I did look into purchasing MariaDB Enterprise Server in the past for a service I was helping, but in the end stuck with MariaDB Community Server,

because I was worried we might have trouble migrating back to the community server version if needed as the client was not 100% sure they could keep paying for all the instances they needed in the future.

If on a certain MariaDB Enterprise version, would it be binary compatible with the same MariaDB Community Server version?

(as long as not using features only in the MariaDB Community Server version)

Thank you.

Have a nice day.

On Wed, Dec 18, 2024 at 9:27 PM Sergei Golubchik <serg@mariadb.com> wrote:

Hi, highclass99,

On Dec 14, highclass99 via discuss wrote:
>
> I noticed on https://mariadb.com/docs/server/release-notes/ that after
> MariaDB 10.6 enterprise there is no MariaDB 10.11 enterprise but only 11.4
> enterprise release candidate right now.
>
> Does this mean there will be no MariaDB 10.11 enterprise?
> Is there a reason for MariaDB to be skipping the LTS version for enterprise?

Yes, it does. Yes, there is.

While MariaDB Community Server's focus is on rapidly delivering new
features to users - which is why there is a rolling release line,
MariaDB Enterprise Server focus is on stability and long life cycle.

In other words, MariaDB Enterprise Server is maintained longer and is
not released as often. It still gets new features through carefully
selected backports, see any release notes, e.g.
https://mariadb.com/resources/blog/mariadb-enterprise-server-q4-2024-maintenance-releases-with-backported-features/

At least this is the current model. It might change in the future.

Regards,
Sergei
Chief Architect, MariaDB Server
and security@mariadb.org