| title | Automation in Azure SQL overview | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| titleSuffix | Azure SQL Database & Azure SQL Managed Instance & Azure Synapse Analytics | ||
| description | Features for job automation to run Transact-SQL (T-SQL) scripts include elastic jobs on Azure SQL Database and SQL Agent jobs on Azure SQL Managed instance. | ||
| author | WilliamDAssafMSFT | ||
| ms.author | wiassaf | ||
| ms.reviewer | srinia, mathoma | ||
| ms.date | 10/30/2025 | ||
| ms.service | azure-sql | ||
| ms.topic | concept-article | ||
| ms.custom |
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| dev_langs |
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| monikerRange | =azuresql || =azuresql-db || =azuresql-mi |
[!INCLUDE appliesto-sqldb-sqlmi-asa-ss]
This article summarizes job automation options.
Consider the following job scheduling and task automation technologies on different platforms:
- Elastic jobs are job scheduling services that execute custom jobs on one or many databases in Azure SQL Database or Azure SQL Database elastic pools. For more information, see the elastic jobs overview.
- SQL Agent Jobs are executed by the SQL Agent service that continues to be used for task automation in SQL Server and is also included with Azure SQL Managed Instances. For T-SQL script job automation in Azure SQL Managed Instance, consider SQL Agent for Azure SQL Managed Instance. The SQL Agent on SQL managed instances is very similar to SQL Server. SQL Agent is not available in Azure SQL Database.
- Pipelines with recurring triggers can be used for T-SQL script automation in Azure Synapse Analytics. Pipelines with recurring triggers are based on Azure Data Factory.
- Pipelines, Dataflows, Spark jobs, and Spark Notebooks can be used to orchestrate data movement and automate T-SQL tasks for [!INCLUDE fabric-sqldb]. Monitor end-to-end runs in the Fabric Monitoring hub. For more information, see SQL database in Fabric documentation.
The following table summarizes key differences between elastic jobs and SQL Agent:
| Elastic jobs | SQL Agent | |
|---|---|---|
| Platform | Azure SQL Database | SQL Server, Azure SQL Managed Instance |
| Scope | Any number of databases in Azure SQL Database only. Targets can be in different logical servers, subscriptions, and/or regions (dynamically enumerated at job runtime). | Any individual database in the same instance as the SQL Agent. The Multi Server Administration (MSX/TSX) feature of SQL Agent allows for master/target instances to coordinate job execution, though this feature is not available in SQL Managed Instance. |
| Supported APIs and tools | T-SQL, PowerShell, REST APIs, Azure portal, Azure Resource Manager | T-SQL, PowerShell, SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS) |
[!div class="nextstepaction"] Elastic jobs in Azure SQL Database