Microsoft Azure App Service OverviewUNIXBusinessApplication

Microsoft Azure App Service is the #4 ranked solution in top Mobile Development Platforms and #9 ranked solution in top Rapid Application Development Software. PeerSpot users give Microsoft Azure App Service an average rating of 8.4 out of 10. Microsoft Azure App Service is most commonly compared to Microsoft Power Apps: Microsoft Azure App Service vs Microsoft Power Apps. Microsoft Azure App Service is popular among the large enterprise segment, accounting for 69% of users researching this solution on PeerSpot. The top industry researching this solution are professionals from a computer software company, accounting for 16% of all views.
Microsoft Azure App Service Buyer's Guide

Download the Microsoft Azure App Service Buyer's Guide including reviews and more. Updated: March 2023

What is Microsoft Azure App Service?

Microsoft Azure App Service is an HTTP-based mobile application development platform and solution. It is designed to enable organizations to completely control their application development and hosting processes.

Microsoft Azure App Service Benefits

Some of the benefits that come from using Microsoft Azure App Service include:

  • A high level of security. Microsoft Azure App Service comes with enterprise-level and industry-standard SLAs through the use of PCI security standards. Users can go about developing their applications without having to worry about exposure to security risks. Microsoft Azure App Service keeps the application development process secure so that all that users have to worry about is creating their application.
  • Collaborate and develop applications from anywhere. Teams that are spread out across the globe can collaborate and build applications from anywhere that they happen to be. Microsoft’s global data center is a cloud hub that developers can take advantage of to connect their teams if they are located in disparate locations. It can handle all of a developer's application hosting needs.
  • Multi-format and multi-lingual support. Microsoft Azure App Service supports both physical machine and virtual machine formats. In addition, it also supports a variety of different programming languages.
  • Utilize pre-fabricated templates. Microsoft Azure App Service gives developers access to an extensive list of templates. These can both ease the process of planning the development of applications by providing developers with ideas and make it easier for the developers to build them.

Microsoft Azure App Service Features

Some of the many useful features Microsoft Azure App Service has to offer include:

When users choose to employ the Microsoft Azure App Service solution, they gain access to many different capabilities. These features include:

  • Manual or automatic auto-scaling capabilities. Microsoft Azure App Service enables developers to control how their applications auto-scale. Developers can employ the auto-scaling feature by hand or set it so that it automatically rescales according to their needs.
  • IDE integrations. Microsoft Azure App Service can easily integrate with various IDE software solutions. This gives developers access to many analytic, debugging, and monitoring options.
  • Deployment slots. These are virtual spaces where developers can test and deploy new versions of their applications while working on them. This feature allows developers to resolve any issues before the new version of the application is put into production.

Reviews from Real Users

Microsoft Azure App Service’s versatility offers organizations that use it a great deal. It is a very complete, ready-to-use, out-of-the-box mobile development solution that gives users the capabilities that they need to design their mobile applications with the greatest level of ease. In addition, users can employ the cloud to scale operations so that their applications have the proper amount of space to run at the time that they need it.

Andriy L., the Azure practice leader at a computer software company, writes, “I like that it's a ready-to-use, out-of-the-box solution that provides all of the necessary functions for customers, such as codes that can be quickly switched from the production version, or test and DEV versions to production.”

Yasir M., a solution architect at Komatsu, writes, "The best feature is scalability, which allows you to target potential clients worldwide by connecting the application to a local server. This makes the application readily accessible, and the response time will be much better."

Microsoft Azure App Service was previously known as Azure App Service, MS Azure App Service.

Microsoft Azure App Service Customers

Real Madrid, Absolut, AccuWeather, Heineken, NBC News, Paramount

Microsoft Azure App Service Video

Microsoft Azure App Service Pricing Advice

What users are saying about Microsoft Azure App Service pricing:
  • "Microsoft Azure App Service is an expensive platform, but it depends on the data ingestion. There's a pay-as-you-go plan and a savings plan for compute, but total costs depend on data ingestion and disk space. For high performance, security, and isolation, Microsoft offers a disk space of 1 TB, with a pay-as-you-go price of $40 per hour, if I'm not mistaken."
  • "Where there are different customer sizes, some customers consume $5,000 US dollars per month. I have some customers who pay and consume more than $20,000 US dollars per month, for example. It is determined by customer sizes and requirements, which vary from month to month."
  • "The price of the solution is high overall."
  • "The pricing for Microsoft Azure App Service is per hour, and you're billed per hour, and it depends on the plan you're using. Each plan can host up to a minimum of four to eight applications at a time, so the pricing is quite okay with how I use Microsoft Azure App Service currently, but with the little testing I've done, I saw that some other regions tend to be costlier than others. If the same SLE is delivered for all services, there should be a way to make the prices parallel across regions. Having more transparent pricing for Microsoft Azure App Service would give customers more comfort."
  • "The cost depends on the App Service plan that you choose. There are a number of tiers available."
  • Microsoft Azure App Service Reviews

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    Sharjeel Khan - PeerSpot reviewer
    Head of Security Operations at Edotco Group
    Real User
    Top 5
    Lets you manage security more efficiently, and supports multiple frameworks, but has limited multi-language support and integration
    Pros and Cons
    • "What I found most valuable in Microsoft Azure App Service is that it's a PaaS. I also like that it supports Docker and multiple frameworks so that you can work on Java, Ruby on Rails, PHP, and Python."
    • "Limited integration is an area for improvement in Microsoft Azure App Service. Another area for improvement in the platform is multi-language support."

