Installing SQL Server 2022 is a straightforward process if you follow the right steps. This covers downloading the installer, running it, and two settings worth checking once it’s done.
Downloading SQL Server 2022
The latest official release is on Microsoft’s SQL Server Downloads page. If you’re looking for an older or specific version, it’s on the Microsoft Evaluation Center under the SQL Server section.
The download asks you to choose between Developer Edition and Express Edition. Microsoft’s editions page says Developer Edition “includes all the functionality of Enterprise edition, but is licensed for use as a development and test system, not as a production server.” Express Edition is free, and the same page caps it at a 10 GB database and 1,410 MB of memory for the buffer pool.
For this guide, I’m using Developer Edition.
Installing SQL Server 2022
After downloading the installer, copy SQL2022-SSEI-Dev.exe (or SQL2022-SSEI-Expr.exe for Express) to the machine where you want to install SQL Server. Right-click the file and choose “Run as Administrator” to start.
Once the installer opens, you’ll have three options:
- Basic: A quick installation with default settings.
- Custom: Walks you through the full setup wizard so you can choose each setting.
- Download Media: Downloads the full installation files to use later.
For most installations, Basic is enough. Accept the License Terms, select your installation location, and click Install. It usually takes a few minutes, depending on your hardware and Windows version.
Two settings to check afterwards
Basic doesn’t walk you through the wizard’s configuration pages, and two of those pages set values that affect how the instance behaves. Microsoft’s setup documentation describes what each one does when it’s skipped.
Max degree of parallelism (MAXDOP). Starting with SQL Server 2019, setup works out a recommended MAXDOP from the number of cores. If the page is skipped, the documentation says setup uses that recommended value “instead of the default Database Engine value for previous versions (0).”
Max server memory. If the Memory page is skipped, setup uses the Database Engine default of 2,147,483,647 MB, which in practice means no limit. Microsoft’s server memory configuration guidance covers how to pick a value, and it’s worth reading before you set one.
This shows what the instance actually ended up with:
SELECT name, value_in_use
FROM sys.configurations
WHERE name IN ('max degree of parallelism', 'max server memory (MB)');Post-Installation
When installation completes, setup shows the configuration it used and confirms whether it succeeded. If something went wrong, it writes a log file with more detail that you can use to troubleshoot.
If you cancel the installation partway through, clean up any leftover files in the installation directory and uninstall any partially installed SQL Server components. Otherwise, they can cause problems the next time you try to install.
This guide only covers installation, not security, best practices, or database configuration. With the installation done, SQL Server 2022 is ready for creating new databases or migrating existing ones.
If you run into an error, search for the error code first, since most installation errors have known solutions. If that doesn’t turn anything up, feel free to leave a comment.