The cloud just got a whole lot cheaper for SQL Azure customers

To meet evolving customer needs across both ends of the database size spectrum, Microsoft announced that they are lowering the price of SQL Azure and introducing a 100MB database option at $5 per month. Customers will realize 48% to 75% savings for databases larger than 1GB. The 100MB DB option enables customers to get started using SQL Azure at half of the previous price

Here is what the pricing looks like, you can also see the percentage of the decrease

  <th>
    Previous Pricing
  </th>
  
  <th>
    New Pricing
  </th>
  
  <th>
    New Price/GB
  </th>
  
  <th>
    Total % Decrease
  </th>
</tr>

<tr>
  <td>
    5
  </td>
  
  <td>
    $49.95
  </td>
  
  <td>
    $25.99
  </td>
  
  <td>
    $5.20
  </td>
  
  <td>
    48%
  </td>
</tr>

<tr>
  <td>
    10
  </td>
  
  <td>
    $99.99
  </td>
  
  <td>
    $45.99
  </td>
  
  <td>
    $4.60
  </td>
  
  <td>
    54%
  </td>
</tr>

<tr>
  <td>
    25
  </td>
  
  <td>
    $299.97
  </td>
  
  <td>
    $75.99
  </td>
  
  <td>
    $3.04
  </td>
  
  <td>
    75%
  </td>
</tr>

<tr>
  <td>
    50
  </td>
  
  <td>
    $499.95
  </td>
  
  <td>
    $125.99
  </td>
  
  <td>
    $2.52
  </td>
  
  <td>
    75%
  </td>
</tr>

<tr>
  <td>
    100
  </td>
  
  <td>
    $499.95
  </td>
  
  <td>
    $175.99
  </td>
  
  <td>
    $1.76
  </td>
  
  <td>
    65%
  </td>
</tr>

<tr>
  <td>
    150
  </td>
  
  <td>
    $499.95*
  </td>
  
  <td>
    $225.99
  </td>
  
  <td>
    $1.51
  </td>
  
  <td>
    55%
  </td>
</tr>

<table>
</table>
GB

*Previous prices 50GB and larger reflect price cap of $499.95 announced December 12, 2011.

As you can see some of these prices decreased by 75%, that is great news for customers.

More details can be found here: https://www.windowsazure.com/en-us/pricing/details/#database