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AZ-305 Exam Study Guide: Azure Solutions Architect Expert

AZ-305 Exam Study Guide: Azure Solutions Architect Expert

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Are you preparing for the AZ-305 Designing Microsoft Azure Infrastructure Solutions exam? This study guide will share with you how to prepare and pass the AZ-305: Microsoft Certified Azure Solutions Architect Expert successfully (with links to exam objectives).

Introduction

Microsoft is keeping evolving its learning programs to help you and your career keep pace with today’s digital world. The new updated role-based certifications will help you to keep pace with today’s business requirements. This change is definitely for the better, but it brings new challenges to organizations. Deployments must be automated and predictable, architecture has to handle spikes in traffic, applications have to be resilient when failures occur, and data must be secure and not vulnerable to malicious actors—and these are just some of the challenges.

Microsoft Learning is constantly evolving its learning program to better offer what you need to skill up, prove your expertise to employers and peers, and get the recognition—and opportunities you’ve earned. On October 7th, 2021, Microsoft announced that they’re reimagining the Azure Solutions Architect Expert certification. The Azure solutions architect is key to all of this and more, and the updated certification better aligns with the skills of real-world solutions architects and the tasks they perform.

To obtain and become a Microsoft Certified: Azure Solutions Architect Expert, you can choose one of the following three options:

Microsoft Certified Azure Solutions Architect Expert
Image Credit – [Microsoft Learning]

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AZ-305 Exam Study Guide: Azure Solutions Architect Expert 1

AZ-305 Exam Prep

How do you prepare for AZ-305?

I would like to share with you how to prepare and pass the AZ-305: Designing Microsoft Azure Infrastructure Solutions exam successfully. To prepare for this exam, I usually use a couple of online resources, mainly Microsoft Docs, Microsoft Learn, and Training Labs, which I am going to share with you in the next section.

The exam will be available starting mid of November 2021 in the Beta phase at the time of this writing. Beta exams are not scored immediately because Microsoft is gathering data on the quality of the questions and the exam. I will update this article as soon as I get the exam results from Microsoft.

Updated – 08/02/2022 – Microsoft announced that the AZ-305 exam is now live and out of beta. Candidates who want to achieve Azure Solutions Architect Expert certification must earn the Azure Administrator Associate certification and pass the AZ-305 exam.

Updated on 23/05/2022 – For the renewal assessment, I got 26 questions in total without any case study. The performance assessment is based on the following topics:

> Design a data storage solution for relational data.
> Design a data storage solution for non-relational data.
> Design for high availability.
> Design a computing solution.
> Design an application architecture.
> Design network solutions.
> Design data integration.

Renewal assessment for Microsoft Certified: Azure Solutions Architect Expert
Renewal assessment for Microsoft Certified: Azure Solutions Architect Expert

Exam Target Audience

The Azure Solution Architects have subject matter expertise in designing cloud and hybrid solutions that run on Microsoft Azure, including compute, network, storage, monitor, and security.
Responsibilities of an Azure Solution Architect include advising stakeholders and translating business requirements into designing secure, scalable, and reliable Azure cloud solutions.

The responsibilities of an Azure Solution Architect include advising stakeholders and translating business requirements into secure, scalable, and reliable cloud solutions. An Azure Solution Architect partners with Azure Developers, Azure Administrators, and other roles responsible for implementing Azure solutions.

The Azure Solutions Architects should have experience and knowledge of IT operations, including networking, virtualization, identity, security, business continuity, disaster recovery, data platforms, and governance–this role should manage how decisions in each area affect an overall solution. Generally, this role has experience in Azure administration, Azure development, and DevOps processes.

Prerequisites

To prepare for this exam, you should have expert Azure administration skills, in addition to extensive experience and knowledge of networking, virtualization, identity, security, business continuity, disaster recovery, data platform, budgeting, and governance–this role should manage how decisions in each area affect an overall solution. In addition, this role should have expert-level skills in Azure administration and experience with Azure development and DevOps processes.

Please note that to take this exam, you must have expert Azure administration skills. Check out my AZ-104 Exam: Microsoft Certified Azure Administrator Associate study guide to get prepared.

Skills measured on this exam

This exam measures your ability to accomplish the technical topics listed below based on the latest update from Microsoft Learning.

I have also included the direct link to the Microsoft documentation so you can read more about each objective.

