Azure Advisor - Simply Explained

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Hello everyone and welcome to another episode of Knowledge Nuggets today's topic, Azure Advisor.

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What exactly is it?

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Is it just another dashboard with a list of suggestions you ignore or is it something more useful?

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Most people think it's a passive recommendation tool,

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something that sits in the corner of the Azure portal and occasionally tells you things you already know.

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But that's not what it is.

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By the end of this episode, you'll understand what Azure Advisor actually does,

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how its five pillars work and how the Advisor score helps you track your progress.

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Grab your coffee, let's dive in.

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What exactly is Azure Advisor?

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Azure Advisor is a free, built-in cloud consultant that analyzes your entire Azure environment.

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It doesn't just sit there.

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It actively scans your resources and compares them against Microsoft's best practices.

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Think of it like a building inspector who walks through your setup with a checklist pointing out what needs fixing.

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Here's the thing, it covers five areas.

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Cost, security, reliability, performance and operational excellence, and it's completely free.

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No extra cost, no installation, nothing to configure.

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The recommendations are personalized to your environment,

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not generic advice from a blog post.

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They're specific to the resources you're actually running, the way you're running them,

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and the patterns it sees in your usage.

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It's integrated directly into the Azure portal,

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available from the moment you start using Azure,

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so you don't need to enable it, sign up or configure anything.

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It's just there.

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So how does it actually do its job?

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How Azure Advisor does its job?

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Think of Azure Advisor like a building inspector for your cloud environment.

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It walks through your resources, checks how you're using VMs, databases and storage,

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and then compares everything against the Azure well-architected framework.

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Microsoft's own set of best practices for building reliable, secure and efficient workloads.

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And it does all of this automatically behind the scenes.

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Now here's the thing, it doesn't just give you a report right away.

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It needs at least seven days of data before it can say anything meaningful.

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Machine learning helps identify patterns like resources that are underused or traffic spikes that look unusual.

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Each recommendation comes with an impact score, high, medium or low.

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High impact ones are the ones you want to tackle first because they give you the biggest return for your effort.

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There's also a quick fix feature.

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Instead of going through each resource one by one,

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you can apply multiple recommendations with just a few clicks.

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An advisor sends proactive alerts about new recommendations and upcoming service retirements,

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so you're never caught off guard when a service you depend on gets deprecated.

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So what are these five pillars?

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Let's take a look.

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The five pillars, a quick overview.

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Azure Advisor breaks its recommendations into five categories.

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Cost recommendations help you find savings, right sizing VMs using reserved instances,

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shutting down idle resources, security recommendations, close vulnerabilities, enabling multifactor authentication,

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restricting network access, encrypting data, reliability recommendations keep services running,

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backups, redundancy, availability zones, performance recommendations make apps faster,

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optimizing throughput, eliminating bottlenecks, database tuning,

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and operational excellence recommendations streamline processes governance monitoring,

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staying current with supported versions.

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Each pillar gets its own section in the advisor dashboard with tailored recommendations.

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And these pillars come directly from the Azure well architected framework,

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which is Microsoft's structured approach to building workloads that are cost effective,

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secure, reliable, performant and well managed.

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Let's break down each one starting with the most popular and cost cost optimization.

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The cost pillar is the one most people open first.

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Everyone wants to save money, right?

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So Advisor looks at your environment and finds idle or underutilized resources,

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things like virtual machines running 24/7 with single digit CPU usage,

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where you're paying for compute cycles you're not using.

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That's where the savings start.

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It suggests right sizing, meaning maybe you're paying for a large VM when a smaller one handles the load just fine.

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An advisor tells you exactly which SKU would work better.

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Advisor also recommends reserved instances, which can save you up to 72% compared to pay as you go pricing.

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If you know you'll need a certain VM size for a year or three, you lock in a lower rate.

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There's also Azure savings plans for compute.

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These are more flexible than reserved instances because they apply across different VM sizes and regions,

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but the discount is slightly lower.

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And as your hybrid benefit, let's you reuse on-premises,

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Windows Server and SQL Server licenses you've already paid for by bringing your own license to Azure

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and getting a reduced rate.