    What is our primary use case?

    We're working on the premium, dynamic, and standard price sharing on Microsoft Azure App Service, and most of our APIs are hosted on Microsoft Azure App Service. We're also using the platform for API calls and security management.

    We're not currently using Microsoft Azure App Service for any static web. We have a lot of API calls daily that try to access services because our applications are interconnected with either Coupa or Microsoft Dynamics 365.

    What is most valuable?

    What I found most valuable in Microsoft Azure App Service is that it's a PaaS.

    I also like that it supports Docker and multiple frameworks so that you can work on Java, Ruby on Rails, PHP, and Python.

    Another valuable feature of Microsoft Azure App Service is DevOps optimization.

    The platform also has connectors and supports on-premise servers, including the IIS server. Microsoft Azure App Service is helpful when my company needs to do some API configurations with SaaS and IIS. However, it still depends on the use case.

    I also find Microsoft Azure App Service templates valuable because of their compatibility with WordPress, Joomla, and Drupal.

    Microsoft Azure App Service also gives you access to the Azure Marketplace, which helps my company work on Azure functions.

    I also like that the platform allows you to have a serverless environment for codes you can run from the server side.

    I find Microsoft Azure App Service secure, which is another pro. You can go for the newest security protocol version, TLS 1.2 because TLS 1.0 and 1.1 have depreciated. Microsoft Azure App Service lets you efficiently manage security via private and public key certificates.

    Overall, my company had an excellent experience with Microsoft Azure App Service regarding serverless configuring, serverless environments for websites, API calls, and microservices.

    What needs improvement?

    Limited integration is an area for improvement in Microsoft Azure App Service.

    Another area for improvement in the platform is multi-language support. That still needs to be added because, at the moment, my team still has to work on specific Python languages whenever the API calls need to be configured.

    The pricing tier for Microsoft Azure App Service also has room for improvement because it significantly varies. For example, you have premium and dynamic pricing, and people on P2 should be offered dynamic pricing or the high-priced tier on offer could still be worked on.

    I want a lifecycle pipeline feature, similar to Azure Pipelines from Microsoft Azure App Service. For example, when configuring the pipelines, I should be able to configure the cloud security posture for a specific deployment. By default, there should be a prebuilt cloud security option that can be configured before moving into the production environment.

    Microsoft Azure App Service should also give you a clue regarding the risks. It would be best if you didn't have to connect to other modules because that wouldn't be as beneficial to platform users, mainly because Microsoft Azure App Service has a lot of security development kits.

    For how long have I used the solution?

    We've been working with Microsoft Azure App Service for three to four years. We're still using it.

    Buyer's Guide
    Microsoft Azure App Service
    March 2023
    Learn what your peers think about Microsoft Azure App Service. Get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions. Updated: March 2023.
    690,226 professionals have used our research since 2012.

    What do I think about the stability of the solution?

    Microsoft Azure App Service is a PaaS, so it's pretty stable.

    In the past three or four years, my company deployed it with Coupa and Microsoft Dynamics 365, yet I haven't seen any outages.

    Microsoft Azure App Service is a Microsoft service, so it has 99.99% stability. I haven't seen any service-related issues from it.

    What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

    Microsoft Azure App Service is scalable, so if you want to utilize it more, you can go for the recommended price tier. What's best about the platform cost-wise is its detection feature, which tells you if your utilization isn't high in terms of memory, so that advisory helps you manage cost. You'll get a recommendation on which Microsoft Azure App Service module to use.

    You'll also find it easy to decide whether to scale up or down for the production or if you need to create an isolated environment.

    How are customer service and support?

    My company is a gold customer of Microsoft Azure App Service, so Microsoft provides premium technical support. It depends on the issue. For example, if my team has a P1 problem, support will call immediately. The support provided is similar to Cisco Smart Net, where support is very supportive, and it's especially recommended if you have a critical issue and your environment is down.

    Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

    Apart from Microsoft Azure App Service, my company also uses the AWS serverless API solution, Amazon API Gateway, where microservices and risk APIs run. It's used side by side with Microsoft Azure App Service. As I belong to the security team, I'd always prefer Microsoft Azure App Service because it's pretty systematic, and Microsoft does checks and balances.

    If you go for Amazon API Gateway, it's cheap and can give you different configurations. However, it's pretty tricky, security-wise, because you still have to enable a couple of new services for security. You cannot manage security easily on Amazon API Gateway. You still have to configure Security Hub and GuardDuty. It's tricky regarding security and data ingestion of logs because you still need to send that to Amazon CloudWatch directly.

    I'm not as comfortable with Amazon API Gateway, which is another reason I prefer Microsoft Azure App Service; However, Microsoft Azure App Service is expensive, but I understand that because of its structure, schematics, easy management, and better security. It's secure by default with security-by-design parameters, and Microsoft would manage significant areas.

    How was the initial setup?

    The initial setup for Microsoft Azure App Service isn't that complex, but it still depends on experience. It's a basic deployment where you define the subscription and the resources you need to connect, depending on how you connect further. For example, you need to configure the code or container or contain it as a static web. Then, you can choose operating systems, such as Linux or Windows, and select the region.

    If you need to connect Microsoft Azure App Service to the GitHub repositories for DevOps, you can also connect it. It would be best if you then defined the networks, the monitoring, and the tags. You also define your application insights. For example, it could be a crown jewel app you will configure. You can also configure the detection, and the process is also straightforward to define, security-wise.

    What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

    Microsoft Azure App Service is an expensive platform, but it depends on the data ingestion. There's a pay-as-you-go plan and a savings plan for compute, but total costs depend on data ingestion and disk space.