Design Identity, Governance, and Monitoring Solutions (25-30%)

Design a Solution for Logging and Monitoring

 Design a log routing solution

 Recommend an appropriate level of logging

 Recommend a monitoring tool(s) for a solution

Design Authentication and Authorization Solutions

 Recommend a solution for securing resources with role-based access controls

 Recommend an identity management solution

 Recommend a solution for securing identities

Design Governance

 Recommend an organizational and hierarchical structure for Azure resources

 Recommend a solution for enforcing and auditing compliance

Design Identities and Access for Applications

 Recommend solutions to allow applications to access Azure resources

 Recommend a solution that securely stores passwords and secrets

 Recommend a solution for integrating applications into Azure AD

 Recommend a user consent solution for applications

Design Data Storage Solutions (25-30%)

Design a Data Storage Solution for Relational Data

 Recommend database service tier sizing

 Recommend a solution for database scalability

 Recommend a solution for encrypting data at rest, data in transmission, and data in use

Design Data Integration

 Recommend a solution for data integration

Recommend a solution for data analysis Recommend a Data Storage Solution

 Recommend a solution for storing relational data

 Recommend a solution for storing semi-structured data

 Recommend a solution for storing non-relational data

Design a Data Storage Solution for Non-relational Data

 Recommend access control solutions to data storage

 Recommend a data storage solution to balance features, performance, and cost

 Resign a data solution for protection and durability

Design Business Continuity Solutions (10-15%)

Design a Solution for Backup and Disaster Recovery

 Recommend a recovery solution for Azure, hybrid, and on-premises workloads that meet recovery objectives (RTO, RLO, RPO)

 Understand the recovery solutions for containers

 Recommend a backup and recovery solution for computing

 Recommend a backup and recovery solution for databases

 Recommend a backup and recovery solution for unstructured data

Design for High Availability

 Identify the availability requirements of Azure resources

 Recommend a high-availability solution for Compute

 Recommend a high-availability solution for non-relational data storage

 Recommend a high-availability solution for relational data storage

Design Infrastructure Solutions (25-30%)

Design a Compute Solution

 Recommend a Virtual Machine-based compute solution

 Recommend an appropriately sized compute solution based on workload requirements

 Recommend a Container-based compute solution

 Recommend a Serverless-based compute solution

Design Application Architecture

 Recommend a caching solution for applications

 Recommend a messaging architecture

 Recommend an event-driven architecture

 Recommend an automated deployment solution for your applications

 Recommend an application configuration management solution

 Recommend a solution for API integration

Design Migrations

 Evaluate migration solution that leverages the Cloud Adoption Framework

 Assess and interpret on-premises servers, data, and applications for migration

 Recommend a solution for migrating applications and Virtual Machines

 Recommend a solution for migrating databases

 Recommend a solution for migrating unstructured data

Design Network Solutions

 Recommend a network architecture solution based on workload requirements

 Recommend a connectivity solution that connects Azure resources to the Internet

 Recommend a connectivity solution that connects Azure resources to on-premises networks

 Optimize network performance for applications

 Recommend a solution to optimize network security

 Recommend a load balancing and routing solution

Microsoft Learn – Study Resources

To prepare for this exam, I use the new Microsoft Learn, a great resource that provides self-paced skills training on a variety of Azure Solutions Architect topics. I highly recommend checking the following modules:

> AZ-305: Design identity, governance, and monitor solutions

> AZ-305: Design business continuity solutions

> AZ-305: Design data storage solutions

> AZ-305: Design infrastructure solutions

> AZ-305: Build great solutions with the Microsoft Azure Well-Architected Framework

> AZ-305: Accelerate cloud adoption with the Microsoft Cloud Adoption Framework for Azure

Case studies and preparation

Check the following case studies that will help you to gain more practical design experience. At the time of this writing, these case studies are still new and will evolve over time. I’ll update the study guide as soon as new case studies are released:

1) Governance: Design a governance solution

2) Compute: Design a compute solution

3) Nonrelational storage: Design Non-relational Storage Case Study

4) Relational storage: Design Relational Storage Case Study

5) App architecture: Design an app architecture solution

6) Authentication and authorization solutions: Design authentication and authorization solutions

7) Loggin and monitoring solutions: Design logging and monitoring solutions 

8) Network infrastructure solutions-1: Design – Product catalog enterprise application

9) Network infrastructure solutions-2: Design a network solution -BI enterprise application

AZ 305 Exam Videos

If  you are interested to prepare for the AZ-305 exam using video training, then I highly recommend checking the following advanced course:

> Cloud Academy: AZ-305 Exam Preparation: Designing Microsoft Azure Infrastructure Solutions.

AZ 305 Books

Microsoft Press released the official Exam Ref AZ-305 Designing Microsoft Azure Infrastructure Solutions by November 2022, you can place the order here.

Exam Ref AZ-305 Designing Microsoft Azure Infrastructure Solutions
Exam Ref AZ-305 Designing Microsoft Azure Infrastructure Solutions

This book helps you prepare for Microsoft Exam AZ-305 and help demonstrates your real-world expertise in designing cloud and hybrid solutions that run on Microsoft Azure, including identity, governance, monitoring, data storage, business continuity, and infrastructure.

