DP-300 Practice Question: Monitor, configure, and optimize database resources
You need to configure alerts for an Azure SQL Database to notify the operations team when the database exceeds 80% DTU consumption for more than 10 minutes. What should you use?
⚠ Common exam trap
DP-300 often tests the confusion between auditing (security logging) and monitoring (performance metrics) — candidates pick 'Azure SQL Auditing' because it sounds like it watches the database.
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
✓
Create a metric alert in Azure Monitor
Azure Monitor metric alerts evaluate platform metrics such as DTU percentage over a defined time window and fire notifications via action groups. To alert when DTU consumption exceeds 80% for more than 10 minutes, you create a metric alert on the 'DTU percentage' metric with a threshold of 80 and an aggregation granularity/window of 10 minutes. This is the native, supported mechanism for Azure SQL Database resource alerts.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✗
Configure a SQL Agent alert
Why it's wrong here
SQL Agent alerts run inside SQL Server Agent and rely on performance counters or jobs unavailable in Azure SQL Database's platform-managed engine, so the DTU threshold cannot be monitored. It is tempting because SQL Agent alerts are correct for on-premises or IaaS SQL Server instances.
- ✗
Configure Azure SQL Auditing
Why it's wrong here
Auditing records database events such as queries and logins to storage; it neither evaluates DTU metrics nor dispatches notifications, so the 80% threshold would never trigger an alert. It is tempting because auditing is the right choice when the requirement is capturing an activity trail for compliance or forensics.
- ✗
Use Azure Advisor recommendations
Why it's wrong here
Azure Advisor supplies passive best-practise recommendations on configuration and cost; it neither monitors DTU consumption continuously nor sends threshold-based notifications after ten minutes. It is tempting because Advisor is the right choice when seeking proactive guidance on optimising an already-deployed database.
- ✓
Create a metric alert in Azure Monitor
Why this is correct
Azure Monitor metric alerts evaluate platform metrics such as DTU consumption against thresholds over a defined window, satisfying the 80% for 10 minutes condition. DTU percentage is emitted automatically as a metric, so no diagnostic logging or query is needed, unlike Log Analytics-based alerts.
Go deeper
Related to this question
Learn chapter
Managing Environment Configurations and Resource Governance
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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JA
Written and reviewed by Johnson Ajibi, MSc IT Security
Senior Network & Security Engineer · founder of Courseiva
Last reviewed September 2026 · checked against the official Microsoft exam blueprint
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