Do I have to pass AZ-104 before AZ-305?

Not before, but you need both. You can sit AZ-305 first, but Microsoft only awards Azure Solutions Architect Expert once you also hold an active Azure Administrator Associate, which you earn by passing AZ-104. Most candidates take AZ-104 first because the design questions assume hands-on administration knowledge.

Is AZ-305 retiring in 2026?

Not as of 25 October 2026. The AZ-305 exam page shows no retirement date, and AZ-305 is not on Microsoft's list of exams scheduled to retire in the next 12 months. Its skills outline was updated on 17 April 2026, so use study material that matches that version.

Will my Solutions Architect Expert expire if my AZ-104 certification expires?

No. Microsoft's renewal FAQ says an expert certification does not automatically expire when its associate prerequisite expires. Each certification is renewed separately by passing its own free online renewal assessment during the six months before it expires.

Can a fresher take AZ-305?

You may book it, but it is not a good first exam. The audience profile expects advanced experience across networking, virtualisation, identity, security, business continuity, data platforms and governance, plus Azure administration, development and DevOps exposure. Freshers usually get more from AZ-900 and AZ-104 first, then AZ-305 after real project work.

Which Azure regions in India have availability zones?

According to Microsoft's regions list, Central India in Pune and India South Central in Hyderabad each have three availability zones. South India in Chennai and West India in Mumbai do not. Check the service you plan to use as well, because not every service supports zones in every region.

AZ-305 Exam Guide for India: Azure Solutions Architect Expert

AZ-305, Designing Microsoft Azure Infrastructure Solutions, is the exam for Microsoft Certified: Azure Solutions Architect Expert, and it is current: its exam page shows no retirement date. To be awarded the expert certification you also need an active Azure Administrator Associate (AZ-104). The skills were last updated on 17 April 2026, and infrastructure design is the heaviest area at 30 to 35%.

At a glance

Exam: AZ-305, Designing Microsoft Azure Infrastructure Solutions
Certification: Azure Solutions Architect Expert, expert level
Prerequisite: Microsoft Certified: Azure Administrator Associate (exam AZ-104)
Skills measured: as of 17 April 2026, in four areas
Pass mark: 700 or greater
Exam time: 100 minutes for role-based exams, or 120 if the exam contains labs
Practice: a free official practice assessment is linked from the study guide
Renewal: free online assessment every year

The AZ-104 prerequisite, explained

Microsoft's own Azure career guide on Learn puts it plainly: when you complete the prerequisite, the Azure Administrator Associate certification, and pass AZ-305, you earn Azure Solutions Architect Expert. Two practical points follow.

You can sit AZ-305 first, but the expert certification only appears once you also hold an active Azure Administrator Associate. Passing AZ-305 alone gives you an exam on your transcript, not a certification.

After you have the expert title, the two certifications renew separately. Microsoft's renewal FAQ says an expert certification does not expire automatically if its associate prerequisite expires. Each needs its own free renewal assessment.

In practice, take AZ-104 first. AZ-305 asks you to recommend designs, and you cannot judge a design well if you have never configured the pieces. If you are not there yet, start with our AZ-104 exam guide for India. The audience profile also expects experience with Azure development and DevOps processes. No developer certification is required, but you should know what an application team actually deploys.

What AZ-305 measures

The AZ-305 study guide lists four areas. Almost every objective starts with "Recommend", which tells you the exam is about choosing, not clicking.

Skill area	Weight	Typical decision
Identity, governance and monitoring	25 to 30%	Management group layout, log routing, secrets
Data storage	20 to 25%	Which database, which tier, how it scales
Business continuity	15 to 20%	Backup and recovery that meets RPO and RTO
Infrastructure	30 to 35%	Compute, app architecture, migration, network

Design identity, governance, and monitoring solutions (25 to 30%)

Logging and monitoring design, including where logs are routed; authentication, identity management and authorisation for Azure and on-premises resources; secrets, certificates and keys; management groups, subscriptions, resource groups and tagging; compliance; and identity governance. Expect to choose between managed identities and service principals, and between Azure Policy and role assignments for a given control.

Design data storage solutions (20 to 25%)

Relational storage, service tiers and compute tiers, scalability and data protection; semi-structured and unstructured storage that balances features, performance and cost; and data integration and analysis. Learn what pushes a design from Azure SQL Database to SQL Managed Instance, and when Cosmos DB beats both.

Design business continuity solutions (15 to 20%)

Backup and disaster recovery for compute, databases and unstructured data that meet stated recovery objectives, plus high availability for each. Know the difference between surviving a datacentre failure (availability zones) and surviving a regional failure (a second region).

