A company runs a critical application on Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS) in a single region. The application is stateless and uses an Azure SQL Database with active geo-replication for database DR. They need to ensure the AKS cluster can failover to a secondary region with an RTO of 15 minutes and an RPO of 5 seconds for the database. What should they recommend for the AKS cluster?
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.
Best answer
Deploy AKS clusters in two regions and use Azure Traffic Manager to route traffic.
Traffic Manager provides DNS-based global load balancing. With AKS clusters in two regions, Traffic Manager can direct users to the healthy region, achieving the required RTO. The database DR is handled separately by active geo-replication.
Distractor review
Deploy a single AKS cluster with pods spread across availability zones within the region.
Availability zones protect against datacenter failure within a region, not against a full region outage. This does not meet the requirement for regional failover.
Distractor review
Use Azure Site Recovery to replicate the AKS cluster to another region.
Azure Site Recovery is designed for IaaS workloads (VMs), not for managed Kubernetes services like AKS. It cannot replicate the AKS control plane or worker nodes effectively.
Distractor review
Back up the AKS cluster configuration and container images to a geo-redundant storage account.
Backup is appropriate for data retention but will not meet the 15-minute RTO for failover. Restoring from backup in a new region would take significantly longer.
Common exam trap
Common exam trap: answer the scenario, not the keyword
Many certification questions include familiar terms but test a specific constraint. Read the exact wording before choosing an answer that is generally true but wrong for this case.
Technical deep dive
How to think about this question
This question should be treated as a scenario, not a definition check. Identify the problem, the constraint and the best action. Then compare each option against those facts.
KKey Concepts to Remember
- Read the scenario before looking for a memorised answer.
- Find the constraint that changes the correct option.
- Eliminate answers that are true in general but not in this case.
- Use explanations to understand the rule behind the answer.
TExam Day Tips
- Underline the problem statement mentally.
- Watch for words such as best, first, most likely and least administrative effort.
- Review why wrong options are wrong, not only why the correct option is correct.
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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 company is designing hub-and-spoke networking. Spoke VNets must use a central Azure Firewall for outbound internet traffic. Which two configurations are required?
Question 2
A company is designing private access to a PaaS database from workloads in a VNet. The database should not be reachable over its public endpoint. What should be recommended?
Question 3
A data platform must support analytical queries over petabytes of files in a data lake, while preserving hierarchical namespaces and fine-grained ACLs. Which storage service should you design around?
Question 4
A database workload has an RPO of 15 minutes and an RTO of 4 hours. Cost is more important than near-zero data loss. Which design is usually more appropriate than synchronous multi-region replication?
Question 5
A hub-and-spoke Azure network must centralize outbound inspection and still allow spokes to resolve private endpoint DNS names. Which two components are commonly required? (Choose 2.)
Question 6
A multinational company uses Microsoft Entra ID and several Azure subscriptions. Security administrators need to review privileged role assignments every month and require justification for continued access. Which design should be recommended?
FAQ
Questions learners often ask
What does this AZ-305 question test?
Read the scenario before looking for a memorised answer.
What is the correct answer to this question?
The correct answer is: Deploy AKS clusters in two regions and use Azure Traffic Manager to route traffic. — For regional failover of stateless AKS workloads, the best approach is to deploy AKS clusters in two regions and use a global load balancer like Azure Traffic Manager or Front Door to route traffic. This allows quick failover. Availability zones protect within a region but not against regional failure. Azure Site Recovery (ASR) can replicate AKS clusters running on VMs, but AKS is a managed service; ASR does not support direct replication of AKS. Backup is not sufficient for low RTO. Therefore, option A is the correct recommendation.
What should I do if I get this AZ-305 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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