The answer is Azure Site Recovery, as it provides the most cost-effective solution for achieving low RPO and RTO in cross-region disaster recovery. Azure Site Recovery replicates entire Azure VMs—including their managed disks and SQL Server Always On configurations—to a secondary region with near-synchronous replication, delivering an RPO of just a few seconds and an RTO of minutes, which comfortably meets the 1-hour requirement without the expense of a full active-passive setup. On the AZ-305 exam, this scenario tests your ability to distinguish between storage-level replication (like GRS, which lacks VM orchestration) and full disaster recovery services, with a common trap being to overcomplicate the solution by deploying a secondary SQL Server instance. Remember the memory tip: “ASR for full VM recovery, GRS for storage only”—if you need to fail over the entire application stack with minimal data loss, Azure Site Recovery is the correct, cost-effective choice.
AZ-305 Design business continuity solutions Practice Question
This AZ-305 practice question tests your understanding of design business continuity solutions. Match the stated requirement to the specific cloud service, access model, or configuration option — many options are valid in isolation but not for this scenario. After answering, compare your reasoning against the explanation and wrong-answer breakdown below. Once you have made your selection, read the full explanation to reinforce the concept and understand why each distractor is designed to mislead on exam day.
A company runs a critical application on Azure VMs in a single region. They need to ensure the application can failover to another region with minimal data loss and a recovery time objective (RTO) of 1 hour. The application uses managed disks and SQL Server Always On availability groups. What is the MOST cost-effective solution that meets the requirements?
Clue words in this question
Noticing these words before you look at the options changes how you read each choice.
Clue: "always"
Why it matters: Absolute qualifier. An answer using 'always' is only correct if there are genuinely no exceptions — absolute statements are often wrong in networking.
Answer the question above first, then reveal the full breakdown to understand why each option is right or wrong.
Correct answer & explanation
✓
Use Azure Site Recovery to replicate VMs to a secondary region with a recovery plan
Option D is correct because Azure Site Recovery replicates VMs to a secondary region with near-synchronous replication (RPO of a few seconds) and provides orchestrated failover with RTO of minutes. It is more cost-effective than full active-passive setup. Option A is wrong because SQL Server Always On requires a secondary instance in the other region, which is more expensive and adds complexity beyond the VM recovery. Option B is wrong because geo-redundant storage (GRS) only provides storage-level replication, not full VM recovery. Option C is wrong because availability zones protect within a region, not cross-region.
Key principle: Answer the scenario, not the keyword: identify the specific constraint before choosing the most familiar-sounding option.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
✗
Use Azure geo-redundant storage (GRS) for the managed disks and restore the VMs in the secondary region
Why it's wrong here
GRS provides storage replication but does not automate VM failover or ensure RTO of 1 hour.
✓
Use Azure Site Recovery to replicate VMs to a secondary region with a recovery plan
Why this is correct
Azure Site Recovery provides orchestrated failover with low RTO and RPO, meeting the requirements cost-effectively.
Clue confirmation
The clue word "always" in the question point toward this answer.
Related concept
Read the scenario before looking for a memorised answer.
✗
Use Azure availability zones to protect against regional failures
Why it's wrong here
Availability zones protect within a single region, not cross-region.
✗
Deploy SQL Server Always On availability groups across two regions
Why it's wrong here
This requires additional SQL Server licenses and compute resources, making it more expensive than necessary.
Common exam traps
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.
Detailed technical explanation
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.
Key takeaway
Answer the scenario, not the keyword: identify the specific constraint before choosing the most familiar-sounding option.
Real-world example
How this comes up in practice
A startup's cloud architect reviews their monthly bill and notices costs are higher than expected for a long-running batch job. Switching from on-demand instances to Reserved Instances — or using Spot/Preemptible VMs — can reduce compute costs by up to 72 %. Questions like this test whether you understand the tradeoffs between commitment, flexibility, and cost across cloud pricing models.
Related glossary terms
Concepts from this question explained
These glossary pages explain the core terms tested in this AZ-305 question in full detail.
Identify which AZ-305 exam domain this question belongs to, then review the specific concept being tested. Practise related questions in that domain and focus on understanding why each wrong answer is tempting — not just why the correct answer is right.
Design business continuity solutions — This question tests Design business continuity solutions — Read the scenario before looking for a memorised answer..
What is the correct answer to this question?
The correct answer is: Use Azure Site Recovery to replicate VMs to a secondary region with a recovery plan — Option D is correct because Azure Site Recovery replicates VMs to a secondary region with near-synchronous replication (RPO of a few seconds) and provides orchestrated failover with RTO of minutes. It is more cost-effective than full active-passive setup. Option A is wrong because SQL Server Always On requires a secondary instance in the other region, which is more expensive and adds complexity beyond the VM recovery. Option B is wrong because geo-redundant storage (GRS) only provides storage-level replication, not full VM recovery. Option C is wrong because availability zones protect within a region, not cross-region.
