DP-900 Practice Question: Identify considerations for relational data on Azure
A company stores customer orders in an Azure SQL Database. They need to ensure that the database can automatically scale to handle peak loads without manual intervention. Which Azure feature should they use?
⚠ Common exam trap
Many candidates confuse elastic pools with automatic scaling, but elastic pools only share resources across databases and require manual adjustment of pool limits, whereas serverless provides true auto-scale and auto-pause for a single 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
✓
Enable the serverless compute tier
The serverless compute tier for Azure SQL Database automatically pauses and resumes the database based on compute usage, scaling compute resources on demand without manual intervention. This makes it ideal for handling unpredictable peak loads while minimizing costs during idle periods.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✗
Purchase reserved capacity
Why it's wrong here
Reserved capacity is a discount-based purchasing model in which you pre-pay or commit to a fixed amount of Azure SQL Database compute (DTUs or vCores) for one or three years. It only lowers the hourly billing rate for resources you already choose; it does not change or automatically adjust the allocated compute size. Because committed capacity must be explicitly matched to an active database's service tier and hardware, it provides zero auto-scaling behavior.
- ✗
Add a read replica
Why it's wrong here
Adding a read replica, such as Azure SQL Database read scale-out or a geo-replica, creates a readable secondary copy that serves read-only queries. That replica offloads read traffic from the primary, improving query performance, but the primary database's compute (vCores or DTUs) remains fixed and does not scale up or down automatically. Writes and transactional workloads still run on the single primary with its original provisioning.
- ✓
Enable the serverless compute tier
Why this is correct
Enabling the serverless compute tier for Azure SQL Database is the correct choice because it automatically scales compute capacity (measured in vCores) based on actual workload demand, scaling up or down within a configured range. It even pauses the database automatically during periods of inactivity, so you are billed only for storage, and resumes quickly when a request arrives. This fits an intermittent order-insert workload without manual intervention.
- ✗
Configure an elastic pool
Why it's wrong here
Configuring an elastic pool groups multiple databases into a shared pool of resources (eDTUs or vCores) so that each database can burst above its individual minimum, using unused capacity elsewhere in the pool. The pool itself is sized with a fixed upper bound, and Azure does not automatically scale the pool's total resource limit based on workload. For a single existing database, an elastic pool does not provide automatic compute scaling; it merely shares a manually configured budget among databases.
Quick reference
Cloud Service Model Comparison
| Model | You Manage | Provider Manages | Examples |
|---|---|---|---|
| IaaS | OS, runtime, apps, data | Hardware, hypervisor, networking | EC2, Azure VMs, GCP Compute Engine |
| PaaS | Apps and data | OS, runtime, middleware, hardware | Elastic Beanstalk, Azure App Service |
| SaaS | Data and settings only | Everything else | Microsoft 365, Salesforce, Workday |
| FaaS / Serverless | Function code only | Infra, scaling, runtime | Lambda, Azure Functions, Cloud Run |
| CaaS | Containers and apps | Kubernetes, OS, hardware | EKS, AKS, GKE |
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This DP-900 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-900 exam.