Cloud is the buzzword in today’s world. The best way to understand the cloud concept is to prepare for the cloud fundamentals certification like AZ-900, CLO-001 & CLO-002, etc. Microsoft released an Azure fundamentals certification exam AZ-900 for both IT and non-technical professionals. The AZ-900 exam aspirants can use this study guide to prepare for the azure fundamental exam. The intent of the exam ref is to provide a compiled list (topics, links, practice tests, etc.) of the guidance materials in a single place.
AZ-900 Exam Prerequisites
Microsoft Azure fundamentals certification exam doesn’t require architect and coding skills. It doesn’t require any working experience with cloud computing as well. The primary objective of the exam is to cover the cloud concept using the Microsoft Azure cloud platform. The number of questions in the exam varies from 35 to 45. The duration of the exam is 90 minutes, and the price is $99. There were four different types of questions in the Microsoft fundamentals certification exam like
- Single choice questions
- Multiple choice questions (maximum of 2 selections)
- Drag-and-drop the correct item from left and put them to the right in the correct position
- Select the correct option from the available options in a drop-down list
AZ-900 Exam Structure
The syllabus of the Microsoft Azure fundamentals exam includes four high-level sections such as
- Understand the cloud concepts (15-20%) covering the foundation of cloud computing with the introduction to the Microsoft Azure platform
- Understand core Azure services (30-35%) covering the compute, storage, and networking services
- Understand security, privacy, compliance, and trust (25-30%) covering the services, tools, and technologies available for a secure, trusted, and industry-compliant Microsoft Azure cloud platform
- Understand Azure pricing and support (20-25%) covering purchasing the Microsoft Azure subscription, available support options and service-level agreement of the services
It is required to understand the concepts mentioned in this AZ-900 study guide. It is compiled with the following topics based on my experience while preparing for the Microsoft Azure fundamentals certification exam. Except for newbies, there is no need to follow a particular order in the AZ-900 study guide
Cloud Concepts
- Introduction to cloud computing
- Virtualization in cloud computing
- Benefits of cloud computing
- Cloud Economics – CapEx and OpEx
- Cloud deployment types like private, public and hybrid cloud
- Different types of cloud models like IaaS, PaaS, and SaaS
- Understand the overview and use case of the Microsoft Azure core services
- Manage the global cloud infrastructure with Geographies, Region, and Datacenters
- Understand the Region-pairs and Availability zones
- Setup an Azure account
Following topics require further studies for Microsoft Azure fundamentals exam and you can expect the questions from them
- Difference between CapEx and OpEx for cloud infrastructure
- Understand the use-case of the hybrid cloud deployment models
- Examples of IaaS, PaaS, and SaaS
- It is difficult to remember ever growing 200+ Azure services and their use cases. Try to cover the most frequently updated Azure services from Azure heat map
Core Azure Services – Compute
- Different compute services like Virtual machines, Containers, Azure app service, and Serverless computing
- Understand the fault domain and upgrade domain
- Understand Virtual machine scale-sets
- Different services under Azure app service like Web app, API app, Mobile App and Web jobs
- Understand Azure container instances and Azure Kubernetes services
- Understand serverless compute like Azure functions and Azure logic apps
- Manage the Azure using the Azure portal, CLI, PowerShell, and mobile app
Following topics require further studies for Microsoft Azure fundamentals exam and you can expect the questions from them
- Types of disk in a VM like temporary, OS and data disk
- Difference between Availability zones and fault domain
- Use-case of Network security groups
- Use-case of Virtual machine scale-sets
- Ways to deploy and remove multiple VM’s in an automated manner
- Ways to move a VM across resource groups and subscription as well
Core Azure Services – Storage
- Different types of storage for structured, semi-structured and unstructured data
- Understand data storages like SQL Azure, Cosmos DB, Azure Data Lake, Blob, Files, Queues and Disk storage (SSD and HDD both)
- Different types of storage tiers like hot, cool and archive
- Different encryption technologies like Azure storage service encryption, Transparent data encryption, and Client-side encryption
Following topics require further studies for Microsoft Azure fundamentals exam and you can expect the questions from them
- Use case of Azure HDInsights, Data Lake and Azure Data warehouse
- Ways to access the data from archive storage tier
Core Azure Services – Networking
- Understand the concepts of Virtual network
- Manage the traffic flows using the network security group in a Virtual network
- Understand services like Azure load balancer, Azure application gateway, Azure DNS, CDN, and Traffic manager
Following topics require further studies for Microsoft Azure fundamentals exam and you can expect the questions from them
- Difference between Azure load balancer, Traffic manager and Azure application gateway
Security & Privacy in Azure
- Overview of Azure security center
- Understand the concept of Authentication and Authorization using Azure active directory
- Different use-cases like SSO, B2B, B2C, and MFA
- Understand Role-based access control in Azure
- Overview of Privileged identity management
- Different type of certificates like service and management certificate
- Secrets, keys and certificates management using Azure key vault
- Overview of Azure firewall
- Overview of Azure information protection
- Overview of Azure advanced threat protection
- Overview of
Following topics require further studies for Microsoft Azure fundamentals exam and you can expect the questions from them
- Enabling MFA using Priviledged identity management?
- Difference between Azure firewall and network security groups
Compliance & Trust in Azure
- Overview of Azure policy
- Overview of Azure blueprint
- Understand Microsoft privacy statement
- Overview of Microsft trust center
- Overview of Services trust portal
- Use case of Compliance manager
Following topics require further studies for Microsoft Azure fundamentals exam and you can expect the questions from them
- Difference between Azure blueprint and ARM template while creating and managing the Azure resources
Service Level Agreements in Azure
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- Available SLA’s across the Azure services
- Calculate the service-level agreements
- Different service tiers available across the Azure services
- Service lifecycles like the private preview, public preview, and general availability
Pricing & Support in Azure
- Different ways of purchasing Azure
- Usage of Azure pricing calculator
- Ways to structure billing data based on subscription
- Service credit due based on uptime
- Overview of Azure advisor
- Overview of Azure cost management
- Usage of Azure TCO calculator
- Different support plans and options available in Azure
Following topics require further studies for Microsoft Azure fundamentals exam and you can expect the questions from them
- Calculate the price of the Azure services using Azure pricing calculator for a fictitious scenario
- Understand the future price impact using Azure cost management for a fictitious scenario
- Ways to migrate the pay-as-you-go subscription to paid subscription
Winding-up
I have gone through the topics before appearing in the Microsoft Azure fundamentals exam. This indeed helped me to pass the AZ-900 exam. To sum up, a few suggestions from my side
- Try to understand the above Azure services at a high level (Overview and use-cases only)
- Check out the free learning available on the official exam site
- A practice test of the Microsoft Azure fundamentals exam is available from Whizlabs. Please note this is optional
- Last but not least, there is no alternative to hard work
With these tips, I wish you all the best for your certification journey. Please share your experience and feedback in the comment section to make the AZ-900 study guide more effective and useful to others.
Thanks Alvin!
how many days of preparation is required???
2-3 weeks of study is sufficient for taking the exam.