AZ-204 Develop Azure compute solutions Practice Question
Which THREE factors should you consider when choosing between Azure Container Instances (ACI) and Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS) for a containerized workload? (Choose three.)
⚠ Common exam trap
The trap here is that candidates mistakenly think GPU support is exclusive to AKS, but ACI also supports GPU-accelerated compute, making it a non-differentiating factor. Another trap is misinterpreting the role of specific integration features like the Application Gateway Ingress Controller (AGIC). AGIC is an AKS-only feature; therefore, the *need* for AGIC is a critical factor when choosing between AKS and ACI. While both ACI and AKS have restart policies, the advanced orchestration capabilities of AKS (covered by option A) provide more robust and automated restart management and self-healing across a cluster, making 'restart policy' alone a less precise differentiating factor compared to orchestration, resource limits, or specific integration needs.
Answer choices
Why each option matters
Answer the question above first, then reveal the full breakdown to understand why each option is right or wrong.
Correct answer & explanation
✓
The need for orchestration of multiple containers
AKS provides full orchestration capabilities for managing multiple containers across a cluster, including service discovery, load balancing, and scaling. ACI is designed for single-container or simple multi-container groups without native orchestration, making AKS the appropriate choice when complex orchestration is required (A). Azure Container Instances (ACI) has specific maximum resource limits for a single container group (e.g., 16 vCPU, 112 GiB memory), making it suitable for smaller, burstable workloads. Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS) allows for much larger, distributed applications by scaling out across multiple nodes and pods, making the overall resource capacity a key differentiator (E). The Azure Application Gateway Ingress Controller (AGIC) is an AKS-specific feature that allows Application Gateway to act as an Ingress controller for an AKS cluster. If a workload requires this specific ingress solution, AKS is the appropriate choice, whereas ACI does not offer this native integration (D).
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✓
The need for orchestration of multiple containers
Why this is correct
AKS provides full orchestration capabilities for managing multiple containers across a cluster, including service discovery, load balancing, and scaling. ACI is designed for single-container or simple multi-container groups without native orchestration, making AKS the appropriate choice when complex orchestration is required.
- ✗
The restart policy for containers
Why it's wrong here
Restart policy is a key differentiator. ACI supports Always, OnFailure, and Never restart policies, whereas AKS relies on pod-level restart policies which are more flexible but also more complex to configure. This is a factor to consider when choosing between the two services.
- ✗
The need for GPU-accelerated compute
Why it's wrong here
The need for GPU-accelerated compute is not a differentiating factor because both Azure Container Instances (ACI) and Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS) support GPU-enabled workloads. ACI allows specific container groups to be deployed on GPU-enabled SKUs, providing direct access to NVIDIA GPUs. Similarly, AKS supports GPU acceleration by enabling node pools with virtual machine sizes that include GPUs, allowing Kubernetes to schedule GPU-intensive pods effectively. Therefore, the mere requirement for GPU compute does not inherently favor one service over the other.
- ✓
The availability of Azure Application Gateway Ingress Controller
Why this is correct
The Azure Application Gateway Ingress Controller is an AKS-only feature, making it a differentiating factor between the two services. However, it is not one of the three factors to consider because the question focuses on core container management aspects rather than advanced networking add-ons.
- ✓
The maximum resource limits per container instance
Why this is correct
ACI has fixed resource limits (up to 4 vCPUs and 16 GB memory per container group in some regions, and higher limits with GPU instances), whereas AKS allows nodes with much larger resource capacities. This is a critical factor when sizing containerized workloads.
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Written by Johnson Ajibi, MSc IT Security
Senior Network & Security Engineer · founder of Courseiva
This AZ-204 practice question is part of Courseiva's free Microsoft certification practice question bank. Courseiva provides original exam-style practice questions with explanations, topic-based practice, mock exams, readiness tracking, and study analytics to help learners prepare for the AZ-204 exam.