It’s designed for modern IT professionals, this Exam Ref focuses on the critical thinking and decision-making acumen needed for success at the Microsoft Certified Expert level.

AZ 305 Exam Dumps and Practice Test

If you wish to validate and assess your skills before taking the real AZ-305 exam, I highly encourage you to purchase one of the following assessment and practice tests:

> Assessment AZ-305: Designing Microsoft Azure Infrastructure Solutions. This assessment is aimed at Azure professionals who want to test their skills. This assessment contains 30 questions from the MeasureUp-associated practice test. It does not include explanations or references as this is an assessment-only product.

> Microsoft Official Practice Test AZ-305: Designing Microsoft Azure Infrastructure Solutions. This exam is aimed at Azure professionals who want to validate and test their skills. This test contains 158 questions from mind hub the official certification prep and covers all the exam objectives. It also includes explanations and references as this is a practice test product.

Instructor-led virtual training

Last but certainly not least, if you prefer instructor-led training, Microsoft released the AZ-305T00 4 days course. This course teaches Azure Solution Architects how to design infrastructure solutions. Course topics cover governance, computing, application architecture, storage, data integration, authentication, networks, business continuity, and migrations. The course combines lectures with case studies to demonstrate basic architectural design principles.

If you prefer to get prepare for this exam with Microsoft MCT instructor-led virtual training, you can get in contact with me here.

Schedule AZ-305 Exam

At the time of this writing, the AZ-305 exam will be available in mid-November 2021 in the beta phase first. Beta exams are not scored immediately because Microsoft is gathering data on the quality of the questions and the exam.

Updated – 16/11/2021 – Microsoft launched the AZ-305 exam in beta mode, if you would like to take the beta exam and receive the 80% discount*, use the code below when prompted for payment. Please note that the seats are offered on a first-come, first-served basis. This exam is out of the Beta phase now and it’s Public. The beta code below is NOT available anymore.

AZ305OAKDALE

Once you are ready, click Schedule exam here and take it online from the comfort of your home/office with proctor supervision.

Exam AZ-305: Designing Microsoft Azure Infrastructure Solutions
AZ-305: Designing Microsoft Azure Infrastructure Solutions

Other Microsoft Azure Exam Study Guides

Are you interested in another Azure certification exam? I highly encourage you to check out the following Azure exam study guides:

If you are planning to take the AZ-305 exam… I wish you all the best and Happy Studying!!!

__
Thank you for reading my blog.

If you have any questions or feedback, please leave a comment.

-Charbel Nemnom-

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About the Author
Charbel Nemnom
Charbel Nemnom is a Senior Cloud Architect, Swiss Certified ICT Security Expert, Certified Cloud Security Professional (CCSP), Certified Information Security Manager (CISM), Microsoft Most Valuable Professional (MVP), and Microsoft Certified Trainer (MCT). He has over 20 years of broad IT experience serving on and guiding technical teams to optimize the performance of mission-critical enterprise systems with extensive practical knowledge of complex systems build, network design, business continuity, and cloud security.

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8 thoughts on “AZ-305 Exam Study Guide: Azure Solutions Architect Expert”

Leave a comment...

  1. Can I attempt AZ-305 first and then AZ-104. Would the order of exams matter to get Azure Solution Architect certification?

  2. Hello Vishal, thanks for the comment!
    The order of the exams doesn’t matter. You can attempt the AZ-305 exam first, and then the AZ-104.
    Hope this helps and good luck!

  3. I cleared AZ-104 already at the end of December. Any tentative dates you are aware of when the AZ-305 is available as a final release? Really detest the idea of taking a beta exam only to see a long wait of 2-3 months!

  4. Hello Amit, thanks for the comment and congratulations on passing the AZ-104 exam.
    For the AZ-305 exam, the tentative release date out of beta is between the end of February 2022.
    Hope this helps you with planning.

  6. Hello Jose, thanks for the comment!
    Please note that Exam AZ-301 is retired and expired. It does not count anymore.
    Starting from the 1st of April, 2022 and later, you must take and pass the AZ-104: Azure Administrator Associate certification and then pass the Exam AZ-305 to become an Azure Solutions Architect Expert.
    If you already passed Exam AZ-104, then only take and pass Exam AZ-305.
    Good luck!

  8. Hello,
    Please note that I’ve updated the study guide to include two practice tests, have a look.
    As for the case study solutions, I can’t share the answers since you need to take the official Microsoft AZ-305 course.
    If you’re interested to take the official course and prepare for the AZ-305 exam with Microsoft MCT instructor-led training, you can get in contact with me here.
    Good luck!

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