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AZ-104 Overview — Format, What’s Tested & How to Prepare

About Fuad Efendi, MSc Mathematics — Mastery Exam Prep Sep 19, 2025 3 min read Cloud Computing Information Technology Microsoft Azure System Administration Azure Az-104 Administrator Cloud

Everything you need to know before taking Microsoft Azure Administrator (AZ-104): format and scoring, who it’s for, skills measured by domain, and a focused study plan that maps to our syllabus and practice tests.

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Exam snapshot

  • Certification: Microsoft Azure Administrator (AZ-104)
  • Audience: Admins/engineers operating Azure workloads day-to-day (identity, compute, storage, networking, monitoring)
  • Experience target: ~6–12 months hands-on with Azure services and the Portal/CLI
  • Format: Multiple choice/multiple response, case sets, drag-and-drop, and short task-style questions
  • Timing: ~2 hours total appointment; question count varies by delivery form
  • Passing: Scaled score 700 (0–1000)

How to use this hub: Skim this Overview, then study the Syllabus objective-by-objective. Keep the Cheatsheet open for last-mile recall, and validate with Practice under timed conditions.

What AZ-104 measures (by domain)

1) Manage Azure identities, governance & access

  • Microsoft Entra ID tenants, users, groups, administrative units
  • Role-Based Access Control (built-in roles, custom roles, scopes), PIM basics
  • Subscriptions, management groups, policies/initiatives, tags, locks, landing-zone guardrails

2) Implement & manage storage

  • Storage accounts, redundancy (LRS/ZRS/GRS/GZRS), lifecycle & access tiers
  • Blob (containers, immutability, SAS), Files (SMB/NFS, AD/Entra auth)
  • Encryption, keys, endpoints, private access, cost & performance tuning

3) Deploy & manage compute

  • VMs and scale sets (images, extensions, availability sets/Zones)
  • Azure Compute Gallery, update/fault domains, backup & restore
  • Containers at admin level (ACR, ACI) and basics of App Service administration

4) Configure & manage virtual networking

  • VNets/subnets, IP addressing, NSGs/ASGs, routing/UDRs
  • Private Endpoints/Private Link, service endpoints, DNS, Bastion
  • Load balancing (LB/App Gateway/Front Door at admin depth), VPN/ExpressRoute fundamentals

5) Monitor, back up & maintain

  • Azure Monitor (metrics, alerts, action groups), Log Analytics & KQL basics
  • Update management, change tracking, inventory, Desired State/Guest Config overview
  • Backup/restore and recovery points; availability & resilience considerations

What’s actually hard on AZ-104

  • Scope creep: RBAC vs Policy vs Locks—know what each controls and where (resource → resource group → subscription → management group).
  • Private access patterns: When to choose Private Endpoint vs service endpoints; DNS plumbing for private access (zones, split-horizon).
  • Resilience knobs: Availability Sets vs Zones vs Scale Sets; SKU/region support and how it affects designs.
  • Storage trade-offs: Redundancy classes, access tiers, lifecycle rules, and cost/perf impacts.
  • Monitoring workflows: Metric vs log alerts, action groups, and “where the data lives” (workspace vs resource).

Readiness checklist

  • I can assign RBAC at the correct scope and verify effective permissions.
  • I can harden storage (private access, shared keys vs SAS, role-based auth).
  • I can place subnets and secure with NSGs/ASGs; I understand UDRs and routing gotchas.
  • I can choose redundancy (Zones, LRS/ZRS/GRS, zone-redundant SKUs) for a target SLA.
  • I can wire up monitoring (metrics/logs, alerts, action groups) and read basic KQL.
  • I can back up and restore VMs and storage with appropriate policies/retention.

Study plan (2–3 weeks, part-time)

Week 1 — Identity & Governance + Storage

  1. Syllabus: Identities/RBAC/Policy.
  2. Lab: create a sandbox subscription, RGs, tags, policies/initiatives, and RBAC assignments.
  3. Storage: create 2–3 storage accounts (different redundancy), enable lifecycle rules, set up a Private Endpoint and test access.

Week 2 — Networking + Compute

  1. VNets/Subnets/NSGs, UDRs, hybrid DNS (custom + Private DNS).
  2. Deploy VMs/Scale Sets with Zones; attach data disks; configure extensions; enable backups.
  3. Load balancing: internal vs public, health probes/rules; try App Gateway or Front Door end-to-end.

Week 3 — Monitoring & Review

  1. Azure Monitor + Log Analytics: build dashboards, alerts (metric + log), and action groups; practice KQL queries.
  2. Resilience review: redundancy options, region/zone implications; run a simple restore drill.
  3. Full Practice set, then targeted sprints on weak domains.

Exam-day tactics

  • First pass fast: Answer what you know; flag the rest and circle back.
  • Sketch the scope: For networking/storage scenarios, diagram resources, scopes, and endpoints.
  • Eliminate safely: Remove answers that violate least privilege, break SLA, or ignore zone-awareness.
  • Think operations: Prefer solutions that are operationally simple, cost-sensible, and auditable.

Continue to the next step

Syllabus