Environments and storage quota in the admin center

Business Central online has a total database quota, and it is shared by all your environments. If you exceed it, posting does not stop, but you cannot create or copy environments. The article explains how to see usage on the Capacity page in the admin center, what takes up space and what you can clean up. It suits those who administer the subscription. The figures were checked against Microsoft Learn.

How much you have

According to Microsoft Learn, customers get 80 GB of database by default plus an addition per licensed user. The addition is 3 GB per Premium licence, 2 GB per Essential licence and 1 GB per Device licence, as the page stood in October 2026. Each additional production environment you buy gives a further 4 GB.

The quota is shared by all environments in the tenant, both production and sandbox. You can buy extra capacity through a CSP partner.

The Capacity page and exceeding the quota

In the admin center, the Capacity page shows total usage, usage per environment and sources of capacity. You also see how many production and sandbox environments you have used of the number you are entitled to.

In Business Central you can open the Table Information page for each environment and see which tables take up the most space.

Microsoft Learn says that exceeding the quota does not interrupt transactions in the existing environments. But you cannot create new environments or copy existing ones until usage has been reduced or you have bought more. That can hit you when you need a sandbox to test an update.

What takes up space, and clean-up

The content of all non-system tables counts. Files and blob data in the database, including the media tables, also count. Typically these are entries such as G/L entries, item ledger entries and log tables, as well as attached files and images.

When an extension is uninstalled, you can choose to delete its data. If you do not, it still counts towards the quota. A sandbox that is a copy of production takes up as much as the source.

Microsoft Learn mentions several ways to reduce the database.

Delete companies that are no longer used, for example test companies and the demo company.
Delete old documents that no longer need to be kept, or compress data following the guidance.
Use retention policies to delete old log entries and archived entries.
Delete sandboxes when they have been used.
Remove data from extensions you do not use.
Do not use Business Central as an archive for large files if another solution suits better.

Keep an eye on growth

Look at the Capacity page every month, and note the figures. If usage grows quickly, you can find the cause by looking at table sizes in the large environment. Often it is a log table or an integration that writes too much.

Talk to your partner about which extensions store large amounts of data and how they can be cleaned.

Planning and everyday use

Copies of production for testing take up as much as the original. Before you create a copy, you should check whether there is room. If not, you can delete an old sandbox or buy capacity through your CSP partner. Ask the partner about current prices and terms, as they are not set out on Microsoft Learn.

The admin center is used for much more than the quota. Here you also manage updates, apps, notification recipients and the telemetry connection per environment. Check who has administrator access and that the recipient list for notifications is up to date.

That way the right people are notified when the quota nears its limit or an update is scheduled.

Compression and performance

Page compression is on by default for tables in the online version, unless a table is set to no compression. Less data also improves performance and makes copying and restoring faster.

Addverk is a new Business Central partner. See our services and prices if you want help analysing usage.