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You can adjust the look back period in advisor from 7 to 90 days,

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so the analysis reflects your actual usage patterns, not just a snapshot.

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And here's a real example, shutting down dev and test VMs after hours.

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Organizations doing this often reduce spending by 30% or more.

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It's a simple fix, just turn things off when nobody's using them.

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Saving money is great, but you also need to keep your environment secure.

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Security.

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Security recommendations in Azure Advisor come from Microsoft Defender for Cloud,

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and are based on the Microsoft Cloud Security benchmark,

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which aligns with industry standards like CIS and NIST.

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The most common high priority recommendation,

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enable multi-factor authentication for privileged accounts.

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It's the single most effective thing you can do to prevent account compromise.

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Next, restrict network access to storage accounts.

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Don't leave them open to the internet.

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Instead, configure firewall rules and service endpoints.

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Enable encryption for data address and in transit.

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Advisor will flag storage accounts, databases,

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and key vaults that aren't properly protected.

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Each recommendation has a score impact that raises your subscription secure score,

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which is a percentage that tells you how well you're following security best practices.

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Microsoft maintains over 100 compliance certifications,

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so when Advisor tells you to enable something,

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it's often because that configuration maps to a specific compliance requirement.

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And QuickFix works here too,

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letting you apply security remediations across multiple resources at once,

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especially valuable for smaller teams, without dedicated security staff.

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Once you're secure in saving money,

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the next concern is keeping things running.

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Reliability?

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The reliability pillar keeps your services running when things go wrong.

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Because things will go wrong, hardware fails,

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and networks go down, entire regions have outages.

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The real question is whether your workload survives it.

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And that's what Advisor helps you answer.

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The biggest recommendation, turn on availability zones for your critical resources.

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Availability zones are physically separate data centers,

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inside and as your region.

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Each one has its own power, cooling, and networking.

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So if one zone goes down, your workloads keep running in another.

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No manual intervention needed.

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It's built into the platform.

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Zone redundant storage is another big one.

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Think of it as having a copy of your data in a separate building.

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If one building burns down, the other copy is safe.

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Your data gets copied across multiple zones.

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If one zone fails, your data stays safe.

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You don't lose a thing.

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For databases, Advisor suggests georeplication.

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That's copying your database to a different Azure region, hundreds of miles away.

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That means if an entire region goes down, say a natural disaster takes out a whole Azure region,

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your database is still running in another region somewhere else.

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For app service, Advisor tells you to set a minimum instance count.

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At least two instances for production workloads.

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That way, if one instance fails or needs maintenance, the other one keeps handling requests.

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Same logic applies to auto scaling.

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You want your app to handle traffic spikes without crashing.

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Backups are a huge part of this pillar.

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Advisor checks whether you've set up proper backup strategies for your VMs, databases, and app services.

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If you haven't, it'll tell you.

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And it's not just about having backups.

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It's about testing them.

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A backup you've never restored isn't a backup.

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It's a hope.

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Advisor will remind you to test your restore process regularly.

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There's a newer feature here too.

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As of May 2025, Advisor now gives Zonal Resiliency recommendations for AKS clusters,

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VPN gateways, and Azure Firewall.

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So if you're running Kubernetes or have a VPN gateway,

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Advisor can tell you whether you need to spread those across zones for better uptime.

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It's a simple check that can save you from a major outage.

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Here's the real world example.

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Imagine one Azure zone in your region goes down.

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If you followed Advisor's reliability recommendations, your workloads keep running in another zone.

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Your users don't notice anything.

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That's the goal.

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Reliability isn't just about being up.

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It's about being resilient.

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Reliability keeps you online.

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Performance keeps you fast.

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Performance.

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The performance pillar makes your applications faster and more responsive for users.

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Nobody likes a slow app, slow apps, frustrated users, and hurt your business.

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And in the cloud, performance problems usually come from resources that are undersized or misconfigured.

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Advisor spots these issues before they become problems.

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The most common recommendation, right size VMs that are consistently overutilized.