    For high performance, security, and isolation, Microsoft offers a disk space of 1 TB, with a pay-as-you-go price of $40 per hour, if I'm not mistaken, but that could be lower depending on your key account manager if I remember correctly.

    You have options cost-wise. You either go with the standard service plan or the premium plan for Microsoft Azure App Service. If you go for the premium plan, it's expensive, but it depends on your risk appetite.

    If you go for Amazon API Gateway or AWS, it would be cheaper, but what's your risk appetite, security-wise? You can still enjoy security from AWS, but that means enabling six modules, for example, Security Hub, GuardDuty, etc. Then, for data log ingestion, you still need to enable Amazon Kinesis Data Firehose, so that would make the costs more expensive.

    In comparison, you can go for the premium Microsoft Azure App Service plan and enable the platform and services. The data will automatically be adjusted toward your Microsoft Sentinel account. You also don't need to procure Microsoft Defender for Cloud because, by default, Microsoft provides security.

    Going for Microsoft Azure App Service also means that Microsoft Azure will also manage identity protection.

    What other advice do I have?

    I'm working on Microsoft Azure App Service, end-to-end security such as Amazon GuardDuty, and AWS Security Hub.

    My company uses SQL services, AWS RDS, PaaS, and SaaS.

    My team also works on all Microsoft Defender for Cloud, Azure WAF, Azure Network Watcher, and Azure Service Map modules.

    My company works on endpoint security and related solutions, such as Microsoft Purview Compliance Manager and Microsoft Purview DLP.

    Microsoft Azure App Service is a mobile development platform. It's a serverless environment.

    My company has an interconnection with Microsoft Azure App Service, with API calls coming from the platform, so there's no specific user but a service account used by the company.

    My rating for Microsoft Azure App Service is seven out of ten based on the features used within the company.

    My company is a customer of Microsoft Azure App Service.

    Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

    Public Cloud
    Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
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    PeerSpot user
    Andriy Lyubimov - PeerSpot reviewer
    Azure Practice Leader at a computer software company with 5,001-10,000 employees
    MSP
    Top 10
    Good backup and restore, with vertical, horizontal, and DEV scaling options
    Pros and Cons
    • "I like that it's a ready-to-use, out-of-the-box solution that provides all of the necessary functions for customers, such as codes that can be quickly switched from the production version, or from test and DEV versions to production."
    • "It would be fantastic if Microsoft morphed after my exit service, removing it from subscriptions and moving it to different regions, especially for that service."

    What is our primary use case?

    We mostly use Microsoft Azure App Service for websites, such as content management systems, WordPress, and others, which are built on Azure Web Repair and App Services.

    What is most valuable?

    I like that it's a ready-to-use, out-of-the-box solution that provides all of the necessary functions for customers, such as codes that can be quickly switched from the production version, or from test and DEV versions to production. 

    Quote backup and restore vertical and horizontal scaling, and DEV scaling are all available. In this case, developers do not need to learn and spend their time on the configuration for the platform, just coding and asking to compute, which they need and that configuration, which platform provides them.

    What needs improvement?

    Price could be reduced.

    Particularly with Azure Web Apps. According to their current architecture, moving services from one Azure subscription to another is difficult.

    Customers can consume the Azure platform through a variety of subscriptions from various partners, financial visions, current political visions, and so on. Some services on the Microsoft Azure platform can be moved automatically from one subscription to another based on security and financial rules, while others cannot.

    Azure Web Apps are the type of service that does not automatically move from subscription to subscription, and region to region. A lot of manual labor must be performed by their organization, customer, and engineers, if necessary.

    They must pay too much attention to how to plan this, how to switch off, switch on, on which days, at what times, and so on. A lot of administrative work is done, but it's not very good. 

    It would be fantastic if Microsoft morphed after my exit service, removing it from subscriptions and moving it to different regions, especially for that service.

    For how long have I used the solution?

    I have used Microsoft Azure App Service for the last 12 months.

    Because it is cloud-based, there is only one version.

    What do I think about the stability of the solution?

    Microsoft Azure App Service is stable. It's good enough. it's present here, but anyone can take it if it's needed. Especially now, Microsoft offers a very special support program in Ukraine. For example, if a customer needs to support their business processes, they can use any Azure solution for free until the end of the calendar year.

    What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

    Microsoft Azure App Service is a scalable solution.

    How are customer service and support?

    We are a technical support team, and we handle all of our support needs. We have not contacted technical support.

    I am Microsoft-certified trained. This is why I don't require any additional support assistance; I train others. In other words, every Microsoft commercial partner receives direct Microsoft support. For example, Amazon provides additional information from the traditional partner channel, or by extra support, through premier support contracts. All of them must be present on a commercial basis in order to provide truly high-quality services to customers.

    Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

    I am a technical architect and I have some commercial partners. I work as a system integrator. It is a software, global company that specializes in delivering cloud software, solutions, and services. As for this, I have over 25 years of experience with all stacks, including Azure, AWS, Google GCP, Oracle Cloud, and others. I was very interested in the Zimbra and Microsoft Exchange compilation because, in my opinion, based on my experience and statistics, Zimbra is not widely used in our accounting and based installation. However, one commercial customer inquired about my thoughts on Zimbra in conjunction with Exchange. It was very unfamiliar to me, which is why I attempted to conduct independent research on Zimbra solutions. Who and how are relevant to that question. I don't think we'll implement Zimbra because it's outside of our stack, but it was very interesting to get some perspective on the questions, nothing special, just vision and experience and growth.

