Azure Fundamentals Exam Guide (AZ-900)
Start your cloud career with confidence using this complete AZ-900 study guide covering cloud computing concepts, core Azure services, security and compliance, Azure pricing models, and service level agreements. This guide is designed for professionals new to cloud computing or those from non-technical backgrounds who need to understand Azure at a foundational level. Every concept is explained with clear analogies, comparison tables, and practice questions that reflect the actual exam format. No prior cloud experience required — just follow the study plan and you will be exam-ready.
Key Features
- Beginner-friendly explanations of cloud concepts with real-world analogies
- Core Azure services mapped and compared: compute, networking, storage, databases
- Security and compliance coverage including Microsoft Defender, Entra ID, and governance tools
- Pricing and SLA deep dives with calculator walkthroughs and cost optimization strategies
- Comparison tables for IaaS vs. PaaS vs. SaaS, public vs. private vs. hybrid cloud
- Practice questions across all domains with detailed explanations
- Visual learning aids with service category maps and decision frameworks
Study Plan
Week 1: Cloud Concepts (25-30% of exam)
- What is cloud computing: on-demand delivery, pay-as-you-go, shared responsibility
- Cloud models: public, private, hybrid — when to use each
- Service types: IaaS, PaaS, SaaS — responsibilities at each level
- Cloud benefits: high availability, scalability, elasticity, agility, disaster recovery
- Consumption-based pricing vs. capital expenditure
Week 2: Azure Architecture and Services (35-40% of exam)
- Azure global infrastructure: regions, region pairs, availability zones, data centers
- Compute services: Virtual Machines, App Service, Azure Functions, Container Instances
- Networking: Virtual Networks, VPN Gateway, ExpressRoute, Azure DNS
- Storage: Blob, File, Queue, Table, and storage redundancy options
- Databases: Azure SQL, Cosmos DB, MySQL, PostgreSQL
- Azure Marketplace and solution categories
Week 3: Security, Privacy, and Compliance (25-30% of exam)
- Defense in depth: physical, network, perimeter, compute, application, data layers
- Microsoft Entra ID: authentication, SSO, MFA, Conditional Access
- Network security: NSGs, Azure Firewall, DDoS Protection
- Azure governance: Policy, Blueprints, Resource Locks, Management Groups
- Compliance: Trust Center, Service Trust Portal, Azure compliance certifications
Week 4: Pricing, SLAs, and Lifecycle (10-15% of exam)
- Azure pricing factors: resource type, usage, region, bandwidth
- Pricing Calculator and Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) Calculator
- Azure Cost Management and billing alerts
- Service Level Agreements: understanding uptime percentages (99.9% vs. 99.99%)
- Azure service lifecycle: preview vs. general availability
Key Topics
| Domain | Weight | Focus Areas |
|---|---|---|
| Cloud Concepts | 25-30% | Models, benefits, service types, pricing models |
| Azure Services | 35-40% | Compute, networking, storage, databases |
| Security and Compliance | 25-30% | Entra ID, governance, network security |
| Pricing and SLAs | 10-15% | Cost management, SLAs, service lifecycle |
Practice Questions
Q1: A company is considering migrating their on-premises servers to Azure. They want to maintain full control over the operating system and installed software but do not want to manage the physical hardware. Which cloud service type best fits their needs?
A1: Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS). With IaaS, the cloud provider manages the physical hardware, networking, and virtualization, while the customer retains control over the OS, middleware, runtime, and applications. Azure Virtual Machines is the primary IaaS compute offering.
Q2: What is the primary benefit of Azure Availability Zones?
A2: Availability Zones protect applications and data from datacenter-level failures by distributing resources across physically separate locations within an Azure region. Each zone has independent power, cooling, and networking. Deploying across zones provides a 99.99% uptime SLA for VMs.
Q3: A company needs to ensure that no one can accidentally delete a production resource group. What Azure feature should they use?
A3: Apply a Delete resource lock at the resource group level. Resource locks override any RBAC permissions — even an Owner cannot delete a resource with a Delete lock until the lock is removed. There are two lock types: Delete (prevents deletion) and ReadOnly (prevents modification and deletion).
Q4: Which Azure service provides serverless, event-driven compute that charges only for execution time?
A4: Azure Functions. It is a serverless compute service that runs code in response to events (HTTP requests, timers, queue messages) without managing infrastructure. Pricing is based on the number of executions, execution time, and memory consumed. The first 1 million executions per month are free.
Q5: A company wants to estimate how much they could save by migrating their on-premises infrastructure to Azure. Which tool should they use?
A5: The Azure Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) Calculator. It compares the cost of on-premises infrastructure (servers, networking, storage, IT labor, electricity) against the equivalent Azure services to estimate potential savings over 1-5 years.
Lab Exercises
Lab 1: Explore the Azure Portal
1. Sign in to the Azure Portal at https://portal.azure.com
2. Navigate to "All Services" and browse service categories
3. Create a Resource Group named "az900-lab-rg" in your preferred region
4. Explore the Cost Management + Billing section
5. Open Azure Cloud Shell and run: az account show
Lab 2: Create and Explore a Virtual Machine
# Open Azure Cloud Shell (Bash) and create a VM
az vm create \
--resource-group az900-lab-rg \
--name lab-vm-01 \
--image Ubuntu2204 \
--size Standard_B1s \
--admin-username azureadmin \
--generate-ssh-keys
# View the VM details
az vm show --resource-group az900-lab-rg --name lab-vm-01 --output table
# Check the VM's public IP
az vm list-ip-addresses --resource-group az900-lab-rg --name lab-vm-01 --output table
# Clean up when done
az group delete --name az900-lab-rg --yes --no-wait
Lab 3: Explore Azure Storage
# Create a storage account
az storage account create \
--name az900labstorage \
--resource-group az900-lab-rg \
--location eastus \
--sku Standard_LRS
# Create a blob container
az storage container create \
--name lab-data \
--account-name az900labstorage
# Upload a file
echo "Hello Azure!" > hello.txt
az storage blob upload \
--container-name lab-data \
--file hello.txt \
--name hello.txt \
--account-name az900labstorage
Exam Tips
- This is a conceptual exam — focus on understanding what services do, not how to configure them
- Memorize the shared responsibility model — know what Microsoft manages vs. what the customer manages for IaaS, PaaS, and SaaS
- Capital vs. operational expenditure — cloud is OpEx; understanding this distinction is tested repeatedly
- Know the SLA math — composite SLA = SLA1 x SLA2; adding redundancy increases composite SLA
- Governance tool differences — Policy enforces rules, Blueprints package governance, Locks prevent changes, RBAC controls access
- Free tier knowledge — know which services have free tiers and what the limits are
Resources
- AZ-900 Exam Skills Outline
- Microsoft Learn: Azure Fundamentals Learning Path
- Azure Pricing Calculator
- Azure TCO Calculator
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