SQL Server 2025 introduces a new data type: VECTOR.

In this session, we will explore what exactly the VECTOR data type is and the problems it helps solve.

I have been doing some proof-of-concept with clients and want to share practical tips, challenges encountered and where these new functionalities fit your scenarios.

Some of the questions we will be answering during this session include:
- What capabilities does it bring that were difficult or inefficient before?
- How does it impact table design?
- Being a new data type, can VECTOR columns be indexed, and how/why might that change the results?

We will also see it in action, how it powers semantic searches by using Similarity search and some more advanced Hybrid searches scenarios, where we combine it with the traditional relational filtering.