Oracle Multitenant licensing Intro
Oracle has made several changes to its Oracle multitenant licensing rules some is now free, but it depends on how much you are using the product and which version of Oracle database that you are running. This article will help you understand the basic concepts of the product and the licensing and the costs.
The short answer
- The Oracle Multitenant architecture allows for the consolidation of multiple physical databases into a single database.
- It can be used with the Oracle Database 12c Enterprise Edition and is compatible with features such as Real Application Clusters and Data Guard.
- The main benefits of the multitenant architecture include ease of adoption, improved manageability, database isolation and security, and the ability to prioritize resources for each database.
- The Oracle Multitenant option supports two types of licensing: Named User Plus and Per Processor. Starting from 19c and onwards, A license is required if you need four or more Pluggable Databases (PDBs) within one Container Database (CDB).
- The Oracle Multitenant license costs are $ 17,500 per processor license or $ 350 per named user plus.
The long answer
What is Oracle’s multitenant option?
Oracle Multitenant was a new feature in Oracle Database 12c that is designed to support cloud infrastructure and consolidation strategies in data centers. This option allows database practitioners to consolidate multiple physical databases into a single database. It can be used with the Oracle Database 12c and later and is fully compatible with other features such as Real Application Clusters and Data Guard.
The major benefits of Oracle Multitenant include ease of adoption, manageability, database isolation and security, and the ability to prioritize resources for each database.
The multitenant option in the Oracle database introduces two new concepts: the Container Database (CDB) and the Pluggable Database (PDB). A CDB is similar to a conventional Oracle database, containing control files, datafiles, undo, temp files, redo logs, and the data dictionary for items that are owned of the root container and these that are visible to all PDBs. A PDB only contains data files and temp files to handle its own objects, including its own data dictionary with information about objects specific to the PDB. In Oracle 12.2 and later, a PDB can and should have a local undo tablespace.
Oracle MultiTenant Architecture
The multitenant architecture in Oracle allows a database to function as a Container Database (CDB). Every Oracle database must be contained within another database, such as a CDB containing Pluggable Databases (PDBs) or an application container containing application PDBs. Starting with Oracle Database 21c, the multitenant container database is the only supported architecture. In previous releases, non-container databases were also supported. A CDB contains one or several user-created PDBs and app. containers. A PDB is a self-contained collection of schemas, schema objects, and non schema objects that appears to an application as a separate database. An application container is an optional container within a CDB that stores data and metadata for one or several applications.
What is an Oracle CDB?
A Container Database (CDB) contains one or more user-created Pluggable Databases (PDBs) and application containers. At the physical level, a CDB is made up of control files, online redo log files, and data files, which are managed by the database instance. A PDB is a self-contained collection of schemas, schema objects, and non schema objects that appears to an application as a separate database. It has its own set of data files that store the data for the PDB, while the CDB includes all the data files for the PDBs contained within it as well as a set of system data files that store metadata for the CDB. To move or archive a PDB, it can be unplugged, which consists of the PDB data files and a metadata file. An unplugged PDB is not usable until it is plugged into a CDB.
Oracle Multitenant Licensing
Oracle Multitenant option licensing The Oracle Multitenant option supports both the
- Named User Plus and Per Processor license metrics.
- The Named User Plus license metric licenses all users and physical devices that access a user-created PDB.
- The Per Processor license metric licenses the processor cores on all physical hosts that are running a user-created PDB.
- Multitenant is only available if you have Oracle Enterprise Edition licenses in the same quantity and products.
Oracle Multitenant licensing calculation
To determine if the Oracle Multitenant option is required for your database deployment, consider the following criteria:
- The Oracle Database version and edition of your Pluggable Databases (PDBs) and Container Databases (CDBs).
- The number of user-created PDBs within each database instance that is running on the database installation.
- Apply Oracle core factor licensing rules to calculate the number of licenses that you require.
Important Licensing Considerations
Multitenant in 19c
Oracle 19c, you can have up to 3 user-created Pluggable Databases (PDBs) of any type without requiring a Multitenant license. However, if you need four or more PDBs within one Container Database (CDB), you will need a Multitenant license.
In versions before 19c, you could only have 1 PDB without a license.
Oracle multitenant license cost
To calculate the cost of the Oracle Multitenant option for a company that needs eight processor licenses and 100 named user plus, you can use the following formula:
Total cost = (Number of processor licenses * Processor license cost) + (Number of named user plus * Named user plus cost)
Using the given costs, the total cost would be:
Total cost = (8 * $17,500) + (100 * $350) = $140,000 + $35,000 = $175,000
So the total cost for this company would be $175,000 for the Oracle Multitenant option.