This is a side-by-side comparison of IaaS, PaaS, and SaaS (each covered fully in the dedicated Cloud Service Models chapter earlier in this guide), useful as a quick-reference recap before moving into Azure's specific architecture chapters. AZ-900 tests this under objective 1.2.
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A simple way to picture Types of Cloud Services: Deep Dive
A cooking book sometimes includes a comparison table summarizing techniques covered across several earlier chapters, side by side, for quick reference — not re-teaching each one from scratch. This chapter is that kind of comparison table for IaaS, PaaS, and SaaS.
Quick-reference comparison
| | IaaS | PaaS | SaaS | |---|---|---|---| | Customer manages | OS, apps, data | App, data | Data/settings only | | Azure manages | Physical infra | Physical infra, OS, runtime | Everything else | | Azure example | Virtual Machines | App Service | Microsoft 365 | | Control level | Highest | Medium | Lowest | | Management burden | Highest | Medium | Lowest |
See the dedicated Cloud Service Models chapter earlier in this guide for the full explanation, examples, and exam-focus detail behind each of these three models.
Why this recap is here
As this guide moves into specific Azure services (compute, storage, networking), it's useful to keep this spectrum in mind — many of those services map directly onto one of these three models, and recognizing which one helps predict what Azure manages versus what you manage for that specific service.
Use the table as a quick lookup
When a later chapter introduces a specific Azure service, this comparison helps quickly place it on the IaaS/PaaS/SaaS spectrum.
See the dedicated Cloud Service Models chapter for full real-world examples — this recap exists purely as a quick-reference comparison before the Azure-specific service chapters that follow.
This recap doesn't introduce new exam-focus content beyond what's covered in the dedicated Cloud Service Models chapter — refer there for the full exam-relevant detail, common wrong answers, and memory tricks.
This is a quick-reference recap — see the dedicated Cloud Service Models chapter for full detail.
IaaS, PaaS, and SaaS represent a spectrum of decreasing customer management burden and control.
Recognizing which model a specific Azure service fits helps predict what Azure manages versus what you manage.
These come up on the exam all the time. Here's how to tell them apart.
IaaS / PaaS
Customer manages some or all of OS/app/data
Building blocks or a platform for building
SaaS
Customer manages only their data/settings
A finished, ready-to-use application
No — this is a quick-reference comparison of that same content, included here to anchor it before the Azure-specific architecture chapters that follow. See the dedicated chapter for the complete explanation.
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