Exchange Support For Windows Server 2016

Windows Server 2016 And Exchange SupportWindows Server 2016 Technical Preview 5 is available from the TechNet Evaluation Centre.  While that's great to download the bits and get the OS running in your test lab, please do not update the OS on your Exchange servers right now or introduce 2016 DCs into production.  This post is just a quick reminder about what is *NOT* currently in the Exchange team's support matrix.

Over the years there have been issues and lots of posts in the TechNet forums where people have run into some challenges when they have either:

  • Upgraded the OS in place to a new version Windows Server

  • Tried to install Exchange onto an unsupported version of Windows Server

Unfortunately there is not much that can be done to help apart from digging out backups as this is not a supported solution at this time.

Walking The Supported Path

TechNet documents the Exchange Product Group's supported OS for each version of Exchange.  Here are the links for your convenience:

Note that the supportability matrix has been condensed into a single page that includes all versions.

Currently Supported Operating Systems

TechNet documents the below at the time of writing as supported Operating Systems for Exchange

Exchange Support For Windows Server 2016 - Currently Supported OS

To reinforce the point of using only what is explicitly stated in the table, there is an additional note

Currently Supported Active Directory Environments

TechNet documents the below at the time of writing as supported Active Directory Environments for Exchange

image

You will note that Windows Server 2016 is not currently listed as a supported OS platform for Exchange.  In addition to this please also note that Windows Server 2016 is not currently listed as supported Domain Controllers.

For example, when writing this post Exchange 2016 supports the following platforms:

  • Windows Server 2012
  • Windows Server 2012 R2

Again note that Windows Server 2016 is not listed.

I didn't list Exchange 2003 as hopefully no one out there is going to be trying that. *

Keep a weather eye on the Exchange team's blog or Twitter account for breaking news on Windows Server 2012 support for Exchange.

Cheers,

Rhoderick

* – Points though if you still can find the CDs!

Source ↔ Download MP3 Free

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