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Advisor looks at your VM metrics over at least seven days.

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If CPU is consistently above 90% or I/O is above 95%, it flags that VM for an upgrade.

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You're hitting the limits of what that scale you can handle and your users are probably feeling it.

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Right sizing gives you more headroom without overpaying.

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There's database tuning too.

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Advisor pulls recommendations from SQL Database Advisor,

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which analyzes your query patterns and suggests index changes or query optimizations.

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Sometimes a single missing index is the difference between a query that takes two seconds

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and one that takes 200 milliseconds.

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That's a huge difference for user experience.

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Intelligent scaling is another area.

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Advisor suggests scaling strategies that match your actual traffic patterns.

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Instead of over-provisioning to handle peak load, which costs you money during quiet periods,

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you scale dynamically.

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Traffic goes up, resources scale up.

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Traffic goes down, resources scale down.

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That's the smart way to handle variable traffic.

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For traffic management, Advisor recommends as your front door and traffic manager to root users

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to the closest or fastest endpoint that reduces latency for users, far from your primary data center.

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And for caching, it suggests Azure Cash for Redis to take load of your databases.

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Frequently access the data stays in memory instead of hitting the database every time.

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There's also a recommendation to upgrade to modern SKUs that support accelerated networking.

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That feature gives your VMs lower latency and higher throughput by bypassing the host software for network traffic.

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It's a simple configuration change that makes a noticeable difference.

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An advisor will tell you if your current SKU supports it.

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The goal of the performance pillar is simple.

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Eliminate bottlenecks before your users notice them.

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By the time users complain about slow load times, you've already lost trust.

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Advisor helps you catch those problems early.

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That's the performance pillar in a nutshell.

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The last pillar is about keeping your environment clean and well managed.

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Operational excellence.

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The last pillar is operational excellence and honestly it's the one most people overlook.

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It's not as exciting as saving money or preventing a security breach,

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but it's the pillar that keeps everything else running smoothly.

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Think of it as the housekeeping and governance pillar and it's all about process and efficiency.

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How do you deploy resources?

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How do you monitor them?

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Are you using supported versions of the services you depend on?

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Operational excellence answers all of that.

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A big recommendation here is to streamline your deployment processes with Azure Policy.

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Instead of manually checking that every resource follows your standards,

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you define policies once and Azure enforces them automatically.

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Want to make sure nobody creates a storage account without encryption?

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Azure Policy handles that.

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Monitoring is another big area and advisor will tell you to enable traffic analytics

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so you can understand your network flows.

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Who's talking to what are their unusual patterns?

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Without this visibility, you're flying blind and won't know if something's wrong

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until a user tells you.

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Upgrading to modern API versions is a recurring theme because older APIs get deprecated

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and if you're still calling them, your automation scripts and tools will eventually break.

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Advisor flags these before they become a problem.

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Same thing with web application, firewall policies.

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If you haven't configured them properly for better protection, advisor will tell you.

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Service retirement alerts are a huge part of this pillar.

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Advisor monitors the services you're using and tells you when they're being deprecated.

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Classic storage accounts are retiring and cloud services classic is being retired.

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If you're running on something that's about to go away, advisor gives you a heads-up

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so you can plan your migration.

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There's also a really practical one,

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tracing enabled on production API management instances.

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That might sound harmless, but tracing logs can expose sensitive information

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like keys, access tokens, and passwords.

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Advisor catches that and tells you to turn it off in production.

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The point of operational excellence is simple.

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Keep your environment clean, manageable, and up-to-date.

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It's not glamorous, but it's the difference between a cloud environment that runs smoothly

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and one that's a constant fire drill.

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Now, how do you measure how well you're doing across all five pillars?

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The advisor score.

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The advisor score is your optimization dashboard,

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a single number from 0 to 100%,

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that shows how well your workloads follow Azure best practices across all five pillars.

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Instead of digging through dozens of recommendations

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and trying to figure out if you're making progress,

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you get one number broken into five category scores, one for each pillar.

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So you can see at a glance that your cost score is 92%,

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but your reliability score is only 65%,

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and that tells you exactly where to focus your attention.

