Create virtual machines in an availability zone using the Azure portal

Applies to: ✔️ Linux VMs ✔️ Windows VMs

This article steps through using the Azure portal to create highly resilient virtual machines in availability zones. Azure availability zones are physically separate locations within each Azure region that are tolerant to local failures. Use availability zones to protect your applications and data against unlikely datacenter failures.

To use availability zones, create your virtual machines in a supported Azure region.

Some users will now see the option to create VMs in multiple zones. If you see the following message, use the Preview tab below.

Screenshot showing that you have the option to create virtual machines in multiple availability zones.

  1. Sign in to the Azure portal.

  2. Click Create a resource > Compute > Virtual machine.

  3. Enter the virtual machine information. The user name and password or SSH key is used to sign in to the virtual machine.

  4. Choose a region such as East US 2 that supports availability zones.

  5. Under Availability options, select Availability zone dropdown.

  6. Under Availability zone, select a zone from the drop-down list.

  7. Choose a size for the VM. Select a recommended size, or filter based on features. Confirm the size is available in the zone you want to use.

  8. Finish filling in the information for your VM. When you are done, select Review + create.

  9. Once the information is verified, select Create.

  10. After the VM is created, you can see the availability zone listed in the Essentials section on the page for the VM.

Next steps

In this article, you learned how to create a VM in an availability zone. Learn more about availability for Azure VMs.