---
title: "How to Fix: The Selected Subscriber does not satisfy the minimum version compatibility"
description: Pio Balistoy explains how to solve an error that might occur when trying to add a new subscriber to a SQL Server Publication.
---

[Blog | Pythian ](https://www.pythian.com/blog)

# [How to Fix: The Selected Subscriber does not satisfy the minimum version compatibility](https://www.pythian.com/blog/how-to-fix-the-selected-subscriber-does-not-satisfy-the-minimum-version-compatibility)

 Written by [Pio Balistoy](https://www.pythian.com/blog/author/pio-balistoy) | Sep 16, 2019 4:00:00 AM

## Problem:

 You are trying to add a new subscriber to a SQL Server Publication using the SQL Server Management Studio and you receive an error similar to the one below: "The selected Subscriber does not satisfy the minimum version compatibility level of the selected subscriber."

## Cause:

 You are receiving this error because the SQL Server version of your Publisher and Subscriber SQL Server instance is not the same. By default, replication backward compatibility for subscribers should be within two versions above or below your publisher. For complete information about Replication Backward compatibility please [click here](https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/sql/relational-databases/replication/replication-backward-compatibility?view=sql-server-2017). The wizard checks this compatibility and may incorrectly throw out an error if the versions are different.

## Workaround:

 Before proceeding, kindly make sure that the versions of your Publisher and Subscriber fall under the [compatibility matrix](https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/sql/relational-databases/replication/replication-backward-compatibility?view=sql-server-2017#transactional-replication-matrix) on the Microsoft Documentation. If they don't fall within the matrix, the pair is unsupported. You may be able to add them but any issues about the replication would be covered by support. The version check can be overridden if you add the subscriber using TSQL:

> DECLARE @publication AS *SYSNAME*; DECLARE @subscriber AS *SYSNAME*; DECLARE @subscriptionDB AS *SYSNAME*; SET @publication = N'PublicationName' ; SET @subscriber = 'SubscriberInstanceName' ; SET @subscriptionDB = N'SubscriberDatabase' ; *--Add a push subscription to a transactional publication.* USE [PublisherDatabase] EXEC **Sp_addsubscription** @publication = @publication , @subscriber = @subscriber , @destination_db = @subscriptionDB , @subscription_type = N'push' ; *--Add an agent job to synchronize the push subscription.* EXEC **Sp_addpushsubscription_agent** @publication = @publication , @subscriber = @subscriber , @subscriber_db = @subscriptionDB go

For further guidance on the sp_addsubscription command, check out the documentation [here](https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/sql/relational-databases/system-stored-procedures/sp-addsubscription-transact-sql?view=sql-server-2017).

## SQL Server Database Consulting Services

Ready to future-proof your SQL Server investment?

[View full post](https://www.pythian.com/blog/how-to-fix-the-selected-subscriber-does-not-satisfy-the-minimum-version-compatibility)

```json
{
  "@context" : "http://schema.org",
  "@type" : "BlogPosting",
  "author" : {
    "@type" : "Person",
    "name" : "Pio Balistoy"
  },
  "dateModified" : "2026-02-18T23:59:10.844Z",
  "datePublished" : "2019-09-16T04:00:00Z",
  "headline" : "How to Fix: The Selected Subscriber does not satisfy the minimum version compatibility",
  "image" : {
    "@type" : "ImageObject",
    "height" : 164,
    "url" : "https://resources.pythian.com/hubfs/Imported_Blog_Media/Capture-5.png",
    "width" : 639
  },
  "mainEntityOfPage" : "https://www.pythian.com/blog/how-to-fix-the-selected-subscriber-does-not-satisfy-the-minimum-version-compatibility",
  "publisher" : {
    "@type" : "Organization",
    "logo" : {
      "@type" : "ImageObject",
      "height" : 60,
      "url" : "/hs/hsstatic/content_shared_assets/static-1.4092/img/default-amp-logo.png",
      "width" : 60
    },
    "name" : "Pythian Blog"
  }
}
```