What should I do if I get this AZ-305 question wrong?
Identify which AZ-305 exam domain this question belongs to, then review the specific concept being tested. Practise related questions in that domain and focus on understanding why each wrong answer is tempting — not just why the correct answer is right.
Are there clue words in this question I should notice?
Yes — watch for: "always". Absolute qualifier. An answer using 'always' is only correct if there are genuinely no exceptions — absolute statements are often wrong in networking.
What is the key concept behind this question?
Read the scenario before looking for a memorised answer.
About these practice questions
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These questions test the same concept from different angles. Work through them to make sure you can recognise it however the exam phrases it.
Variation 1. A company runs a critical application on Azure virtual machines in the West US region. They need a disaster recovery solution that replicates VMs to East US with a recovery point objective (RPO) of 15 minutes and a recovery time objective (RTO) of 2 hours. They also need to perform non-disruptive disaster recovery drills. Which Azure service should they use?
medium
A.Azure Backup
✓ B.Azure Site Recovery
C.Azure Traffic Manager
D.Azure Front Door
Why B: Azure Site Recovery (ASR) orchestrates replication, failover, and failback of Azure VMs between regions. It supports RPOs as low as 15 minutes (continuous replication with crash-consistent or app-consistent snapshots) and RTOs of 2 hours or less, and it enables non-disruptive disaster recovery drills via test failover that isolates replicated VMs in a separate virtual network without impacting production.
Variation 2. Your company runs a critical web application on Azure Virtual Machines in a single region. You need to design a disaster recovery solution that meets a Recovery Point Objective (RPO) of 15 minutes and a Recovery Time Objective (RTO) of 1 hour. The solution must be cost-effective for a planned failover test. What should you do?
medium
✓ A.Configure Azure Site Recovery (ASR) with replication to a paired secondary region and perform regular test failovers.
B.Create a read-only replica of the VMs in another region using Azure SQL Database geo-replication.
C.Deploy the VMs across two Azure Availability Zones within the same region.
D.Use Azure Backup with daily backups to a Recovery Services vault in a paired region.
Why A: Option C is correct because Azure Site Recovery with replication intervals as low as 30 seconds can meet the RPO of 15 minutes, and with pre-staged resources, the RTO of 1 hour is achievable. It is cost-effective for testing because replication can be paused and test failover uses isolated networks without affecting production. Option A is wrong because Azure Backup's typical RPO is 1 day and RTO is hours. Option B is wrong because Availability Zones protect within a region, not across regions. Option D is wrong because read-only replicas do not provide failover capability for compute.
Variation 3. Your company runs a mission-critical application on Azure Virtual Machines that requires a Recovery Time Objective (RTO) of 5 minutes and a Recovery Point Objective (RPO) of 1 minute. The application uses a single VM with a managed disk. You need to design a disaster recovery solution that meets these requirements with minimal cost. What should you recommend?
hard
A.Configure Azure Backup for the VM with a 1-minute backup frequency.
B.Store the managed disk in geo-redundant storage and use Azure Resource Manager templates to redeploy.
✓ C.Use Azure Site Recovery to replicate the VM to a secondary region with a recovery plan.
D.Deploy a second VM in a secondary region and use continuous replication with Azure Migrate.
Why C: Option C is correct because Azure Site Recovery can replicate Azure VMs with a disk-level RPO of 5 seconds and RTO of minutes, meeting the requirements. Option A is wrong because Azure Backup has a minimum RPO of 1 hour for VMs. Option B is wrong because read-access geo-redundant storage does not replicate the VM configuration. Option D is wrong because a secondary VM with replication would be more expensive than Azure Site Recovery's pay-as-you-go model.
Variation 4. Your company runs a mission-critical application on Azure VMs. You need to design a cross-region disaster recovery solution that meets a recovery time objective (RTO) of 15 minutes and a recovery point objective (RPO) of 5 minutes. The solution must minimize costs. What should you recommend?
medium
A.Use Azure SQL Database active geo-replication with a failover group.
B.Use Azure Storage with read-access geo-redundant storage (RA-GRS) and Azure Traffic Manager.
C.Use Azure Backup with geo-redundant storage.
✓ D.Use Azure Site Recovery with replication frequency set to 30 seconds.
Why D: Azure Site Recovery with replication frequency set to 30 seconds meets the RPO of 5 minutes and can achieve an RTO of 15 minutes with proper planning. Option A is incorrect because Azure Backup has a minimum RPO of 15 minutes for VMs. Option B is incorrect because Read-access geo-redundant storage does not provide automated failover for compute. Option D is incorrect because active geo-replication is for databases, not VMs.
Last reviewed: Jun 20, 2026
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