    We use what our customers requested from the Microsoft stacks, which are mostly infrastructure as a service solutions. It is a very limited number of PaaS installations or implementations, such as Aurora or Microsoft SQL, Azure SQL as a service, web applications on Azure, and so on. Of course, SaaS, such as Office 365, is a good option, but I can't say what other options aren't because the Microsoft stack is our primary commercial platform for our sources. It's fantastic; it provides us with some commercial advantages.

    We recently used Azure, virtual machines, virtual networks, and virtual storage, as well as Azure IaaS Stack, Azure Virtual Machines, and Azure Storage.

    Because Azure Web Services is based on the Azure IaaS Stack, it is infrastructure as a service. It's a platform as a service that's based on IaaS for some purposes, but our customers don't need the services to bring ready-to-use apps because they don't have a lot of education and institutes. Overall, Qualys solutions are not widely used in Ukraine, for example, by schools, governments, and institutes, due to commercial issues and, in particular, our notice time.

    We chose Microsoft Azure App Service because the customer inquired. We are a very commercial company, and if the market or the customer did not request it, we did not provide it. If the customer requests it, we will provide it.

    How was the initial setup?

    I don't recall any problems with the initial setup at the time because I believe it was adequate. I didn't hear anything about widespread or public knowledge of some issues in that area.

    What was our ROI?

    Most importantly, not too much. The customer has a high level of financial maturity to value DPI; they do not discuss ROI or other metrics. They simply book on current, can say spending, if current model spending is adequate.

    What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

    Price could always be cheaper.

    It is not about the license fees, but rather about the pay-as-you-go services.

    Customers consume varying amounts of quality services and pay roughly the same amount. Where there are different customer sizes, some customers consume $5,000 US dollars per month. I have some customers who pay and consume more than $20,000 US dollars per month, for example. It is determined by customer sizes and requirements, which vary from month to month.

    What other advice do I have?

    I would advise paying closer attention to the architecture of the solutions. If the architecture is well designed, this will be a very good placement on cloud solutions; otherwise, it will be placed incorrectly. It's a common situation, and owing too much money as it should be.

    I would rate Microsoft Azure App Service a nine out of ten.

    We are a Microsoft partner.

    Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

    Public Cloud

    If public cloud, private cloud, or hybrid cloud, which cloud provider do you use?

    Microsoft Azure
    Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer: partner
    PeerSpot user
    Buyer's Guide
    Microsoft Azure App Service
    March 2023
    Learn what your peers think about Microsoft Azure App Service. Get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions. Updated: March 2023.
    690,226 professionals have used our research since 2012.
    Senior Architect at a financial services firm with 10,001+ employees
    Real User
    No code experience needed, customizable, and easy to scale
    Pros and Cons
    • "The user interface and the ability to quickly develop are the two main advantages of Microsoft Azure App Service. You can develop anything without having any coding experience and it is not complex and the components are easily customizable."
    • "There is still room for improvement in terms of the maturity of the solution. Everything is available that we need, but the issue is that they are still upgrading. Even though they have Azure applications and automation services, they still need to mature more. There are many things that need to mature and the road map for this is quite long, taking another three to eight years to have a mature solution."

    What is our primary use case?

    We developed a low-code platform in Microsoft Azure App Service, for showcasing a mission-running application in a replay format for sales validation purposes.

    How has it helped my organization?

    This solution is providing us with options for machine learning that we didn't have before that have helped the organization.

    What is most valuable?

    The user interface and the ability to quickly develop are the two main advantages of Microsoft Azure App Service. You can develop anything without having any coding experience and it is not complex and the components are easily customizable. 

    What needs improvement?

    There is still room for improvement in terms of the maturity of the solution. Everything is available that we need, but the issue is that they are still upgrading. Even though they have Azure applications and automation services, they still need to mature more. There are many things that need to mature and the road map for this is quite long, taking another three to eight years to have a mature solution.

    The dashboards could improve. Customers are still not satisfied with the current releases, and because there are too many releases.

    Microsoft Azure App Service apps cannot be deployed on-premise. They can only be deployed in the cloud.

    For how long have I used the solution?

    I have been using Microsoft Azure App Service for approximately one year.

    What do I think about the stability of the solution?

    The solution is stable.

    I rate the stability of Microsoft Azure App Service an eight out of ten.

    What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

    Microsoft Azure App Service is a scalable solution and can be done easily. The solution does not take long to deploy and scale to multiple environments.

    The number of people using the solution can vary, as there may be multiple concurrent users at any given time, such as 23 users. Overall, we may have approximately 100 to 150 users. It depends on how we configure the pipelines. Concurrently, we may have 23 to 100 users accessing the solution at the same time.

    I rate the scalability of Microsoft Azure App Service a six out of ten.

    How are customer service and support?

    We only use support when we encounter a problem. We don't have much support up front. We have to rely on trial and error to fix issues.

    I rate the support from Microsoft Azure App Service a seven out of ten.

    How would you rate customer service and support?

    Neutral

    Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

    We tried Appian and Oracle Application Express prior to using Microsoft Azure App Service.

    We switched to Microsoft Azure App Service because the customer already had an Azure license and could use it, which was not the case with Appian or Oracle. The licensing cost is much higher for those platforms and they also have their own cloud. Additionally, Appian requires the use of all three clouds. The customers are more familiar with Microsoft products. They preferred to use Microsoft Azure App Service over Oracle or Appian. They wanted to have a single solution for their entire organization and most of their work is done with Azure. These were some of the issues we faced and why we switched to this solution.

