Oracle's partitioning policy determines whether your licence requirement is based on the virtual CPUs you allocate — or the full physical processor count of the server or cluster. Getting this wrong is the most common and most expensive Oracle licensing mistake in enterprise IT. This guide covers the complete Oracle partitioning policy, approved hard partitioning technologies, core factor calculations, and strategies to minimise Oracle Database licence exposure in modern infrastructure.
Oracle's partitioning policy defines how Oracle counts licence requirements in virtualised and partitioned environments. The policy is published in Oracle's "Processor Core Factor Table" and "Oracle Partitioning Policy" documents, which are regularly updated and supersede any previous versions. The current partitioning policy document should always be consulted when making licensing decisions — the policy has changed over time, and relying on an outdated version can result in incorrect licence calculations.
The fundamental principle of Oracle's partitioning policy is: if the virtualisation or partitioning technology is on Oracle's approved "hard partitioning" list, the licence requirement is based on the allocated virtual or logical processor count multiplied by the applicable core factor. If the technology is not on the hard partitioning list (including VMware), Oracle's position is that the entire physical server or cluster must be licensed. This distinction creates enormous commercial consequences for organisations deploying Oracle software on modern virtualised infrastructure.
This guide forms part of our comprehensive Oracle license negotiation pillar guide and complements our dedicated Oracle licensing on VMware guide and Oracle licence calculation guide.
Oracle's partitioning policy document is updated periodically. Always download the current version from Oracle's official website before making licensing decisions. Third-party summaries, including this article, provide guidance but may not reflect the most recent policy changes. Oracle advisors keep current with policy updates — see our Oracle negotiation firm rankings for specialist support.
Oracle's current approved hard partitioning technologies are relatively limited compared to the full range of virtualisation options available in enterprise IT. The key approved technologies are:
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| Technology | Partitioning Type | Licence Basis | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Oracle VM Server (x86) | Hard | Allocated vCPU × core factor | Free Oracle hypervisor |
| Oracle Linux KVM | Hard* | Allocated vCPU × core factor | *Requires OL host + specific config |
| IBM LPAR (Dedicated) | Hard | Allocated LPAR CPUs × core factor | Shared LPAR = soft partitioning |
| Oracle Cloud (OCI) | Hard | OCPU allocated × core factor | Best BYOL economics |
| Solaris Capped Zones | Hard | Allocated zone CPUs | Must be capped, not uncapped |
| VMware ESXi/vSphere | Soft | ALL physical cores in cluster | Highest licence exposure risk |
| Microsoft Hyper-V | Soft | ALL physical cores on host | For non-Windows Oracle products |
| Nutanix AHV | Soft | ALL physical cores in cluster | Not on Oracle's approved list |
| AWS EC2 | Soft* | ALL physical cores on host | *Except Dedicated Hosts under some conditions |
| Azure VMs | Soft | ALL physical cores on host | For Oracle non-Windows products |
Any virtualisation technology not on Oracle's approved hard partitioning list is treated as soft partitioning. This includes VMware (the most common enterprise hypervisor), Microsoft Hyper-V for non-Windows Oracle products, Nutanix AHV, Citrix XenServer (separate from Oracle VM), Docker containers without additional restrictions, and most public cloud VM instances on AWS and Azure.
The practical consequence of soft partitioning is that Oracle's licence requirement is the total physical core count of the server or cluster where Oracle software is accessible — not the cores allocated to Oracle VMs. For VMware specifically, Oracle's position is that all hosts in the vSphere cluster must be licensed if Oracle software can run anywhere in that cluster. This creates the massive licence exposure described in our Oracle licensing on VMware guide.
It is worth noting that Oracle's position on soft partitioning is a commercial policy — not a legal requirement in most jurisdictions. Some organisations have successfully challenged Oracle's soft partitioning claims in audit situations by demonstrating through technical evidence that Oracle software could not actually access the full cluster's physical resources. However, these challenges require specialist expertise and are not guaranteed to succeed. The safest and most commercially predictable approach is to use approved hard partitioning technologies for Oracle workloads wherever possible.
The Oracle Core Factor Table assigns a multiplier to each processor type that determines how many Oracle processor licences are required per physical core. The core factor applies regardless of partitioning type — it is the unit conversion factor between physical cores and Oracle processor licences.
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The most common scenario in enterprise IT is Intel x86 processors with a 0.5 core factor. A server with 2 sockets × 32 physical cores = 64 total cores requires 64 × 0.5 = 32 Oracle processor licences under soft partitioning. Under hard partitioning with a 4-vCPU Oracle VM, the requirement is 4 × 0.5 = 2 processor licences — a 16× reduction in licence requirement for the same physical hardware.
The 2022 Intel Ice Lake and 2024 Intel Granite Rapids server processors both remain at the 0.5 core factor — Oracle has maintained this factor for x86 throughout recent CPU generations. AMD EPYC processors are also 0.5 core factor. The core factor table should be checked when deploying Oracle on any new or unfamiliar processor type, as Oracle periodically updates it. Our Oracle licence calculation guide provides a detailed worked example for common enterprise server configurations.
