DP-300 Plan and implement data platform resources Practice Question
You manage an Azure SQL Database that is experiencing performance degradation during peak hours. You suspect that the current pricing tier is insufficient. You need to increase performance with minimal downtime. Which action should you take?
⚠ Common exam trap
The trap here is that candidates might confuse scaling up (vertical scaling) with scaling out (horizontal scaling) or offloading reads, and choose a more complex or disruptive option instead of the straightforward, supported online scaling operation.
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
✓
Use the Azure portal to scale up the DTU or vCore service tier.
Scaling up the DTU or vCore service tier in the Azure portal is a dynamic scaling operation that typically completes within minutes and does not require application downtime. Azure SQL Database supports online scaling, meaning the database remains available during the transition, with only a brief connection failover at the end. This directly addresses the need to increase performance during peak hours with minimal disruption.
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 the Azure portal to scale up the DTU or vCore service tier.
Why this is correct
Scaling up is a dynamic operation with minimal downtime.
- ✗
Create a new database on a higher tier and copy data manually.
Why it's wrong here
Manual copy causes significant downtime.
- ✗
Enable read scale-out to offload read workloads.
Why it's wrong here
Read scale-out does not improve write performance.
- ✗
Implement horizontal sharding across multiple databases.
Why it's wrong here
Requires application changes and is not a quick fix.
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.
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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.