AZ-204: Azure Developer Associate Study Guide

I’m excited to announce that this guide is now available as a Notion template! Extended and enhanced for 2023 it provides in-depth notes for all 47+ exam topics, example PowerShell / AZ CLI commands, further tips and the ability to track your study progress. It can be downloaded from Gumroad here.

Exam overview

Even as an “infrastructure guy”, I found this exam to be incredibly useful. There’s a decent amount of overlap with some of the other exams, such as AZ-104, but with a developer’s perspective on how services such as Azure Functions, Application Insights, API Management, etc., are used.

The content of this exam was recently updated on January 20, 2023. This study guide reflects the latest objectives

The AZ-204 exam is the only exam needed to obtain the Azure Developer Associate certification. According to Microsoft -

“Candidates for the Azure Developer Associate certification are cloud developers who participate in all phases of development from requirements definition and design to development, deployment, and maintenance. They partner with cloud DBAs, cloud administrators, and clients to implement solutions.

Candidates should be proficient in Azure SDKs, data storage options, data connections, APIs, app authentication and authorization, compute and container deployment, debugging, performance tuning, and monitoring.

Candidates should have 1–2 years professional development experience and experience with Microsoft Azure. They should be able to program in an Azure-supported language, and should be proficient using Azure CLI, Azure PowerShell, and other tools”

The high-level view of the skills measured in the exam are:

• Develop Azure compute solutions (25–30%)

• Develop for Azure storage (15–20%)

• Implement Azure security (20–25%)

• Monitor, troubleshoot, and optimize Azure solutions (15–20%)

• Connect to and consume Azure services and third-party services (15–20%)

More information can be found on the exam’s website. The exam has a passing score of 700.

Free Microsoft Learn resources

Microsoft Learn is an ever-expanding catalogue of free training courses provided by Microsoft. After you’ve reviewed the exam objectives, I’d highly recommend working through these next. They’re in nice bite-sized sections, and you can easily track your progress.

Microsoft Learn contains dedicated learning paths for the AZ-204 exam. Across 12 learning paths, there are a total of 31 modules:

• AZ-204: Create Azure App Service web apps (4 modules)

• AZ-204: Implement Azure Functions (3 modules)

• AZ-204: Develop solutions that use Blob storage (3 modules)

• AZ-204: Develop solutions that use Azure Cosmos DB (3 modules)

• AZ-204: Implement infrastructure as a service solutions (4 modules)

• AZ-204: Implement user authentication and authorization (4 modules)

• AZ-204: Implement secure cloud solutions (3 modules)

• AZ-204: Implement API Management (1 module)

• AZ-204: Develop event-based solutions (2 modules)

• AZ-204: Develop message-based solutions (1 module)

• AZ-204: Instrument solutions to support monitoring and logging (1 module)

• AZ-204: Integrate caching and content delivery within solutions (2 modules)

Online Paid Training Courses

In addition to Microsoft’s free resources, there are several paid options for online training courses. These are often more interactive and provide a useful way to fill in any gaps in your knowledge.

Below, I’ve linked to what I think are the best options for the AZ-204 exam -

• Udemy AZ-204 Developing Solutions for Microsoft Azure Exam Prep (10hrs, 1 practice test)

• Whizlabs Exam AZ-204: Developing Solutions for Microsoft Azure (9hrs, 8 practice tests)

AZ-204 Books

Some people prefer to use books to study, which is why Microsoft still publishes the Exam Ref series. As exam objectives get updated fairly regularly, make sure that you get the latest edition of any study guides.

A quick note of caution — the book for AZ-204 (below) was last updated in December 2020, so there are likely to be some topics not fully covered -

• Exam Ref AZ-204 Developing Solutions for Microsoft Azure (Amazon)

Practice Exams

So you’ve studied for the exam and want to assess your readiness? Practice tests are a great way to assess your readiness for the real exam.

Here are some links to the most popular ones -

• Microsoft Official Practice Test via Mindhub (140 questions)

• Udemy AZ-204: Developing Solutions for Azure practice tests (6 tests, 371 questions)

If you’re new to certification exams, Microsoft has also recently announced an “exam sandbox”. The aim is to allow you to experience the look and feel of a certification exam before you sit one for real.

Microsoft Docs for AZ-204

This section steps through each of the exam topics with links to the relevant Microsoft documentation.

Develop Azure compute solutions (25–30%)

Implement IaaS solutions

• provision virtual machines (VMs)

• configure, validate, and deploy ARM templates

• configure container images for solutions

• publish an image to the Azure Container Registry

• run containers by using Azure Container Instance

Create Azure App Service Web Apps

• create an Azure App Service Web App

• enable diagnostics logging

• deploy code to a web app

• configure web app settings including SSL, API settings, and connection strings

• implement autoscaling rules including scheduled autoscaling and autoscaling by operational or system metrics

Implement Azure functions

• create and deploy Azure Functions apps

• implement input and output bindings for a function

• implement function triggers by using data operations, timers, and webhooks

• implement Azure Durable Functions

Develop for Azure storage (15–20%)

Develop solutions that use Cosmos DB storage

• select the appropriate API and SDK for a solution

• implement partitioning schemes and partition keys

• perform operations on data and Cosmos DB containers

• set the appropriate consistency level for operations

• manage change feed notifications

Develop solutions that use blob storage

• move items in Blob storage between storage accounts or containers

• set and retrieve properties and metadata

• perform operations on data by using the appropriate SDK

• implement storage policies, and data archiving and retention

Implement Azure security (20–25%)

Implement user authentication and authorization

• authenticate and authorize users by using the Microsoft Identity platform

• authenticate and authorize users and apps by using Azure Active Directory

• create and implement shared access signatures

• Implement solutions that interact with Microsoft Graph

Implement secure cloud solutions

• secure app configuration data by using App Configuration or Azure Key Vault

• develop code that uses keys, secrets, and certificates stored in Azure Key Vault

• implement Managed Identities for Azure resources

Monitor, troubleshoot, and optimize Azure solutions (15–20%)

Implement caching for solutions

• configure cache and expiration policies for Azure Cache for Redis

• implement secure and optimized application cache patterns including data sizing, connections, encryption, and expiration

Troubleshoot solutions by using metrics and log data

• configure an app or service to use Application Insights

• review and analyze metrics and log data

• implement Application Insights web tests and alerts

Connect to and consume Azure services and third-party services (15–20%)

Implement API Management

• create an APIM instance

• create and document APIs

• configure authentication for APIs

• define policies for APIs

Develop event-based solutions

• implement solutions that use Azure Event Grid

• implement solutions that use Azure Event Hub

Develop message-based solutions

• implement solutions that use Azure Service Bus

• implement solutions that use Azure Queue Storage queues

Additional tips

For any of the Azure certifications, I find deploying the relevant Azure resources and configuring their features to be hugely beneficial to my learning. You can grab a free Azure trial to receive 12 months of free popular services, $200 free credit, and 25+ always free services.

If you’re working with Azure on a daily basis, then there are likely areas you’re already familiar with. Focus on those areas that are new to you, read and practice!

Alternatively, if you’re an experienced developer but new to Azure, the AZ-900 certification can be a good place to start. It’ll help you to become quickly familiar with Azure’s main concepts.

In general, I found the AZ-204 exam to be focused heavily on case studies. As with many Microsoft certifications, the emphasis is on selecting the right Azure technology and how to configure them.

I hope you found this study guide useful, and good luck! Please let me know of any other resources that you found helpful for the exam.