Cross-region read replicas enable read-only database replicas in different AWS regions to improve latency for distributed users and provide disaster recovery capabilities by promoting replicas as standalone databases during failovers. The expansion added support in 16 new regions including Africa, Asia Pacific, Europe, Canada, Mexico, Middle East, and Israel.
This feature facilitates scaling out read-heavy workloads geographically closer to end-users and offers robust recovery strategies against regional disruptions. Customers can create up to fifteen replicas across regions, increasing flexibility in architectural design and resilience planning with SQL Server databases on AWS.
Source & further reading
Amazon RDS for SQL Server now supports cross-region read replica in additional AWS Regions ↗Source published 2026-01-09. This report was prepared with AI assistance from the linked primary-source material. Claims and limitations should be checked against the original announcement or research.