    How was the initial setup?

    The deployment of Microsoft Azure App Service was simple. We had integrated cases with everything set up for us. It didn't require much knowledge. Anyone with basic knowledge can do it. It doesn't require an extraordinary person. It's one of the easiest setups.

    The deployment of the solution does not take long. It is very simple and can take as little as 30 to 40 minutes.

    We use scripts and execute them for the deployment. We have some scripts that are automated. Everything is based on script-based automation. We follow the DevOps process to create and deploy the applications.

    Once it is configured, it doesn't require any additional resources. Only if there are any corrections needed, then we would require resources. Otherwise, the pipeline is automated and there is no need for manual intervention unless there is a problem.

    I rate the initial setup of Microsoft Azure App Service a seven out of ten.

    What about the implementation team?

    Deployment is done by only one person but it can depend on how the pipeline is configured.

    What was our ROI?

    In terms of resources, we have created an automated solution that has reduced manual effort. It is also providing us with options for machine learning solutions that we didn't have before. This has reduced the number of development engineers needed, as it doesn't require as many resources. For example, creating a user interface and backend are eliminated in this solution. The development effort and resources required have been reduced. Previously, we needed 10 resources, now we only need three resources to handle the same workload. This has resulted in a saving of seven resources.

    What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

    the licensing cost is too high from some perspectives. For example, if we can deliver a package that is already being used by others, it would be better for new customers who are low-income, as they cannot afford the high prices or fees. This is because the chargeable aspect is a problem for them. Additionally, once we have developed something in Microsoft Azure App Service if we want more of the same in the future, we have to create another application, which is not ideal for low-income customers as they prefer to have everything in their own control.

    It could be beneficial to provide proper licensing options. It would be helpful if they split it into multiple packages from a development perspective. Additionally, offering free licensing for development and charging for production could be beneficial for Microsoft.

    The price of the solution is high overall.

    I rate the price of Microsoft Azure App Service a five out of ten.

    Which other solutions did I evaluate?

    We did not evaluate other options before choosing Microsoft Azure App Service.

    What other advice do I have?

    I would recommend that if others already have a cloud platform, specifically a Microsoft Cloud, they should use Microsoft Azure App Service. It allows for faster development, even if you don't have many resources or coding knowledge. Instead of creating apps from scratch, it is a great tool to use a no-code solution to develop apps. It's a rapid development tool. If you have limited resources this is a great tool to use and scale them.

    I rate Microsoft Azure App Service an eight out of ten.

    Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

    Public Cloud
    Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer: Partner
    Flag as inappropriate
    PeerSpot user
    Babatunde Ojo - PeerSpot reviewer
    Cloud Engineer at Tek Experts
    Real User
    Can run a function faster and more frequently, is easy to utilize, and only requires minimal setup
    Pros and Cons
    • "I've used Microsoft Azure App Service quite a lot, and what I like best about it is that it's a serverless HAM, which is a feature that can run a function, a single function, but faster and more frequently without needing any other assistance. This has been what I found most valuable in Microsoft Azure App Service, the serverless option that's very easy to utilize, and you only need a minimal setup to use this and to enjoy the functionalities required, so the solution gives me a lot of comfort whenever I'm using it."
    • "Customers love it when a solution is affordable, but with Microsoft Azure App Service, you can start and stop it, and when you stop it, it won't be reachable and it won't be available, yet you're still being charged for it. You'll still be charged even if the solution isn't accessible because Microsoft Azure App Service runs on a shared virtual machine that keeps on running, so if there's a way to work this out, it'll be a great improvement to only pay for what you use. The solution should have no hidden cost and no extra charge when it's stopped. This is what needs improvement in Microsoft Azure App Service."

    What is our primary use case?

    My use case for Microsoft Azure App Service is to deploy web solutions faster and easier online. Rather than setting up my servers and worrying about the need to set up the infrastructure, the OS, and the run time, I use Microsoft Azure App Service for faster deployment and to get my solutions to the market at a faster rate.

    What is most valuable?

    I've used Microsoft Azure App Service quite a lot, and what I like best about it is that it's a serverless HAM, which is a feature that can run a function, a single function, but faster and more frequently without needing any other assistance. This has been what I found most valuable in Microsoft Azure App Service, the serverless option that's very easy to utilize, and you only need a minimal setup to use this and to enjoy the functionalities required, so the solution gives me a lot of comfort whenever I'm using it.

    What needs improvement?

    Customers love it when a solution is affordable, but with Microsoft Azure App Service, you can start and stop it, and when you stop it, it won't be reachable and it won't be available, yet you're still being charged for it.

    You'll still be charged even if the solution isn't accessible because Microsoft Azure App Service runs on a shared virtual machine that keeps on running, so if there's a way to work this out, it'll be a great improvement to only pay for what you use. The solution should have no hidden cost and no extra charge when it's stopped. This is what needs improvement in Microsoft Azure App Service.

    For how long have I used the solution?

    I've been using Microsoft Azure App Service for four years now, but professionally, this is my second year to use it.

    What do I think about the stability of the solution?

    Microsoft lives up to its word. For example, the SLA it promised is 99.7%, and to the best of my knowledge, Microsoft Azure App Service has been able to reach that percentage without any global outage from any of the services and underlying infrastructure that power it. The solution is available 100% throughout its lifetime.

    What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

    Microsoft Azure App Service is very scalable, and it's built in such a way that it encourages flexibility in scaling. You can grow from a single instance to thirty instances, and you can increase from 5GB RAM to over 30GB RAM.

