Web App Hosting with Azure App Service

# Web App Hosting with Azure App Service *This article is Part 1, Chapter 1.1 of the **AZ-204 Exam Refresher** series. In this section, we kick off the compute domain by mastering Azure App Service — the backbone of web and API hosting on Azure.* --- ## Introduction Every application needs somewhere to live. Before you reach for containers or functions, Azure App Service is often the right call: it's a fully managed PaaS that handles the OS patching, load balancing, and scaling infrastructure so you can focus on shipping code. For the AZ-204 exam, App Service is a substantial chunk of the compute domain. But beyond the exam, it's genuinely one of the most practical Azure services you'll use day-to-day — whether you're deploying a React frontend, a .NET REST API, or a Python microservice. --- ## Core Concepts ### App Service Plans Think of an **App Service Plan** as the rental agreement for the compute resources your app runs on. The plan defines the region, number of VM instances, and pricing tier. Multiple apps can share one plan. | Tier | Use Case | Key Features | |---|---|---| | **Free / Shared** | Dev/test only | No SLA, shared compute | | **Basic** | Low-traffic prod | Manual scale, custom domain | | **Standard** | Most production workloads | Autoscale, deployment slots, SSL | | **Premium v3** | High-performance, VNet integration | Larger VMs, private endpoints | | **Isolated v2** | Regulated / dedicated environments | App Service Environment (ASE), full isolat