Windows Virtual Desktop Pricing Breakdown

By now you’ve probably heard quite a lot about Windows Virtual Desktop (WVD). After all, it’s a product that people were looking forward to for a long time before its release. Although it took a while to get here, I think a lot of people would agree that it has proven to be worth the wait. It comes packed with features and makes a huge effort to improve on existing RDS environments. However, having said all that there is still a matter of cost to discuss. Despite all the potential benefits we could reap from WVD, we need to take a peek at what the pricing breakdown looks like.

Factors to consider

Before looking at the actual pricing, it’s also important to check out at what else you need to consider. As you would expect, with Windows Virtual Desktop being Azure-based, you are going to need an Azure account and subscription. This is will make deployment and management of your virtualization environment quick and easy. Also, the following Azure components are going to factor into the price of your WVD deployment: virtual machines and OS storage, data disk (personal desktop only), user profile storage, and networking. Furthermore, it is worth noting that WVD session host VMs including Citrix Cloud and VMW Horizon Cloud on Azure deployments will be charged at Linux rates for Windows Server, Windows 10 multi-session, and Windows 10 single. 

Eligible licenses

Some clients will be fortunate enough to not incur any additional costs. In this group, you have clients who already have certain licenses. These are namely:

-      Microsoft 365 E3/E5

-      Microsoft 365 A3/A5/Student Use Benefits

-      Microsoft 365 F3

-      Microsoft 365 Business Premium (previously known as Microsoft 365 Business)

-      Windows 10 Enterprise E3/E5

-      Windows 10 Education A3/A5

-      Windows 10 VDA per user

So if you already have one of the above licenses then you will get access to Windows 7 or 10 Enterprise desktops. At no extra cost! In addition, if you have a Microsoft 365 E3/E5/F3/Business/ A3/A5/Student Use Benefits or Windows 10 VDA per-user license then you can also access WVD from your non-Windows Pro endpoints.

Breaking down the cost

To help clients get a clearer picture, Microsoft offers information on some common use cases. These start with personal desktop scenarios. For example, you can consider a graphics workstation with a hundred users such as engineers and graphic designers. If they are working 5-6 hours a day with 12 VCPUS and 112GB of RAM, your estimate will come up to just over $32 000 per month. And this figure is according to the Azure Calculator.

Another potential scenario is for Microsoft Office. Here you can look at a thousand standard knowledge users using Microsoft Office products for 8-10 hours a day. With 2 VCPUS and 4GB of RAM, your estimate will come to just under $29 000 per month.

And then we also have the multi-session desktop scenarios to consider. Instead of single users accessing a persistent virtual desktop, you have multiple users sharing a pooled virtual desktop. The first example falls under Microsoft Office with a thousand standard knowledge users using Microsoft Office products. They are going to be using 24/7 RI so that the management of virtual machines is rendered unnecessary. User density will be 2 per vCPU. Once again, we consult the Azure Calculator and it gives us a figure of just over $7 000 a month.

Call centers also provide a good potential scenario to look at. Here we can consider a situation with a 1000 call center users with low-intensity workloads working with a 6 vCPU per user density. Since they’ll be operating in 3 eight-hour shifts a 24/7 RI will be the most cost-effective option. The estimate provided by our reliable calculator gives us a figure of just under $900.

Note: These figures are correct at the time of writing according to the Azure Calculator estimates and are for the East U.S region.

Additional costs

Now that you have an idea of the kinds of costs you may be facing, you need to find out whether there are any other costs that you may incur. However, the answer is not a simple one as this will depend on your environment. The potential costs we are talking about are with regards to networking and FSLogix user profile storage. Similar to what we saw above, the specific details for these areas can be found in the Azure Pricing Calculator.

Making a decision

Even with all the information at hand, it can still prove a little difficult deciding which way to go. Windows Virtual Desktop gives you a lot with features such as native Windows 10, profile management technology, and support for OneDrive. However, what may win you over is the convenience afforded if you already have an eligible license. With a Windows 10 Enterprise subscription then cost is a non-issue. In other words, there are no additional costs for WVD Management Service. Consequently, your budget is not going to require any adjustments. Moreover, you also will not require additional Azure VMs to run the control plane.

Setting up for the future

Virtualization technology is here to stay. Something that not so long ago seemed to a lot of people like movie technology is now very much an integral part of how we operate. Especially in light of the situation that we have faced this year. Windows Virtual Desktop is an up-to-date platform that provides a great experience. And what’s even more exciting is that if you’re not new to Azure then Windows Virtual Desktop will have a somewhat familiar feel. But even for newcomers, it’s not going to be difficult to get going. So if you hadn’t considered WVD, then it’s certainly worth at least checking out.