How to Monitor web apps in Microsoft Azure

Introduction

Monitoring web applications in Microsoft Azure is a critical step in ensuring performance, reliability, and security. With businesses increasingly depending on cloud-hosted applications, it becomes essential to have visibility into how applications behave under different workloads, identify bottlenecks, and quickly resolve issues before they impact end users.

Azure provides a robust set of monitoring tools such as Application Insights, Log Analytics, and Change Tracking that give developers and administrators end-to-end observability of their applications and infrastructure. By enabling these tools, you can gain valuable insights into application performance, track user interactions, log errors, analyze queries, and monitor configuration changes. This not only improves troubleshooting efficiency but also strengthens governance and compliance.

In this step-by-step guide, we will walk through how to configure and integrate these monitoring features to ensure your web apps are fully observable and secure in Microsoft Azure.

Steps Covered in This Article

• Enable Application Insights.
• Disable logging for .NET core snapshot debugger.
• Configure web app HTTP logs to be written to a Log Analytics workspace.
• Configure SQL Insights data to be written to a Log Analytics workspace.
• Enable file and configuration change tracking for web apps

Step 1 Enable Application Insights

• In the Azure Portal Search Bar, enter rg-alpha and select rg-alpha from the list of results.

• From the list of items in the resource group, choose App Services for the Web App with an SQL Database.

• In the Overview blade Select properties and choose Application Insights.

• On the Application Insights page, choose Turn On Application Insights.

• On the Application Insights page, ensure that Create a new resource is selected and that the Log Analytics Workspace is set to LogAnalyticsWorkspace and choose Apply.

• On the Apply monitoring settings dialog, choose Yes.

Step 2 Disable logging for .NET core snapshot debugger

• In the Azure Portal Search Bar, enter rg-alpha and select rg-alpha from the list of results.

• From the list of items in the resource group, choose App Services for the Web App with an SQL Database.

• Under Settings choose Application Insights.
• Under Instrument your application, choose .NET Core and then set the Snapshot Debugger setting to Off. Choose Apply.
• On the Apply Monitoring Settings dialog box, choose Yes.

Step 3 Configure web app HTTP logs to be written to a Log Analytics workspace

• In the Azure Portal Search Bar, enter rg-alpha and select rg-alpha from the list of results.

• From the list of items in the resource group, choose App Services for the Web App with an SQL Database.

• Under Monitoring, choose Diagnostic settings.

• On the Diagnostic settings page, select + Add diagnostic settings.

• On the Diagnostic settings page, choose the following and select Save.

Step 4 Configure SQL Insights data to be written to a Log Analytics workspace

• In the Azure Portal Search Bar, enter rg-alpha and select rg-alpha from the list of results.

• From the list of items in the resource group, choose the sample SQL database.

• Under Monitoring, choose Diagnostic settings.

• On the Diagnostic settings page, choose Add diagnostic setting.

• On the Diagnostic setting page, provide the following information and choose Save.

Step 5 Enable file and configuration change tracking for web apps

• In the Azure Portal Search Bar, enter rg-alpha and select rg-alpha from the list of results.

• From the list of items in the resource group, choose the AzureLinuxAppWXYZ-webapp.

• Choose Diagnose and Solve Problems.

• In the search dialog box, type Application Changes.

• On the Change Analysis page, choose Configure.

• On the Enable file and configuration change tracking page, change the Status slider to On and then choose Save.

Conclusion

Monitoring web applications in Microsoft Azure is not just about collecting data—it’s about transforming that data into actionable insights that improve performance, security, and reliability. By enabling Application Insights, configuring Log Analytics, and tracking configuration changes, you gain a comprehensive view of your applications and infrastructure. These practices empower teams to detect issues early, optimize resources, and deliver a seamless experience to end users.

With Azure’s robust monitoring tools, developers and administrators can move beyond reactive troubleshooting to proactive management, ensuring that web apps remain resilient, scalable, and ready to meet business needs.