Microsoft’s retired-sizes modernization guide covers a long list of older Azure VM series. Microsoft calls modernization mandatory to avoid unexpected shutdown. Most retirement dates are 2028 or later, but the reservation cut-offs and some HPC and FPGA deadlines are much closer.
Retirement dates
| Retirement date | VM series |
|---|---|
| May 31, 2027 | HBv2, NP-series (NP10s, NP20s, NP40s) |
| May 1, 2028 | D, Ds, Dv2, Dsv2, Ls |
| Nov 15, 2028 | Av2, Amv2, Bv1, F, Fs, Fsv2, G, Gs, Lsv2 |
| Nov 15, 2029 | Dv3, Dsv3, Ev3, Esv3 (all 32 sizes; does not apply to Azure Government, Azure operated by 21Vianet or sovereign cloud regions) |
The isolated sizes Standard_E64i_v3 and Standard_E64is_v3 are also retiring; see Microsoft’s isolation documentation for details.
Recommended replacements
| Current series | Target series (per Microsoft) |
|---|---|
| D, Ds, Dv2, Dsv2 | Dsv5, Ddsv5, Dasv5, Dadsv5; v6 and v7 D-family; Esv6, Edsv6, Easv6, Eadsv6; Easv7, Eadsv7 |
| Dv3, Dsv3 | Dv5, Dsv5, Ddv5, Ddsv5, Dasv5, Dadsv5 (smoothest transition); v6 and v7 D-family for the latest features |
| Ev3, Esv3 | Ev5, Esv5, Edv5, Edsv5, Easv5, Eadsv5 (smoothest transition); v6 and v7 E-family for the latest features |
| Av2, Amv2 | Bsv2, Basv2; Dsv5, Ddv5, Dasv5; Esv5, Edv5, Easv5; Dsv6, Ddsv6, Dasv6; Esv6, Edsv6, Easv6 |
| Bv1 | Bsv2, Basv2; Dlsv5 and Dalsv5 families; Dlsv6 and Dalsv6 families |
| F, Fs, Fsv2 | Dlsv6 and Dalsv6 families; Falsv6; Dldsv5, Dlsv5, Dsv5, Ddsv5 |
| Ls, G, Gs, Lsv2 | Lsv3, Lasv3; Lsv4, Lasv4 |
| HBv2 | HBv5, HX, HBv4, HBv3 (validate MPI performance, memory bandwidth and RDMA; HDR moves to NDR on HBv4 and HBv5) |
| NP-series | NDv2 (V100), NCads_H100_v5 (H100) or NCasT4_v3 (T4). FPGA workloads must be ported to CUDA and GPU frameworks. |
What happens if you do nothing
- After retirement, VMs on the retired size are deallocated and stop incurring charges, but lose their SLA and support.
- In-memory and temporary disk data is lost. Managed disk data is preserved.
- To recover, resize to a supported size and restart.
- HBv2 and NP-series VMs are automatically deallocated after May 31, 2027.
Reservations: the nearer deadline
For Dv3, Dsv3, Ev3, Esv3 and the older series, existing reservations stay valid through their original term. After July 1, 2026, expired reservations cannot be purchased or renewed, and workloads fall back to pay-as-you-go unless you act. For HBv2 and NP-series, 1-year and 3-year purchases ended on April 2, 2026. Microsoft’s options:
- Exchange reservations for a newer VM series without penalty.
- Trade in reservations for an Azure Savings Plan for compute, which is flexible across families and regions.
- Buy new reservations for the new series, with 1-year terms for flexibility.
Separately, the Dv3, Dsv3, Ev3 and Esv3 retirement is not the same as the capacity growth restrictions that began in July 2026.
How to migrate
- Inventory every VM by series, region and reservation coverage.
- Review reservations and decide between exchange, trade-in or new purchase.
- Pick the target size by comparing CPU, memory and storage. For NP-series, validate GPU needs and port workloads first.
- Check and request quota for the target series before you schedule changes.
- Resize: stop (deallocate) the VM, resize it, then start it. This means downtime, so schedule it.
v6 caveats
Microsoft prefers current v6 or Extended v5 general-purpose and memory-optimised series, but v6 has requirements: NVMe enabled on a supported OS, Generation 2 VMs only, and the Microsoft Azure Network Adapter (MANA) with a supported OS. Capacity may be unavailable in some regions and zones, and Bsv2, Bpsv2 and Basv2 are not available in sovereign clouds. If you cannot meet these, or capacity is tight, v5 or v4 may fit better. For Dv3 and Ev3, v5 is the smoothest move.
Where to be skeptical
The retirement dates are years out for most workloads, which makes the work easy to postpone. The risk is not the date itself: it is lapsed reservations moving you to pay-as-you-go, capacity limits in older series, and a cluster of resizes landing at once. Also test before production: a resize is a restart, and v6 changes the disk and network stack.