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How is the score calculated?

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It uses the healthy resource ratio,

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the percentage of resources that follow the recommendations.

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If you have 100 VMs and 80 of them,

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follow the cost recommendations your cost score is 80%.

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Simple.

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The overall score is the average of all five category scores.

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So if you're scoring 80 in cost, 70 in security, 60 in reliability,

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90 in performance, and 75 in operational excellence,

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your overall score is 75%, that's your baseline.

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For reliability, performance, and operational excellence,

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the scores are broken into subcategories with fixed weights.

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For example, zone resiliency carries a weight of 30 in the reliability category.

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Regional resiliency is 25,

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and data protection and recovery is 20.

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Each subcategory contributes proportionally to the category score,

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which means not all recommendations are equal.

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Some matter more than others, and the score reflects that.

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The score updates every 24 hours,

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so if you implement a recommendation today, it takes up to a day

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for your score to reflect that change.

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Don't expect instant gratification,

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but over time, you'll see your score trending upward

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as you work through the recommendations.

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It also tracks progress over time,

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so you can see daily, weekly, and monthly trends.

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You can look back and say, "Three months ago,

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my overall score was 62%, now it's 78%,

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here's the proof that we're improving."

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This is how you prove to your boss that you're making progress.

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Instead of saying, "I think we're doing better,"

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you show them a chart.

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The advisor score gives you a concrete, measurable way

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to track optimization.

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If a recommendation doesn't apply to your situation,

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you can postpone or dismiss it,

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and those recommendations are excluded from the score calculation.

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So you're not penalized for ignoring something

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that doesn't make sense for your workload.

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So how do you actually start using all of this?

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Getting started with Azure Advisor.

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So you want to get started with Azure Advisor?

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Here's the thing.

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You don't need to install anything or configure anything.

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Just open the Azure portal,

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and advisor is right there in the navigation.

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You'll see personalized recommendations

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immediately no setup required.

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Start with the advisor score.

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That single number tells you where you stand today.

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Look at your overall score,

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then check which pillar is dragging you down.

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Focus on the lowest score first.

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That's where you'll get the biggest improvement

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with the least effort.

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Next, look at high impact recommendations.

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These are the ones that give you the most bang for your buck.

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Tackle those first.

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Don't get bogged down in low impact recommendations

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that barely move the needle.

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You want to save time and energy.

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Set a regular review cadence.

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Weekly or monthly.

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Put it on your calendar.

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Your environment changes constantly.

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New resources get added.

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Usage patterns shift.

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Services get deprecated.

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If you only check advisor once,

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you're missing the point.

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Think of it like a regular check-up for your cloud setup.

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Now here's where it gets powerful.

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Combine advisor with Azure Policy

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to enforce standards automatically.

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When advisor tells you something is wrong,

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create a policy that prevents it from happening again.

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That turns one time fixes into ongoing compliance.

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If you're more advanced,

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use the rest API and CLI tools

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to integrate recommendations into your DevOps workflows.

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You can pull recommendations programmatically

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and act on them as part of your deployment pipeline.

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That's the automation layer.

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Microsoft Learn has free training resources

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if you want to go deeper.

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But honestly, you don't need training to get started.

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Open advisor check your score,

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act on one high impact recommendation this week.

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That's it.

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Starts more.

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Pick one pillar.

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The rest will follow.

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So now you have the full picture.

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As your advisor is a free built-in cloud consultant

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that analyzes your entire environment across five pillars.

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Cost, security, reliability, performance,

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and operational excellence.

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It gives you personalized recommendations

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based on your actual usage, not generic advice.

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And the advisor score gives you a single number

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to track your progress over time.

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Your homework is simple.

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Open as your advisor today.

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Check your score and act on one high impact recommendation this week.

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That's it. Start small, but start.

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If this episode helped you understand

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Azure Advisor a little better,

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subscribe on your favorite podcast platform

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and share this with someone who's just starting their Azure journey.

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They'll thank you later.

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I'm Mirko Peters from M365.

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FM, thanks for listening.