mediummultiple choiceObjective-mapped

A company uses Azure Blob Storage to store compliance documents that are required to be kept for 10 years. The documents are very rarely accessed; on average, only 2-3 requests per year are made, usually for audits. The company needs the lowest possible storage cost. When a document is requested, the company can tolerate a retrieval time of up to 15 hours. Which Azure Blob Storage access tier should the company use?

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A company uses Azure Blob Storage to store compliance documents that are required to be kept for 10 years. The documents are very rarely accessed; on average, only 2-3 requests per year are made, usually for audits. The company needs the lowest possible storage cost. When a document is requested, the company can tolerate a retrieval time of up to 15 hours. Which Azure Blob Storage access tier should the company use?

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

Hot access tier

The Hot tier is intended for data accessed frequently and has the highest storage cost among standard tiers. It does not meet the goal of lowest storage cost for rarely accessed data.

B

Distractor review

Cool access tier

The Cool tier is for data that is infrequently accessed (about once per month or less) and has lower storage cost than Hot, but higher than Archive. It offers immediate retrieval, which is not necessary here, and would still be more expensive than Archive for this use case.

C

Best answer

Archive access tier

The Archive tier is the lowest-cost storage tier, designed for data that is rarely accessed and can tolerate retrieval latencies of up to 15 hours. This matches the company's requirement for low cost and acceptable retrieval time, making it the correct choice.

D

Distractor review

Premium access tier

The Premium tier is for high-performance workloads requiring low-latency access and high transaction rates. It is significantly more expensive than all other tiers and is not suitable for rarely accessed compliance documents.

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.

Related practice questions

Related AZ-900 practice-question pages

Use these pages to review the topic behind this question. This is how one missed question becomes focused revision.

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 developer is building a serverless application that requires integration with an on-premises SQL Server database for real-time data processing. The on-premises network is connected to Azure via a site-to-site VPN. Which Azure service would allow the function to securely access the on-premises database without exposing it to the public internet?

Question 2

A solutions architect is designing a storage solution for a large media company. The company needs to store video files that are accessed infrequently but must be retained for several years for compliance. Which two Azure storage options meet these requirements? (Select two.)

Question 3

A company deploys a multi-tier application using Azure virtual machines. The web tier VMs must be evenly distributed across two distinct data centers within an Azure region to avoid a single point of failure from an infrastructure outage. Which Azure construct should they use to meet this requirement?

Question 4

A company wants to enforce a set of security policies across all their Azure subscriptions. They have created several individual policy definitions. Which Azure construct should they use to group these policies together and assign them as a single package?

Question 5

A company deploys a line-of-business application on an Azure virtual machine. The IT team wants to ensure the application remains secure. According to the shared responsibility model, which of the following security tasks is the sole responsibility of the customer (the company)?

Question 6

A company develops a web API that runs on Azure App Service. The development team wants to deploy a new version of the API to a staging environment, run integration tests against it, and then gradually shift production traffic to the new version. If any issues are detected, they want to immediately roll back to the previous version without redeploying. Which Azure App Service feature should the team use to meet these requirements?

FAQ

Questions learners often ask

What does this AZ-900 question test?

Read the scenario before looking for a memorised answer.

What is the correct answer to this question?

The correct answer is: Archive access tier — The Archive access tier is designed for data that is rarely accessed and has flexible retrieval latency (up to 15 hours), offering the lowest storage cost. The Cool tier provides lower storage cost than Hot but immediate retrieval, while Hot is for frequent access. The Premium tier is optimized for high transaction rates and low latency, making it the most expensive option. For long-term, infrequently accessed data with acceptable retrieval delay, Archive is the most cost-effective choice.

What should I do if I get this AZ-900 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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