AZ-305 Design business continuity solutions Practice Question
A company runs an application on Azure VMs that uses Azure SQL Database. They need a disaster recovery solution that ensures the application can fail over to a secondary region with minimal data loss. The solution must include automatic failover for the database and manual failover for the VMs. Which TWO Azure services should they use? (Choose two.)
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
✓
Azure SQL Database auto-failover groups
Azure SQL Database auto-failover groups (option A) are correct because they provide automatic failover of the database to a secondary region with a defined RPO/RTO, satisfying the requirement for automatic database failover with minimal data loss. Azure Site Recovery (option D) is correct because it orchestrates replication and recovery of Azure VMs to a secondary region, and it supports manual (planned/unplanned) failover, matching the requirement for manual VM failover. Azure Traffic Manager (option B) and Azure Front Door (option C) are traffic-routing and load-balancing services that can direct users to a healthy endpoint, but they do not themselves provide database failover or VM replication/recovery. Azure SQL Database active geo-replication (option E) enables replicas and manual failover of the database, but it does not provide the automatic failover capability required, so it does not meet the scenario.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✓
Azure SQL Database auto-failover groups
Why this is correct
Auto-failover groups provide automatic, policy-driven failover for Azure SQL Database to a secondary region, with asynchronous replication giving minimal data loss. This directly satisfies the stem's requirement for automatic database failover, while VMs are handled separately by manual failover.
- ✗
Azure Traffic Manager
Why it's wrong here
Traffic Manager performs DNS-based routing between endpoints; it neither replicates Azure SQL Database nor orchestrates VM failover, so it cannot deliver the required automatic database failover. It is tempting because Traffic Manager is the standard service for distributing traffic across regions.
- ✗
Azure Front Door
Why it's wrong here
Azure Front Door is a global HTTP load balancer and content delivery service; it neither replicates Azure SQL Database nor fails over Azure VMs. It is tempting because Front Door is the usual choice for routing web traffic across regions, which suits availability scenarios rather than database disaster recovery.
- ✓
Azure Site Recovery
Why this is correct
Azure Site Recovery orchestrates replication and manual failover of Azure VMs to a secondary region, meeting the stem's requirement for manual VM failover. It complements the database's automatic failover, ensuring the full application can recover with minimal data loss.
- ✗
Azure SQL Database active geo-replication
Why it's wrong here
Requires manual failover.
Go deeper
Related to this question
Learn chapter
Azure Data Factory for Data Integration Design
Key term
Disaster Recovery Design
Disaster Recovery Design is the process of planning and implementing strategies to restore IT systems and data after a catastrophic failure, ensuring business continuity with minimal downtime and data loss.
Key term
BIA and RPO RTO Design
Business Impact Analysis and the design of Recovery Point Objective and Recovery Time Objective define how much data loss and downtime a business can tolerate after an IT failure, guiding the architecture of backup and disaster recovery systems.
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JA
Written by Johnson Ajibi, MSc IT Security
Senior Network & Security Engineer · founder of Courseiva
This AZ-305 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-305 exam.