DP-300 Practice Question: Plan and configure high availability and disaster recovery
Which TWO configurations are required to enable automatic failover for an Azure SQL Database configured with active geo-replication?
⚠ Common exam trap
Candidates often confuse the prerequisites for automatic failover with the features of active geo-replication alone, forgetting that a failover group is the specific construct that enables automation.
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
✓
Configure a failover group that includes the primary and secondary databases.
A failover group is the Azure feature that manages automatic failover for geo-replicated databases. It coordinates the failover of the primary and all secondaries in the group, providing a single endpoint and automatic failover policy. Without a failover group, active geo-replication only supports manual failover.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✗
Enable read-scale out on the secondary database.
Why it's wrong here
Read-scale out is optional and not required for automatic failover.
- ✓
Configure a failover group that includes the primary and secondary databases.
Why this is correct
Failover group is required to orchestrate automatic failover.
- ✗
Set the secondary database to have the same service tier as the primary.
Why it's wrong here
Service tiers can differ; not a requirement for automatic failover.
- ✗
Configure zone redundancy on the primary database.
Why it's wrong here
Zone redundancy provides HA within a region, not for geo-failover.
- ✓
Ensure the secondary server is in a different Azure region than the primary.
Why this is correct
Geo-replication requires a secondary in a different region for disaster recovery.
Go deeper
Related to this question
Learn chapter
Overview of Azure Data Platform Options
Key term
Azure SQL Performance Tuning
Azure SQL Performance Tuning is the process of optimizing the speed and efficiency of queries and database operations in Microsoft Azure SQL Database or SQL Managed Instance to reduce latency and improve throughput.
About these practice questions
One of 906 original DP-300 practice questions on Courseiva, each with a full explanation and wrong-answer analysis — not exam dumps or protected exam content. Learn why practice questions differ from exam dumps →
JA
Written by Johnson Ajibi, MSc IT Security
Senior Network & Security Engineer · founder of Courseiva
This DP-300 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 DP-300 exam.