Azure Virtual Desktop Hybrid — Pricing, Plans & What's Included

Azure Virtual Desktop Hybrid is a deployment model and per-user license for running Azure Virtual Desktop session hosts on your own on-premises infrastructure while the AVD management service stays in Azure. Microsoft announced it in public preview in May 2026; its Azure Virtual Desktop pricing page now states it is generally available, and the dedicated license appeared on the September 2026 price list. Session hosts connect to the service through Azure Arc, so the desktops run on your hardware but are brokered and managed from the cloud.

Microsoft's Azure Virtual Desktop pricing page states that Azure Virtual Desktop Hybrid is generally available, and the per-user license — which Microsoft said would follow the public preview — is new on the September 2026 price list. When we last checked, Microsoft's Hybrid overview documentation still carried the preview-era note that only validation host pools were supported and that production host pools would need redeployment at GA. If you piloted during the preview, plan for that redeployment; if you are starting now, confirm production host pool support in the current documentation before committing to a term.

With standard Azure Virtual Desktop the session hosts are virtual machines in Azure, so you pay Azure consumption for compute, storage, and networking while user access rights come through qualifying Microsoft licenses. With the Hybrid model the session hosts run on customer-operated infrastructure — Hyper-V, VMware vSphere, Nutanix AHV, or physical Windows Server — and the catalog lists a per-user license for the hybrid service instead of Azure-hosted session host consumption. One difference to plan for: Hybrid supports Windows 11 Enterprise single-session and Windows Server session hosts, but not Windows 11 Enterprise multi-session.

Windows 365 is a Microsoft-hosted Cloud PC service where you buy a fixed per-user configuration and Microsoft runs the infrastructure. Azure Virtual Desktop Hybrid keeps the infrastructure with you: your servers host the desktops, and the per-user license connects them to the Azure-hosted AVD management plane. Choose Windows 365 when you want Microsoft to operate everything, and consider Hybrid when the desktops must stay on your own hardware.

Microsoft's announcement lists Microsoft Hyper-V, VMware vSphere, Nutanix AHV, and physical Windows Server machines — broadly, anywhere Azure Arc-enabled servers can run on premises. Each session host needs the Azure Arc connected machine agent, and the AVD components are installed through an Arc extension that registers the host with a host pool. Azure Local is a separate case: it has its own Azure Virtual Desktop on Azure Local deployment path, and whether the Hybrid license applies to Azure Local VMs is not confirmed.

The September 2026 Commercial catalog lists a separate Azure Virtual Desktop Hybrid SKU tagged as a trial on a monthly term alongside the paid per-user SKU. The trial's duration, seat cap, and conversion behavior are not stated in the catalog data and are not documented publicly, so ask us to confirm the current trial terms in Partner Center before planning an evaluation around it.

Microsoft's catalog description for the SKU states the requirements directly. Windows 11 and Windows Server licenses are still required for the session hosts. For Windows 11 session hosts, each user needs one of Microsoft 365 A3/A5/E3/E5/F3/F5, Windows 11 Enterprise E3/E5, or Windows 11 VDA. For Windows Server session hosts, the server needs a Windows Server license and each user needs an RDS CAL with active Software Assurance, an RDS User Subscription License, or an RDS SAL. The Hybrid license is bought in addition to those. Beyond licensing, session hosts must be Azure Arc-enabled and joined to Active Directory Domain Services or Microsoft Entra ID.

No. Microsoft's Hybrid deployment prerequisites are the Azure Arc connected machine agent, network access to the Azure Arc and Azure Virtual Desktop endpoints, and a directory join (Active Directory Domain Services or Microsoft Entra ID). Intune is an optional management path for Windows 11 session hosts that are Microsoft Entra joined or Microsoft Entra hybrid joined; hybrid join requires Microsoft Entra Connect. Windows Server session hosts cannot be enrolled in Intune and are managed with Group Policy.

The September 2026 Commercial catalog lists a monthly commitment paid monthly, a one-year commitment paid upfront or monthly, and a three-year commitment with upfront and monthly billing paths. On both the one-year and three-year commitments, paying upfront carries a lower listed price than paying monthly on the same commitment; use the configurator to compare the current price for the selected term before ordering.

No, the license does not supply infrastructure: session host hardware, hypervisor licensing, storage, and networking remain the customer's responsibility, which is the point of the model for organizations with existing capacity. Microsoft's pricing page describes the offer as a per-user, per-month fee for on-premises session hosts managed through the Azure portal. On the Azure side, the Azure Arc control plane is offered at no extra cost per Microsoft's Azure Arc pricing page; Azure services you enable on the hosts, such as Azure Monitor, Microsoft Defender for Cloud, or Azure Update Manager, are billed at their own rates.