    Microsoft Azure App Service is designed so you can start small and expand as your customer base grows. It's built around that ideology and it's been living up to that ideology. The solution is defined scalability-wise, and it's practical in both approach and usage.

    How was the initial setup?

    The setup for Microsoft Azure App Service is very straightforward. All you have to do is navigate to the portal, search for the App Services, curate one, give it a name, select a location, region, and resource group, then customize the number of RAM you want. Do you want a disk to be attached to it? Do you want to do some modern networking parameters which are not requirements?

    The basic requirements for setting up Microsoft Azure App Service are very straightforward, so anyone who can power his computer can get started with.

    You also have several deployment options to choose from for Microsoft Azure App Service which would make life easy. You can deploy from your existing repository, or you can upload your code directly, so for me, the setup is quite easy for the solution.

    How long Microsoft Azure App Service deployment usually takes depends on the content, specifically the size of the content you want to deploy to it. At most, if you have a one-page website, the solution takes less than five minutes to deploy, which is quite fast, so you can get your sites up and running in less than twenty minutes with the setup and deployment, so the process is considerably okay.

    What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

    The pricing for Microsoft Azure App Service is per hour, and you're billed per hour, and it depends on the plan you're using. Each plan can host up to a minimum of four to eight applications at a time, so the pricing is quite okay with how I use Microsoft Azure App Service currently, but with the little testing I've done, I saw that some other regions tend to be costlier than others. If the same SLE is delivered for all services, there should be a way to make the prices parallel across regions. Having more transparent pricing for Microsoft Azure App Service would give customers more comfort.

    What other advice do I have?

    Microsoft Azure App Service can be used by a lot of people, but either the cloud engineer or the infrastructure engineer should be in charge of it because the solution relates to a lot of infrastructures and other resources such as storage, databases, networking, firewalls, and it can even relate to APIs and other resources outside the cloud environment. A lot of people can work on Microsoft Azure App Service, but it's best handled by the cloud engineer who has an understanding of how to implement the relationship with other resources.

    I've worked on Microsoft Azure App Service for four years, and I have enough experience to orchestrate, manage, and maintain it.

    My advice to anyone looking to use Microsoft Azure App Service is that you should try it and see the power of getting your applications out at a faster rate. It can get your application to speed up in less than twenty minutes, and it can handle between thirty to fifty thousand users at a time. You can try Microsoft Azure App Service while you're starting, then you can keep scaling until you need more resources or more solutions that can help you with your workload. Try Microsoft Azure App Service out, so you can see for yourself what it can give you. This is the best way to enjoy its features and benefits.

    My rating for Microsoft Azure App Service is nine out of ten.

    My company is a partner of Microsoft Azure App Service.

    Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer: Partner
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    Technical Lead at a tech services company with 1,001-5,000 employees
    Real User
    Top 10
    A multi-tenant environment where customers can load and run applications
    Pros and Cons
    • "The most valuable feature is the ability to scale the application."
    • "The outbound connectivity is not great."

    What is our primary use case?

    Our primary use case for this solution is hosting web applications which can be Linux or Windows-based. Microsoft Azure App Service is a multi-tenant environment where customers can load and run the application. It is similar to a platform as a service.

    What is most valuable?

    The most valuable feature is the ability to scale the application. It scales dynamically and comes with two features. If you can find a fabulous feature in the Azure Functions app, it allows you to scale, so you don't need to worry about manually scaling or setting any scaling parameters. Then it automatically does the scaling on its own.

    The other feature comes with VNet integration. So we can connect the Microsoft Azure App Service to a VNet so that it can privately communicate with other resources within Azure with a private IP. It also comes with the CDN feature, which can automatically load in some of your configuration files and use it instead of going back to storage to pick that up. It also has awesome features like backup, so you don't need to set up a recovery service, as it automatically does that. So you can back up the existing state of your application in case of any loss. In a nutshell, it has dynamic tools.

    What needs improvement?

    The outbound connectivity is not great but can be improved because, on virtual machines, the Microsoft Azure App Service uses four or five outbound IPs. So basically, if you want to communicate with an external source, you can use outbound IPs. For example, you must whitelist the outbound IP when communicating with an SQL database externally. However, because it's a multi-tenant environment and other customer applications are being shared on a skills tab, there are always limitations in the smart port. So each customer has a particular allocated smart port, which they should exhaust. It helps to work with the code. Regardless of features like a firewall where they have a hub and an environment they have features like a front door which can increase the smart port's limits to about 64,000. Hence, it will be good to have one IP without needing to add any other infrastructure.

    Additionally, they can improve scaling the typical environment in terms of scalability. I believe the limit for the multi-tenant environment is about 20 to 30 maximum on the PV3. So if they can increase that, other than having these significant scaling limits for the Microsoft Azure App Service environment, which is about 200, that will also help.

    Also, dedicating one outbound IP for App Service will go a long way.

    For how long have I used the solution?

    We have been using this solution for approximately three years.

    What do I think about the stability of the solution?

    The solution is stable.

    What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

    The solution is scalable.

    How are customer service and support?

    They have a good support team. We don't think the front-end support is of concern because the front end has to talk to the internal respective application engineering team. Sometimes the core platform issues may take about two months or more. They can answer your queries, and they can help you do investigations.

    Additionally, depending on your support package, if you have a premium plan, you get the best because you have support engineers who are intelligent. But you get different services with the pro-direct support plan. There's miscommunication between the front end and the application engineering team. I think that's something that they need to improve. On a premium plan, you get excellent support. I rate support for pro-direct a six out of ten and premium support an eight out of ten.

