Microsoft announces the release of SSMS, SQL Server Management Studio 17.6.

Microsoft has released SSMS 17.6, the latest generation of SQL Server Management Studio with support for SQL Server 2017. SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS) can be used to query, design, and manage databases and data warehouses, from the local computer, or in the cloud. It provides tools to configure, monitor, and administer instances of SQL. SSMS can be used to deploy, monitor, and upgrade the data-tier components of applications, as well as build queries and scripts.

The SQL Server Management Studio, 17.6 has added a support for Azure SQL Database Managed Instance. This new flavor of Azure SQL Database provides,

• Near 100% compatibility with SQL Server on-premises.
• A native virtual network (VNet) implementation that addresses common security concerns.
• A business model favorable for on-premises SQL Server customers.
• Support for common management scenarios like creating, altering, backing, and restoring databases, importing, exporting, extracting and publishing Data-tier Applications, viewing and altering Server properties, support for full Object Explorer, SQL Agent jobs, Linked Servers and more.

The SSMS 17.6 also features changes in the Object Explorer. Microsoft has added settings to not force brackets around names when dragging & dropping from Object Explorer to Query Window. They have also improved Integration Services by adding support to deploy packages to a SQL Database Managed Instance.

In addition, SSMS 17.6 is labeled as Microsoft SQL Server Management Studio 17, and has a new icon.

Source: Microsoft SSMS docs

The version 17.6 of SSMS works with all supported versions of SQL Server 2008 – SQL Server 2017 and provides support for working with the cloud features in Azure SQL Database and Azure SQL Data Warehouse. Additionally, SSMS 17.6 can be installed side by side with SSMS 16.x or SQL Server 2014 SSMS and earlier.

You can read the entire release notes on Microsoft SSMS docs.