.
Conclusion
It is important to note that Azure Synapse Analytics pricing is subject to variation based on regions, agreements with Microsoft, date of purchase, and currency exchange rates. To optimize costs, consider pausing the SQL pool when it is not required, as you won’t be charged for compute until you resume the pool.