Comparing Sitecore 9.0, 9.1 and 9.2 Infrastructure and Hosting on Azure PaaS

Overview

The recent release of Sitecore 9.2. has prompted a series of questions around the changes between the new version, and its predecessors 9.1. and 9.0. We're going to play spoiler and remove some of the mystery of what you can expect from a Sitecore + Azure + PaaS perspective. In this blog post, we try to shed some light on this and take a deep-dive into the cost, feature and infrastructure changes between Sitecore 9.0, 9.1. and 9.2.

Azure Deployment Topologies & SKUs

Before we dive into the cost, feature and infrastructure changes that have occurred across each new version, let’s first take a look at the evolution of the templates used by Sitecore XP in versions 9.0, 9.1 and 9.2.

Sitecore uses a resource templating system called ARM templates to create automated deployments in Azure. With each version of Sitecore, new versions of the ARM templates are released and provided in Extra Small, Small, Medium, Large and Extra Large topologies for XP1. The new versions of these templates adjust both the infrastructure, as well as the size/power of the resources that are used by Sitecore.

Cost Comparison By Version

With all this in mind, let's take a look at how the pricing has changed between each version.

SKU	Sitecore XP1 9.0	Sitecore XP1 9.1	Sitecore XP1 9.2
Extra Small	$1,108.58 USD	$1,638.85 USD	$1,393.57 USD
Small	$1,262.32 USD	$1,843.83 USD	$1,598.55 USD
Medium	$2,097.00 USD	$3,314.71 USD	$2,824.15 USD
Large	$4,623.60 USD	$6,324.43 USD	$5,588.59 USD
Extra Large	$7,686.75 USD	$10,117.00 USD	$9,381.16 USD

These are monthly estimates using 30.42 days/month based on the SKUs as of August 22, 2019.

Detailed Cost Breakdown

For an in-depth look at the changes in cost between versions 9.0, 9.1 and 9.2, read our blog about Sitecore’s XP1 9.0 cost breakdown and Sitecore’s XP 9.2 cost breakdown.

What Changed In Each Version?

Sitecore 9.0

Version 9.0 introduced a scaled, role-based infrastructure

xConnect roles for Marketing Operations, Marketing Automation Reporting, xConnect Collection Search, xConnect Collection & xConnect Reference Data were introduced

App Services were provisioned as B-level resources

Sitecore 9.1

Identity Server App Service was introduced

Sitecore Cortex brought the addition of Cortex Processing Service and Cortex Report Service databases and App Services

B-level App Services were all upgraded to S-level, which provided better performance and a new tier of DevOps features

With the inclusion of Cortex and the increase of all App Services to S-level, there is a commensurate price increase

Sitecore 9.2

Extra Small, Small, Medium, Large & Extra Large template topologies have all been reduced in cost from version 9.1

This price reduction comes from scaled back Azure Search instances, which were over-scaled in 9.1

Azure Search errs on the more expensive side of cloud-based search tools, so if cost reduction is your goal, you might want - to consider other options

Closing Thoughts

Sitecore XP1 9.2 looks to have reached the best value when considering balancing pricing and performance

The release of version 9.2. shows that Sitecore are continuing to adjust their deployment templates to find the right fit for their customers

Have further questions?

Feel free to reach out at [email protected] or you can find me on LinkedIn, Twitter or Sitecore Slack (dancruickshank) and say hello.