    How would you rate customer service and support?

    Positive

    How was the initial setup?

    The initial setup is easy. You can set it up through the portal, a template, or Terraform. It integrates with other features like Docker so if you have your image in Docker Hub or ECR, you can select the image, and it pulls those images in and runs your application.

    It has many features, and other deployment methods like Bitbucket, FTP, DevOps, and GitLab can integrate these things into Microsoft Azure App Service. It is easy to set up because you don't need to start building servers. We also don't need to complete any maintenance. 

    What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

    The price of this solution is competitive. It works as an App Service plan so you can have multiple App Services that are part of a plan. So, for example, you can have about 10 App Services in an App Service plan. It's like a VM, where you have different applications running and you are not charged for all of the applications. However, you are being charged for the plan, so I think it's worth having that setup. At the same time, you need to plan how your costs will be and their ranges of variations. As we call it, SKU is where you can easily factor in so it is okay in terms of price.

    One of the best products is the Functions app, which comes with serverless computing in the sense that it gives you about a million transactions for free every month. That is one of the cheapest. So you don't need to worry about how long your function triggers, just that if it scales more than that and performs more transactions, you get charged for it. The exact cost depends on the SKUs.

    What other advice do I have?

    I rate the solution an eight out of ten. 

    Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer: Partner
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    Reema Nandi - PeerSpot reviewer
    Application Development Associate Manager at Accenture
    Real User
    A solution with great server management and helps improve performance.
    Pros and Cons
    • "We are able to do millions of things simultaneously."
    • "The configuration is slow without understanding the systematic process."

    What is our primary use case?

    We use this product for integration and use a bidirectional approach. Some cases are created in service now, which are pushed to Salesforce. When an item is created in Salesforce, it is also created in ServiceNow which exposes some risk APIs. Those risk APIs are Salesforce, snow and sales group, but it's not enough for our portal because they need some customization, so we do it ourselves with function apps deployed over Azure. The function apps are forced through API and ServiceNow and application performance integration systems. These function apps are consumed by those APIs.

    What is most valuable?

    We are able to do millions of things simultaneously. Additionally, Azure maintains and manages the server, which is very helpful because we don't have to. The microservice architecture is also very good. Performance wise it is the best thing I have ever found.

    What needs improvement?

    The product could be improved by including crude operations. Previously, we provided it in the same application. However, when the operation went down, other operations also went down. This was one of the risks we had to overcome with this solution to avoid other operations being affected when one operation went down. With this resolved, the performance will be seamless because data can be handled simultaneously.

    For how long have I used the solution?

    We have been using this solution for the last six months. Microsoft Azure App Service has multiple plans and subscriptions. It provides access to certain subscriptions and specific profiles, fewer consumption plans and subscription premium plans. So when we work on logic or function apps, they provide certain resource groups. We can discuss certain logic and function apps when we have access to resource groups.

    What do I think about the stability of the solution?

    The solution is stable. Everything is organized. Additionally, access is provided to their help centres in case you face difficulty. When we had issues, we contacted them, and they made a ticket and resolved it.

    What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

    The solution is scalable. Approximately 50 to 100 people in different roles use this product in our company. However, I am unaware of the total amount of people that could be added to this product.

    How are customer service and support?

    Unfortunately, I cannot comment on our experiences with customer service and support at this time.

    How was the initial setup?

    The initial setup was easy. However, understanding the configuration was important because everything was very systematic. The configuration is slow without understanding the systematic process.

    Deployment is fast, and it takes a few seconds to publish it. This often occurs in our application because we have to make changes, but not all of our staff are involved in deployment. We take 15 minutes from the client and 15 for testing, but it takes only two to three minutes to publish.

    What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

    There are several plans available for different licenses and costs. When using this product for the first time, it is essential to understand the type of scaling required, the kind of skills needed and the level of necessary tiers. For example, to keep services running for up to 24 hours, there is a charge, but if you want to have your app services running for 12 hours daily, there is a different charge. You can also purchase specific plans. In addition, there are different types of client packages. Therefore it is important to explore each package to find the one best suited for the task required. We suggest using this product, which is helpful because it improves performance and loading times.

    Which other solutions did I evaluate?

    We chose this product because it has several plans, including consumption plans. My company will not have to worry about maintaining server systems. Hence, we only have to perform a daily routine after deploying and maintaining the service. Our company handed these tasks to Azure. Microsoft Azure takes care of our content application, including when to turn it off. We pay for these services, which saves us the pain of managing them. This is very important when using Microsoft Azure.

    What other advice do I have?

    I rate this solution a ten out of ten. It is a very good solution that improves our performance. However, it would be helpful to include flow diagrams via logic apps in the next release.

    Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
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    Roshan George Thallamore - PeerSpot reviewer
    Azure DevOps and Cloud Lead at a consultancy with self employed
    Real User
    Top 5
    Is ideal for lifting and shifting monolithic applications to the cloud but deployment needs improvement
    Pros and Cons
    • "The most valuable feature is that it's an ideal solution when it comes to lifting and shifting monolithic applications from on-premises to Azure Cloud. It allows for a quick shift into the cloud without having to analyze and design very specific infrastructure and services for monolithic applications hosted primarily on-premises. Let's say that the team does not want to really redesign monoliths in a microservices-based application and that they want to make a quick move towards adopting the cloud tech stack. Then, Microsoft Azure App Service is probably the best option."
    • "In terms of room for improvement, ease of deployment would be an area that needs some focus. Azure does provide out-of-the-box deployment features, but I found that deploying to an App Service instance can be better in terms of more tools that could be available to perform a deployment."

