How Do Azure Reservation Exchanges Work, and What's Changing in February 2027?

Does Exchange Eligibility Apply to Reservations, Savings Plans, or Both?

Exchanges are a feature of Azure Reservations only. Azure Savings Plans cannot be exchanged — this is a Microsoft platform limitation, not an Archera one. When Archera identifies an underperforming or underutilized commitment as a candidate for exchange, that candidate is always a native Reservation.

Is Microsoft Changing Azure's Native Exchange Policy?

Yes. Starting February 1, 2027, Microsoft is restricting native exchange eligibility for Azure Reservations on services that are also covered by Azure Savings Plans (for example, Virtual Machines, App Service, and SQL Database). This change does not apply to reservations for services that Savings Plans don't cover, such as Azure VMware Solution.

• Reservations purchased before February 1, 2027 keep the right to one final exchange. Once that exchange is used (or once you exchange after February 1, 2027), the resulting reservation is treated as a new, post-cutoff purchase and is no longer exchangeable.
• Reservations purchased on or after February 1, 2027 aren't eligible for exchange at all, for services covered by Savings Plans. You can still cancel a reservation (subject to Azure's existing $50,000/12-month cancellation limit) or trade it in for a Savings Plan — trade-in is a separate mechanism from exchange and isn't affected by this change.

This applies equally to 1-year and 3-year terms.

What does this mean for Archera?

None of this affects Archera's money-back guarantee.

Because the guarantee is not built on top of Microsoft's native exchange mechanism, it has nothing to depend on here — there is no shared plumbing, no shared eligibility rule, and no shared cutoff date. Whether a commitment has zero, one, or unlimited native exchanges remaining has no bearing on whether it's protected by Archera's guarantee. Your GRI's rebate protection continues to operate exactly the same way before and after February 1, 2027.

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