Pass AZ-304 Certification Exam Fast

AZ-304 Exam Has Been Retired

This exam has been replaced by Microsoft with new exam.

Microsoft AZ-304 Exam Details

The Microsoft AZ-304 exam targets solutions architects who want to improve their Azure architecture and development skills to reach the highest level of proficiency in these fields.

Which Certification AZ-304 Can Bring?

The Microsoft company offers loads of options that can help you throughout your career. For those who are interested in Microsoft Azure, we want to talk about one of the most popular certificates in this sector, which is the Microsoft Certified: Azure Solutions Architect Expert. If you want to earn this certification, you need to ace the Microsoft AZ-304 exam. However, prior to this test, there is AZ-303 that you must also pass.

AZ-304 Exam Targeted Audience

Candidates to sign up for the Microsoft AZ-304 are those who have familiarized themselves with and are skilled in developing and executing solutions that work on Azure. Among the targeted spheres in terms of experience are compute, storage, networking, and security. Others are Azure development in addition to DevOps processes. The targeted level of skills for these areas is intermediate.

About AZ-304 Exam

Test AZ-304 has another name which is Microsoft Azure Architect Design. It costs $165 and is available in English, Korean, Chinese Simplified, and Japanese. In the final AZ-304 exam, you will need to answer questions ranging from 40 to 60 which will be presented in different formats. Included are active screen, short answer, multiple choices, review screen, and build lists. The applicants will have 180 minutes to answer all the questions and that is why time management will be quite an important skill to enhance. The final marks should start from 700 points. Signing up is carried out with Pearson VUE.

AZ-304 Exam Topics

The students will need to study the following topics to master their AZ-304:

  • Define Business Continuity;
  • Develop Identity and Security;
  • Design Monitoring;
  • Develop Infrastructure;
  • Create Data Storage.

These domains for AZ-304 cover varied aspects of Azure. Within that of developing business continuity, there is the creation of solutions meant for backup and recovery alongside creating solutions geared towards high availability. For backup and recovery, you will have to recommend recovery solutions targeting on-premises and Azure hybrid, design solutions for Azure Site Recovery, and suggest solutions targeting recovery in varied regions and for managing Azure Backup. Also, involved is creating solutions for archiving and retaining data. With regards to creating solutions meant for high availability, candidates ought to suggest solutions for apps and workload redundancy and for autoscaling, identify resources needing high availability, identify high availability storage, and suggest solutions for workload geo-redundancy.

Regarding the topic for developing identity along with security, the abilities revolve around creating authentication, authorization, governance, and app security. For the creation of authentication, candidates should show abilities in recommending single-sign-on solutions, an authentication solution including the conditional access one, and network access verification. Recommending a hybrid identity solution, user self-service solution, and executing a B2B integration solution are also issues to look at. When it comes to the part of creating governance still under the second domain, familiarity with tagging strategies, Azure Policy, and Azure Blueprint are also included. For creating authorization, featured areas include authorization approach, hierarchical structure, and solution for access management. Lastly, for this section, candidates ought to be familiar with creating app security for apps. In this aspect, you will find issues like suggesting solutions including KeyVault, managed identities for Azure, and integration of applications into Azure AD.

When it comes to the third portion regarding design monitoring, one has to know how to develop solutions targeting cost optimization, logging, and keeping track. For cost optimization, besides cost management, one ought to know more about cost reporting. Also, for logging as well as monitoring, the issue is to be good at storage levels and locations directed at logs, monitoring tools, event routing as well as escalation, and logging solutions targeting compliance expectations.

For the sphere of developing infrastructure, things to find include creating solutions for compute, developing a solution for the network, creating architecture for apps, and designing migrations. For the area of compute solutions, compute provisioning, technologies, solutions meant for containers, and automation of compute management are covered. Under the development of a solution for the network, network addressing, name resolution, provisioning, security, and connectivity will be studied. Others include network management automation and load balancing in addition to traffic routing. To cover in application architecture design are aspects like microservices architecture, an orchestration solution designed to be used for deployment, and API integration. In the final part of creating migrations, candidates will come across on-premises servers, apps, and data for migration.

The final domain encompasses creating data storage. It revolves around creating solutions for databases as well as data integration and choosing the right account for storage. The aspect of creating solutions for databases includes data platform, sizing of a database service tier, database scalability, and data encryption. Under data integration, the issues covered are data flow and data integration. Finally, when it comes to choosing the right account for storage, one has to consider storage tiers, access solutions for storage, and tools for managing storage.

Jobs, Responsibilities, and Pay

After acing your AZ-304 exam and the Microsoft Certified: Azure Solutions Expert certification has been achieved, you can now apply to work as an Azure solutions architect in a company of your choosing. Responsibilities are such as guiding stakeholders and interpreting requirements for business into cloud solutions that meet scalability, security, and reliability. Your role is to perform while cooperating with Cloud DBAs, administrators, and clients to make it possible to execute the needed solutions. The career paths involved include an IT director, senior solutions architect, and enterprise architect. Roughly, the median earnings for these positions are $119,412 as PayScale.com divulges. To be specific, the salary for IT directors will be $120,874, and that for senior solutions architects will be $135,436. Additionally, enterprise architects will be earning $133,720 per year.

Certification Path

It’s to be noted that the Microsoft Certified: Azure Solutions Expert is the highest-level certificate that can be earned in this niche. However, if you are aimed to get more knowledge of Dynamics 365 and broaden your horizons, you can opt for the Microsoft Certified: Dynamics 365 + Power Platform Solution Architect Expert or the Microsoft Certified: Dynamics 365: Finance and Operations Apps Solution Architect Expert certifications.