Azure Cloud Services
Create highly-available, infinitely-scalable cloud applications and APIs.
OVERVIEW
Deploy highly available and scalable applications in minutes
Build the web and cloud applications you need on your terms while using the many languages we support. Simplify the management of your applications with cloud services while ensuring high availability. Scale your environment automatically based on demand and reduce costs. Automate operating system and application updates to increase security. Take advantage of integrated health monitoring and load balancing. Focus on your application, not the underlying cloud infrastructure.
- Build and deploy powerful web and cloud applications and services in minutes with Azure Cloud Services. Use Azure Cloud Services to keep your applications available and redirect traffic from troubled instances to healthy ones that are running smoothly. Once your application is deployed, Azure will take care of the rest—from provisioning to load balancing. Your application is backed by an industry-leading 99.95 percent service-level agreement (SLA).
- Use the new Azure Resource Manager–based deployment model—provided by Azure Cloud Services (extended support)—to increase regional resiliency. With this new deployment model, use capabilities such as role-based access control (RBAC), tags, policy, and support for deployment templates. Keep using the existing Azure Cloud Services (classic) deployment model for your Azure Service Manager–based applications.
- Automatically scale your cloud services infrastructure based on current demand. The autoscale feature helps you manage unexpected traffic spikes by automatically scaling your Azure Cloud Services environment up or down to deliver an excellent customer experience. Set scaling limits, schedule goals, and ensure that the performance of your applications can scale while simultaneously minimizing costs.
- Experience an excellent development environment using the Azure SDK, which integrates seamlessly with Visual Studio. Deploy applications using the language you like, including .NET, Java, Node.js, PHP, Python, or Ruby. Test your application before deploying it to the cloud by using Azure Emulator, which brings the platform’s key functionality right to your development computer. To deploy the new release to production, just swap the staging environment into production.
- Set up real-time alerts to know when service availability or other metrics may degrade. Automate operating system updates to improve the security of your environment. Focus on building great applications and don’t worry about patching, faulty hardware, or network issues. Azure Cloud Services helps you conveniently monitor the health and availability of your applications. The health metrics dashboard shows you key statistics at a glance.
FEATURES
Scalable, managed cloud services for apps and APIs
Hyperscale
Highly available and massively scalable platform for your applications and APIs. Accelerated application deployment.
Elasticity
Autoscaling of your cloud environment to optimize costs and improve performance.
Observability
Integrated health monitoring and load balancing with dashboards and real-time alerts.
Tooling
Excellent development experience using the Azure SDK, which integrates seamlessly with Visual Studio.
Security
Embedded security and compliance
34,000
Full-time equivalent engineers dedicated to security initiatives at Microsoft.
15,000
Partners with specialized security expertise.
>100
Compliance certifications, including over 50 specific to global regions and countries.
Pricing
Azure Cloud Services pricing
Select the right virtual machine for your Azure Cloud Services deployment based on your target application. Review prices based on your Azure region. Reduce your costs with one- and three-year reservations.
RESOURCES
Resources
Frequently asked questions
- Azure Cloud Services (extended support) is a new Azure Resource Manager–based deployment model for Azure Cloud Services. The Azure Service Manager–based deployment model is now named Azure Cloud Services (classic). Both deployment models are available in Azure Cloud Services.
- The primary benefit of this new deployment model is regional resiliency. Azure Cloud Services (extended support) also offers Azure Resource Manager capabilities such as RBAC, tags, policy, and support for deployment templates.
- There are many other Azure options to consider:
- Virtual machine scale sets
- Azure App Service
- Azure Kubernetes Services (AKS)
- Azure Service Fabric
- We guarantee that, when you deploy two or more role instances in different update domains, at least one role instance will have role instance connectivity at least 99.95 percent of the time. For additional details, please refer to the Azure Cloud Services SLA.
- Azure Cloud Services (extended support) provides two paths to migrate from Azure Service Manager (ASM) to Azure Resource Manager (ARM). The first path requires a redeployment, where customers deploy cloud services directly in ARM and then delete the old cloud service in ASM after thorough validation. This migration path is already generally available. Learn more in the documentation. The second path is an in-place migration, which can migrate existing Azure Cloud Services (classic) to Cloud Services (extended support). In this scenario, the platform orchestrates the migration of your customer’s services from ASM to ARM and provides a no-downtime migration experience for most scenarios. This feature is now in Public Preview. Learn more in the documentation.
- To use Azure Cloud Services (extended support), please refer to the documentation.
Next steps
Choose the Azure account that’s right for you
Pay as you go or try Azure free for up to 30 days.
Azure Solutions
Azure cloud solutions
Solve your business problems with proven combinations of Azure cloud services, as well as sample architectures and documentation.
Business Solutions Hub
Find the right Microsoft Cloud solution
Browse the Microsoft Business Solutions Hub to find the products and solutions that can help your organization reach its goals.
Get the Azure mobile app 