Design infrastructure solutions (30 to 35%)

Compute choice (virtual machines, containers, serverless, batch), application architecture (messaging, events, API integration, caching, configuration, automated deployment), migrations using the Cloud Adoption Framework, and networks: internet connectivity, on-premises connectivity, performance, security, load balancing and routing.

Design thinking: how to read an AZ-305 question

AZ-305 questions are short consulting briefs. A requirement such as "minimise administrative effort", "the database must survive the loss of a zone" or "traffic must not cross the public internet" decides the answer. A method that works:

Underline the hard constraints first: compliance, recovery objectives, region, connectivity.
Strike out every option that breaks one. Usually two go immediately.
Among the rest, pick the simplest and cheapest design that meets all constraints. When both would work, the managed service is usually the intended answer.

The audience profile asks you to align designs with the Azure Well-Architected Framework and the Cloud Adoption Framework. Read the Well-Architected pillars once, then use them as a checklist on every practice question: reliability, security, cost optimisation, operational excellence and performance efficiency.

Designing for India: regions, pairs and data residency

Indian clients often ask the architect one question before any other: will the data stay in India? You should know the Indian regions without looking them up. From Microsoft's Azure regions list:

Region	City	Availability zones	Paired region
Central India	Pune	3	South India
India South Central	Hyderabad	3	Central India
South India	Chennai	None	Central India
West India	Mumbai	None	South India

Three design consequences:

Zone redundancy inside India is available in Central India and India South Central. For a zone-redundant design, start there, and check each service, because Microsoft notes that even in a region with zones some services may not support them.
The pairs are asymmetrical. Microsoft's region pairs page notes that West India pairs with South India, but South India pairs with Central India, and India South Central pairs with Central India, but Central India pairs with South India.
Every Indian region pairs with another Indian region. Geo-replication that follows the region pair keeps the secondary copy in India too, which simplifies a residency conversation.

Clients may also hand you regulatory requirements. This is general information, not legal advice; the client's compliance team decides what applies.

Payments: the Reserve Bank of India's payment data storage FAQ, based on its circular of 6 April 2018, says the entire data relating to payment systems must be stored in a system only in India. Processing abroad is allowed, but the data must come back within one business day or 24 hours, whichever is earlier.
Security logs: CERT-In's directions of 28 April 2022 require logs of ICT systems to be kept securely for a rolling 180 days within the Indian jurisdiction, with listed incidents reported within 6 hours. CERT-In's FAQ 35 adds that logs may be stored outside India if they can be produced to CERT-In in reasonable time. Our guide to CERT-In directions for IT teams goes further.

The exam will not name RBI or CERT-In. It tests the skill underneath: turning "data must stay in a country" or "keep logs for 180 days" into a region choice, a replication setting and a log retention design.

Case-study practice

Case studies are one of the question types Microsoft lists for its exams, and design scenarios suit them well. When you meet one, read the requirements and the questions first, then go back into the background for only what you need. Microsoft's exam experience page warns that if you take a break during a case study, you cannot return to any question you saw before the break, so plan breaks between sections.

Build your own case studies. Take a realistic Indian scenario, such as a lender moving a loan application system from an on-premises datacentre to Azure, and write a one-page design covering identity, data, recovery and network, with one sentence of reasoning for each choice. Then compare it with a reference architecture in the Azure Architecture Center. Three or four of these teach you more than a hundred memorised questions.

A six-week plan, once AZ-104 is done

Week	Focus	Output
1	Governance, identity, monitoring	Management group and policy design for a three-team company
2	Data storage and integration	Decision table: SQL Database, Managed Instance, Cosmos DB, storage tiers
3	Business continuity	Backup and DR design for stated RPO and RTO
4	Compute and application architecture	Same app designed on VMs, containers and serverless
5	Migration and networking	Hybrid network with private access to PaaS services
6	Case studies and practice assessment	Two self-written case studies, two timed practice runs

Keep a single "why" document: every time you pick one service over another, write the reason in one line. In the exam, that list is what you will be recalling.

How CertTulen Academy can help

CertTulen Academy, a Microsoft Training Services Partner, runs the AZ-305 Azure Solutions Architect Expert course as live, MCT-led online training built around design scenarios and case-study practice, and the AZ-104 Azure Administrator course for the prerequisite. Professional certification courses include an exam voucher, mock practice tests and lab access; each course page lists details and INR pricing. For a batch that suits your time zone, message us on WhatsApp at +91 93618 83583 or use our contact page.