Cloud partitioning is a critical topic for organisations deploying Oracle software in public cloud environments. The rules differ significantly between cloud providers, and the differences have enormous commercial implications.
Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI) is the only major public cloud where Oracle officially recognises the VM shapes as hard partitioning. Oracle Database deployed on OCI using BYOL requires licences only for the allocated OCPU count — making OCI the most licence-efficient cloud platform for Oracle Database workloads. This is a deliberate Oracle commercial strategy to incentivise OCI adoption.
AWS (Amazon Web Services) is more complex. Oracle does not recognise standard EC2 instances as hard partitioning for non-Windows Oracle products — meaning the full physical host underlying the EC2 instance would technically need to be licensed. Oracle has acknowledged Dedicated Hosts on AWS as a potential path for BYOL, where the customer licenses the full Dedicated Host's physical core count. AWS published its own guidance on Oracle licensing, and customers should review both Oracle's and AWS's current documentation. The effective BYOL economics on AWS are substantially less favourable than OCI for Oracle Database.
Azure has a similar situation to AWS — Oracle does not recognise Azure VMs as hard partitioning for Oracle Database. Microsoft has published guidance suggesting that Oracle on Azure may be licensed based on vCores, but this is Microsoft's view, not Oracle's official policy. The commercial risk of assuming vCore licensing on Azure is that Oracle may assert a different position in an audit. For OCI migration economics and BYOL comparison, see our Oracle cloud migration credits guide.
Container-based deployments of Oracle Database — using Docker, Kubernetes, or similar container orchestration — present one of the most complex partitioning scenarios in Oracle licensing. Oracle's current published policy does not recognise containers as hard partitioning unless they are running within an approved hard partitioning hypervisor (such as Oracle Linux KVM or OCI).
An Oracle Database container running in a Kubernetes pod on a bare metal server would, under Oracle's current interpretation, require licensing of all physical cores of the underlying node. An Oracle Database container running in a Kubernetes pod on a VMware cluster would require licensing of all physical cores across the entire VMware cluster. These scenarios represent some of the highest-risk Oracle licensing situations in modern enterprise infrastructure.
Organisations deploying Oracle Database in containers should seek specific Oracle advisory guidance before deployment. The compliance risk can be very large, and proactively establishing the correct licence position — or restructuring the deployment to use approved hard partitioning — is significantly less costly than resolving a large audit finding after deployment. Our Oracle compliance checklist includes container-specific checks for this reason.
Not sure if your Oracle deployment meets the hard partitioning requirements?
Oracle's LMS (Licence Management Services) team is highly experienced at identifying soft partitioning environments where Oracle software is deployed on unlicensed infrastructure. Oracle's audit scripts capture physical server topology, cluster membership, and CPU configuration data — providing Oracle with the information needed to assert the full physical core count as the licence requirement.
In practice, Oracle audits of VMware environments almost always result in a large licence shortfall claim, and the same is increasingly true for Nutanix and other non-approved hypervisors. Organisations in soft partitioning environments who have not licensed the full physical core count are taking a significant compliance risk — one that Oracle is likely to identify if an audit is initiated. Our Oracle audit defense playbook covers the specific strategies for managing soft partitioning audit claims.
Proactive compliance management — establishing the true licence position before Oracle contacts you — is consistently the most cost-effective approach. An independent compliance assessment identifies the exposure, quantifies the risk, and creates options for addressing it before Oracle is in a position of strength. See our Oracle licence optimisation guide for how compliance assessment fits into a broader Oracle cost management strategy.
The most impactful strategy for reducing Oracle Database licence exposure from partitioning is to segregate Oracle workloads onto infrastructure that uses Oracle-approved hard partitioning. This does not necessarily require migrating to OCI — it can be achieved on-premises by moving Oracle VMs to Oracle Linux KVM or Oracle VM environments, or by placing Oracle VMs on dedicated VMware hosts that are physically isolated from non-Oracle infrastructure (reducing the licensed VMware host count to the Oracle-dedicated hosts only).
For organisations already planning VMware replacement because of Broadcom cost increases, the partitioning decision should be integrated into the hypervisor selection process — choosing Oracle Linux KVM or another approved technology for Oracle workloads rather than moving to another soft partitioning hypervisor that maintains the same Oracle licence exposure.
For new Oracle Database deployments, the cleanest approach from a licensing perspective is: OCI for cloud-based workloads (BYOL with hard partitioning recognition); Oracle Linux KVM for on-premises workloads (hard partitioning, free hypervisor); or dedicated bare metal servers for high-performance workloads where virtualisation overhead is undesirable. Avoiding shared VMware clusters for Oracle Database — or licensing them correctly — is the single most impactful risk reduction available to most organisations today. Download our free Oracle licensing guide for a comprehensive reference including partitioning calculation worked examples.
The difference between hard and soft partitioning can mean millions in Oracle licence exposure. Independent assessment identifies your true position and creates options to reduce it — before Oracle does the analysis for you.