Use this tag for questions specific to the Express version of the 2016 version of Microsoft SQL Server. The Express version is an entry level, free version of SQL Server 2016 with license restrictions such as the maximum size of a database and the number of concurrent users.
Microsoft SQL Server Express 2016 is the free, Express version of SQL Server 2016. The Express version has support for many of the capabilities of SQL Server 2016 making it a reasonable choice for applications that need a database engine that has similar characteristics as SQL Server 2016 yet do not need the full feature set and operating capacity as the full SQL Server 2016.
Limitations of SQL Server Express 2016 include database size, limit of 10 GB for each database though multiple databases are allowed each with the 10GB limit, and hardware capabilities that the software will use such as memory, max of 1GB, and number of processor cores, max of 4. There are also some additional reliability and robustness provisions in the standard SQL Server 2016 such as fallover and other advanced provisions that are not part of SQL Server Express.
SQL Server Express 2016 has two types of deployment. The first is similar to SQL Server 2016 in which it is installed as an out-of-process database engine running as a Windows service. The second is an an embedded database engine, Server Express LocalDB, which runs as an in-process database engine within the application using it rather than as a Windows service.
