Deprecated Column Types

Column data types text, ntext and image will be removed in a future version of SQL Server. As such use of these data types is not recommended, and any affected columns should have their data types changed, as shown below. Changing the data types as below is generally a quick change, not requiring any downtime on production servers.

  • text → varchar(max)
  • ntext → nvarchar(max)
  • image →varbinary(max)

Suggested Action

Convert the deprecated column type to a new and supported data type.

How to Upgrade Deprecated Data Types in SQL Server

ALTER TABLE TableName ALTER COLUMN TextColum VARCHAR(MAX);

Further Reading

​ntext, text, and image (Transact-SQL) | Microsoft Docs

ALTER TABLE (Transact-SQL) | Microsoft Docs