Azure Traffic Manager
Load balancing software
- Features
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- Ease of management
- Quality of support
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Pay-as-you-go
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What is Azure Traffic Manager
Azure Traffic Manager is a DNS-based global traffic distribution service that routes users to application endpoints based on routing policies such as priority, performance, weighted distribution, geographic rules, or subnet matching. It is used by cloud and infrastructure teams to improve availability and direct users to the most appropriate regional deployment or failover site. The service operates at the DNS layer (not as an in-path proxy), and it integrates with Azure endpoints as well as external/public endpoints. It is commonly deployed for multi-region architectures, disaster recovery, and gradual traffic shifting between environments.
Multiple DNS routing policies
Traffic Manager supports priority (failover), weighted, performance-based, geographic, and subnet routing. This enables common patterns such as active-passive DR, active-active multi-region, and controlled traffic migration. Policies can be combined with endpoint monitoring to automate failover decisions based on health.
Azure-native endpoint integration
The service integrates directly with Azure resources such as public IPs, App Service, and cloud services, while also supporting external endpoints. This simplifies configuration for Azure-hosted applications and aligns with Azure resource management and access controls. It fits well when the rest of the stack already uses Azure networking and monitoring conventions.
No in-path data plane
Because routing happens via DNS responses, Traffic Manager does not sit in the application data path. This reduces operational overhead compared with proxy-based load balancers that must be scaled and patched as part of the request path. It is also suitable for distributing traffic across heterogeneous environments where only DNS control is shared.
DNS-based routing constraints
Traffic Manager cannot provide per-request load balancing because clients cache DNS answers according to TTL behavior. Failover and traffic shifts may not be immediate for all users, especially when resolvers ignore low TTLs or cache aggressively. It also cannot enforce application-layer features that require in-path inspection.
Limited L7 traffic controls
As a DNS service, it does not provide capabilities such as TLS termination, header-based routing, WAF functions, or request/connection-level observability typical of reverse proxies. Teams needing fine-grained routing, retries, or circuit-breaking must pair it with other components. This can increase architectural complexity for advanced traffic management needs.
Internet-facing DNS dependency
Traffic Manager is designed for public DNS-based endpoint selection and is not a general-purpose internal service discovery mechanism. Private/internal-only scenarios often require different Azure networking services or internal load balancers. Organizations with strict DNS governance may also need additional controls around delegated domains and record management.
Plan & Pricing
Pricing model: Pay-as-you-go Free tier/trial: Azure free account (get $200 credit for 30 days) — product itself has no permanently free tier listed on the Traffic Manager pricing page.
Billing components (as listed on the official Azure Traffic Manager pricing page):
- DNS queries
- First 1 billion DNS queries/month — price not rendered on the page snapshot (region/currency selection required).
- Over 1 billion DNS queries/month — price not rendered on the page snapshot (region/currency selection required).
- Basic health checks
- Basic health checks (Azure) — price not rendered per Azure endpoint/month.
- Fast interval health checks add-on (Azure) — price not rendered per Azure endpoint/month.
- Basic health checks (external) — price not rendered per external endpoint/month.
- Fast interval health checks add-on (external) — price not rendered per external endpoint/month.
- Real User Measurements
- Measuring Azure Regions — price not rendered per million measurements.
- Traffic View
- Data points processed — price not rendered per million data points processed.
Notes: All the above billing line items and add‑ons are explicitly listed on the official Azure Traffic Manager pricing page, but numeric price amounts (USD) did not render in the static snapshot returned by the site without executing the site’s client-side scripts. The official page requires selecting Region and Currency (and/or the Azure pricing calculator or Retail Prices API) to display concrete numeric rates. For exact USD amounts, select your Region/Currency on the official Traffic Manager pricing page or contact Azure sales.
Seller details
Microsoft Corporation
Redmond, Washington, United States
1975
Public
https://www.microsoft.com/
https://x.com/Microsoft
https://www.linkedin.com/company/microsoft/
