Microsoft Azure is a platform for public cloud computing that delivers serverless computing, infrastructure as a service, software as a service, and platform as a service. Microsoft Azure, a perpetual hybrid cloud, is becoming more and more popular, with about 90% of Fortune 500 organizations embracing Azure services.
Even complicated programs can be deployed and managed by the Azure cloud services using the virtual infrastructure. It supports a wide range of hardware, databases, operating systems, and programming languages. Therefore, alternatives to the conventional methods of organizational processes are offered by Azure services designed for professionals and businesses, with the best Azure services significantly enhancing performance.
Why Should You Choose Microsoft Azure Services?
While each company may have its own unique reasons for selecting Microsoft Azure services, there are a number of outstanding benefits that everyone can take advantage of, including:
- Microsoft Azure can offer an alluring blend of Infrastructure as a Platform (IaaP) and Platform as a Service (PaaS), assisting businesses in the building and deploying their own web applications without putting in a lot of extra effort.
- The Security Development Lifecycle, created by Microsoft Azure, is an industry-standard security procedure that takes into account all security elements, including obtaining licenses and assuring the highest level of safety in all activities.
- Microsoft Azure already has a sizable user base, but the infrastructure is constantly expanding thanks to the usage of additional processing power for apps and cloud storage sales.
- Microsoft Azure continues to have a distinctive feature: a hybrid cloud computing ecosystem. Utilizing Virtual Private Networks (VPNs), ExpressRoute connections, caches, CDNs, etc. can boost performance.
- It makes sense to invest in a cloud platform that works effectively with all Microsoft products given that the majority of businesses rely on MS office tools. Furthermore, C++, C, and Visual Basic knowledge can assist you to advance your career in Microsoft Azure. You can try out the Azure certification courses for Windows credentials if you need additional validation.
- With the aid of machine learning bots, cognitive APIs, and Blockchain as a Service, Microsoft Azure offers the intelligence and analytics capabilities to enhance the business process (BaaS).
- Microsoft Azure additionally includes data processing tools for SQL and NoSQL to extract more nuanced and useful insights from the available data.
- The accessibility of Azure services is a key factor, as maintenance of virtual infrastructure is very cost-effective.
List of Top Azure Services
Although there isn’t a big list of rivals for the most popular cloud service, Microsoft Azure continues to face stiff competition from leading contenders like Google and AWS. Microsoft Azure has grown and changed throughout the years despite fierce competition, particularly during the remote working phase brought on by a pandemic in 2020 and 2021. The platform has retained its integrity and popularity by providing top Azure services. Let’s now go further into learning more about the top 10 Azure services.
Azure Active Directory
One of Microsoft Azure’s most well-known cloud computing services is Azure Active Directory (AD). It is a global identification platform that is a part of the Identity Division and guarantees the management and security of identities. Because of its strong security solutions, it earns the first spot in our list of the greatest Azure services.
As an enterprise identity solution, Azure Active Directory delivers single sign-on and multi-factor authentication to safeguard users from online dangers. Identity-based security guarantees comprehensive user protection against cyberattacks. Through an authenticated login, they can access the program from anywhere in the world. The creation of a single identity platform using Azure Active Directory makes it simpler to engage with internal and external users in a secure manner.
Azure CDN
A special mention should be made of Azure Content Delivery Network (CDN), a crucial Azure feature that fosters and accelerates business growth. Its server is constructed such that it can accommodate a substantial amount of storage, web applications, and Azure cloud services. Because of this, content is delivered safely all over the world using Azure CDN.
Due to its quick response times and quick load times, Azure CDN is right up there with the best Azure services. Additionally, it is heavily secured so that the creators won’t have to invest enough time in creating fresh security measures each time they release any content. Additionally, this data is further dispersed into precise customer workflows with user engagement insights.
Azure Data Factory
Azure Data Factory ingests data from several sources to automate data transmission and movement in a cloud-based workflow. Several Azure services, including Azure Machine Learning, Azure HDInsight Hadoop, and Azure Data Lake Analytics, are used by Azure Data Factory for computing. Azure Data Lake can be thought of as a sizable original data repository for big data analytics.
Business analytics (BI) apps can publish output data from Azure Data Factory on Azure Data Lake for analytics and visualization. Given that it does not store any data but instead lets you track data movement and create a data-driven workflow, Azure Data Factory deserves to be mentioned among the best Azure services.
Azure SQL
The platform as a service (PaaS) category includes the Azure SQL database, which handles the majority of database maintenance tasks like backups, monitoring, patching, and updating without the need for user interaction. We have to include Azure SQL in our list of the best Azure services because of its effectiveness without the need for human interaction.
The integrated PaaS capabilities of the Azure SQL database enable you to manage domain-specific databases and tailor your operations to your company’s demands. The SQL server database engine’s most recent and stable version is always used by the Azure SQL database. A patched OS with 99.99% availability is included with it.
Azure Function
Azure Functions are used by developers to connect to messaging platforms or data sources and respond to events. The most advantageous feature of Azure Function is its compute-on-demand capability, which allows you to only pay for the services you really use. Azure Functions, a serverless compute service, enables enterprises to run event-triggered codes without having an infrastructure for its provision.
Azure Function is utilized in production environments and is extremely dependable. Decoupling, high throughput, sharing, and reusability can all be accomplished with it.
CosmosDB
CosmosDB is a widely distributed database service and one of the most well-known Azure services. While providing capabilities to scale up your processing resources and worldwide distribution patterns with Microsoft Azure, it can access and manage data from dispersed data centers.
It’s interesting to note that CosmosDB limits read and write latencies to single-digit milliseconds while guaranteeing 99.99% availability. It can be used for graph models, key-value models, relational models, and documents because it supports many data models through a single backend. A popular Azure service known as a NewSQL database, CosmosDB stands out due to its inability to process relational data models.
DevOps
The software as a service (SaaS) platform of DevOps will be required to build and deploy applications as soon as you begin using Microsoft Azure services. It can facilitate the orchestration of a DevOps toolchain and provides simple integration capabilities with well-known industry solutions. DevOps services demonstrate the tools’ agility by monitoring, scheduling, and debating their work with other teams.
No matter the platform, language, or cloud, DevOps is generally very helpful for users’ applications. Through greater collaboration and active planning, they also facilitate quicker delivery. This Azure solution guarantees unlimited access to a private Git repository housed in the cloud where enhanced file management encourages cooperation when developing applications.
Azure Backup
Human mistake is an unfortunate fact, but Azure Backup enables basic data protection measures from the Azure Web app services to keep your data safe from ransomware or any other form of loss. SQL workloads and virtual machine data can both be backed up for a relatively low price with this method.
In addition to Azure Backup, tools like Windows VSS Snapshot and Linux freeze might be useful for maintaining data consistency. Azure’s backup system promotes more effective task management and project execution.
