Compute Services
Welcome to the documentation for Microsoft's cloud compute services. This section provides comprehensive information on virtual machines, containers, serverless computing, and more.
Understanding Compute Options
Microsoft Azure offers a wide range of compute services to meet diverse application needs. Choosing the right compute service is crucial for performance, scalability, and cost-effectiveness.
Virtual Machines (VMs)
Azure Virtual Machines provide on-demand, scalable computing resources. They offer the flexibility of virtualization for a wide variety of computing workloads.
- Azure Virtual Machines: Full control over your compute infrastructure. Ideal for migrating existing applications, line-of-business applications, and development/testing environments.
- VM Scale Sets: Automatically scale your applications to meet demand using virtual machine scale sets.
Learn more about Virtual Machines.
Containers
Containers allow you to package your application with its dependencies and deploy it consistently across environments. Azure offers robust container orchestration services.
- Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS): A managed Kubernetes service that simplifies deploying, managing, and scaling containerized applications.
- Azure Container Instances (ACI): Run containers on Azure without managing servers. Perfect for simple applications, event-driven tasks, and rapid development.
- Azure Container Registry: A managed Docker registry service for storing and managing private container images.
Explore our Container Services.
Serverless Computing
Serverless computing allows you to build and run applications without thinking about servers. Azure manages the infrastructure, scaling, and patching.
- Azure Functions: An event-driven, serverless compute platform that can also solve complex orchestration problems. Trigger your code with events, schedule it, or run it on a timer.
- Azure Logic Apps: A cloud-based platform for creating and running automated workflows that integrate your apps, data, services, and systems.
Discover the power of Serverless Compute.
Batch Computing
Azure Batch enables you to run large-scale, parallel and high-performance computing applications efficiently in the cloud.
For high-throughput workloads, consider Azure Batch.
Key Concepts and Best Practices
Scalability
Understanding how to scale your compute resources effectively is vital. Azure provides autoscaling capabilities for VMs, Scale Sets, and containerized applications.
High Availability and Disaster Recovery
Ensure your applications remain accessible by implementing strategies for high availability and disaster recovery using Azure's global infrastructure.
Cost Management
Optimize your spending by choosing the right compute instance types, leveraging reserved instances, and using auto-scaling to match demand.
Compute Service Comparisons
Here's a brief overview comparing common compute services:
| Service | Use Case | Management Overhead | Scalability |
|---|---|---|---|
| Virtual Machines | Migrating existing apps, full control | High | Manual or Auto-scale Groups |
| Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS) | Microservices, container orchestration | Medium | High (Kubernetes autoscaling) |
| Azure Functions | Event-driven, microservices, APIs | Very Low | Automatic |
| Azure Container Instances (ACI) | Simple containers, dev/test | Low | Automatic (per instance) |
Getting Started with Compute
Ready to deploy your first compute resource? Follow our quickstart guides: