Question 1mediummultiple choice
Full question →mediummultiple choiceObjective-mapped
A subnet has a route table with these user-defined routes: 172.16.0.0/16 -> Virtual appliance 10.1.1.4 and 172.16.1.0/24 -> Internet. A VM in the subnet sends traffic to 172.16.1.20. Which next hop is used?
Answer choices
Why each option matters
Good practice is not just finding the correct option. The wrong answers often show the exact trap the exam wants you to fall into.
A
Distractor review
Virtual appliance 10.1.1.4, because the broader route was added first.
Route addition order does not matter when Azure selects the next hop for a destination.
B
Best answer
Internet, because the most specific route prefix always wins.
Azure chooses the longest matching prefix. The /24 route is more specific than the /16 route.
C
Distractor review
Virtual network gateway, because all traffic to private IP addresses uses the gateway by default.
A VPN gateway is not selected unless a matching route points to it or system routing requires it.
D
Distractor review
No next hop, because conflicting user-defined routes disable routing for that destination.
Conflicting routes are not disabled; Azure still uses the most specific valid route.
Common exam trap
Common exam trap: usable hosts are not the same as total addresses
Subnetting questions often tempt you into counting all addresses. In normal IPv4 subnets, the network and broadcast addresses are not usable host addresses.
Technical deep dive
How to think about this question
Subnetting questions test whether you can identify the network, broadcast address, usable range, mask and correct subnet. Slow down enough to calculate the block size correctly.
KKey Concepts to Remember
- CIDR notation defines the prefix length.
- Block size helps identify subnet boundaries.
- Network and broadcast addresses are not usable hosts in normal IPv4 subnets.
- The required host count determines the smallest suitable subnet.
TExam Day Tips
- Write the block size before choosing the subnet.
- Check whether the question asks for hosts, subnets or a specific address range.
- Do not confuse /24, /25, /26 and /27 host counts.
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More questions from this exam
Keep practising from the same exam bank, or move into a focused topic page if this question exposed a weak area.
Question 1
A route table contains these entries: 10.0.0.0/8 with next hop Virtual appliance, and 10.1.1.0/24 with next hop Virtual network gateway. Which next hop will Azure use for traffic to 10.1.1.5?
Question 2
You are deploying a stateless web application on Azure virtual machines. The solution must automatically add and remove instances based on CPU demand and allow all instances to be managed as one logical group. Which Azure compute feature should you deploy?
Question 3
You are deploying a Windows Server VM for an internal app. The VM must support Secure Boot and vTPM later, its OS disk must survive host moves, and the team wants the lowest-cost managed disk tier that still behaves like a normal writable OS disk. Which two choices should you make? Select two.
Question 4
You need to deploy several identical virtual machines and ensure that the failure of a single Azure host does not affect all of them. Which feature should you use?
Question 5
You need to connect VNet-Hub and VNet-Spoke so that resources in both virtual networks can communicate privately over the Microsoft backbone. Both virtual networks are in the same region. What should you configure?
Question 6
You need to create a storage account that provides the lowest-cost redundant storage for non-critical data and only needs protection against local disk or server failure within a single datacenter. Which redundancy option should you choose?
FAQ
Questions learners often ask
What does this AZ-104 question test?
CIDR notation defines the prefix length.
What is the correct answer to this question?
The correct answer is: Internet, because the most specific route prefix always wins. — Azure routing uses the longest prefix match first. Both routes match 172.16.1.20, but 172.16.1.0/24 is more specific than 172.16.0.0/16, so the Internet next hop is selected. This behavior is independent of the order the routes were created. In Azure, route specificity determines the outcome before other less specific routes are considered. Why others are wrong: The broader route does not win simply because it was created first. A virtual network gateway is only used when a route points to it or a system route selects it. Azure does not stop routing because two routes overlap; it evaluates them and picks the most specific match.
What should I do if I get this AZ-104 question wrong?
Then try more questions from the same exam bank and focus on understanding why the wrong options are tempting.
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