    What is our primary use case?

    One use case was to host the Azure Bot logic code. The Bot logic was hosted on an App Service instance. The other use case was a POC where we were lifting and shifting a monolithic application, a .NET monolithic application, onto the cloud.

    What is most valuable?

    The most valuable feature is that it's an ideal solution when it comes to lifting and shifting monolithic applications from on-premises to Azure Cloud. It allows for a quick shift into the cloud without having to analyze and design very specific infrastructure and services for monolithic applications hosted primarily on-premises. Let's say that the team does not want to really redesign monoliths in a microservices-based application and that they want to make a quick move towards adopting the cloud tech stack. Then, Microsoft Azure App Service is probably the best option.

    What needs improvement?

    In terms of room for improvement, ease of deployment would be an area that needs some focus. Azure does provide out-of-the-box deployment features, but I found that deploying to an App Service instance can be better in terms of more tools that could be available to perform a deployment.

    For how long have I used the solution?

    I've been using this solution since 2020.

    It is deployed on a virtual network on Azure.

    What do I think about the stability of the solution?

    It is stable, but it really depends on the workload that is being shifted and the base service plan that is selected. Because though it is a platform as a service, you do have the option to design a service plan that is adequate for your applications, performance needs, and overall traffic that hits your applications. In terms of it being a platform-as-a-service feature, it is quite stable.

    What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

    It is scalable. The user base for the Bot service application was about 400 to 500 users worldwide.

    How are customer service and support?

    The technical support is average, and I would give them a six out of ten.

    How would you rate customer service and support?

    Neutral

    How was the initial setup?

    The initial setup is easy and can be done quickly depending on the number of applications being deployed. A single application should not take more than a couple of minutes to deploy.

    What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

    The cost depends on the App Service plan that you choose. There are a number of tiers available.

    What other advice do I have?

    If you have a standard enterprise application, for example, for the sake of simplicity, a single server with 50 requests per second, trying to do a lift and shift to App Service is probably a good idea. Bot framework solutions generally tend to use App Service for custom Bot logic, for hosting the custom Bots and the custom logic for Bots. App Service is probably a bit easier in terms of implementation compared to that of other options.

    However, for high performance applications that have a heavy load on them and are expected to perform at a certain level of response time, a pure lift and shift to App Service will not work well. You would probably need to choose a higher tier of App Service with a good App Service plan with a certain number of underlying host servers that are servicing it.

    Overall, I would rate Microsoft Azure App Service at six on a scale from one to ten.

    Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
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    Mouly Korthiwada - PeerSpot reviewer
    Enterprise Architect at Tata Consultancy Services
    Real User
    Top 5
    Flexible, configurable, and easy to use
    Pros and Cons
    • "The cost is reasonable."
    • "From an IoT use case perspective, we're all good, however, we should have additional plugins."

    What is our primary use case?

    We have used App Services to integrate a lot of solutions, to bring content from a different domain or maybe a different data source. 

    We were using a lot of Microsoft Azure services to build. We were also leveraged to deploy non-SAP solutions like Python Machine Learning IOTs, using these App Services to bring solutions into SAP.

    We were doing one POC for one of the last customers where we had to integrate mobile solutions and IoT. We were using App Services to build those IOT components, retrieve data, and integrate with SAP.

    We were using some temperature readings for our supply chain logistics company. Once we read temperatures, we'll push it to the App Service, and App Service will internally push it to the digital twins. From there, we get the events and consume those events into a function, and then whatever the functions read will be pushed into the DB.

    What is most valuable?

    The best feature is the latency is significantly less. The functions which are provided in this App Services app work very fast, and there are no latencies that we see. The realistic data allow us to configure analytics on top of it, and it is very fast.

    It is easy to set up.

    The cost is reasonable.

    We've found the product to be stable. 

    What needs improvement?

    Recently, we have used some scheduling and event management. From an IoT use case perspective, we're all good, however, we should have additional plugins.

    For how long have I used the solution?

    We started using the solution in 2021.

    What do I think about the stability of the solution?

    It is stable so far. We have not received any challenges during our implementation. 

    What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

    Azure was very fast in doing scalability from a user management perspective. Whenever you add a new user, it automatically aligns, and then the license gets adjusted automatically.

    We have a few thousand users. Pretty much everyone uses it. 

    Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

    We began using the solution due to the fact that digitalization is becoming normal now, and we have to integrate a lot of non-SAP solutions. App Services gives a lot of flexibility for us to bring data from any data source and push it to enterprise services, which we want to consume.

    How was the initial setup?

    The solution is easy to set up. It's very easy. it's not complex at all. 

    It only takes about a week to deploy a bare-bones product. To have an end-to-end solution, it only takes 20 to 30 days. 

    What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

    From a licensing cost perspective, Microsoft Azure, compared to other cloud services providers, is competitive and reasonable from an implementation point of view.

    The Azure license is based on usage. It's pay as you. We pay for what we consume. 

    What other advice do I have?

    We are partners with Microsoft.

    I'm not sure what version of the solution we're using. 

    I'd advise users to try out the product.

    I would rate it eight out of ten. It is flexible and easy to use. Configuring and deploying are also quick and easy. 

    Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer: Partner
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    Buyer's Guide
    Download our free Microsoft Azure App Service Report and get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions.
    Updated: March 2023
    Buyer's Guide
    Download our free Microsoft Azure App Service Report and get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions.