Do the “Managed Components” of Azure Virtual Desktop generate their own charge in the usage data (do they have individual MeterIDs) ?

Question

Hello,

Regarding the (customer side) managed components of Azure Virtual Desktop,
“Components that you manage” https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/architecture/example-scenario/wvd/windows-virtual-desktop#components-that-you-manage

do each of these components generate their own charge in the usage data (do they have individual MeterIDs) ?
Azure Virtual Network
Azure AD
Active Directory Domain Services
Azure Virtual Desktop session hosts
Azure Virtual Desktop workspace

If so, how can one differentiate the usage (charge) that resulted from using Azure Virtual Desktop? My customer is unable to find any resources relating to “Managed Component” when looking in Cost Management.

Do these “managed components” not generate a charge?

If they do generate a charge, where can one go to confirm?

Answer 1

Hi,

Out of the list, the one item that is guaranteed to have a cost associated with it is the session hosts. The session hosts are Virtual Machines, so will show up just like any other Azure VM for billing purposes. I'll do a quick review of each below

1. Azure Virtual Network--free, however, customer pays for bandwidth used as applicable. https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/pricing/details/virtual-network/
2. Azure AD--no additional cost for AVD. Customer may be using the Free version of Azure AD, or they may be paying directly or indirectly for one of the higher versions such as Premium P1 or Premium P2. https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/pricing/details/active-directory/
3. Active Directory Domain Services--this is part of Windows Server, so is not an Azure service. Depending on where the customer has their Active Directory Domain Controllers, there may be a charge for the virtual machines. For example, if their DCs are on premises, then there is no Azure-related charge (except perhaps network bandwidth or related). On the other hand, if their DCs are running on Azure virtual machines, then there would be charges for the virtual machines (and related like storage)
4. Azure Virtual Desktop session hosts--as mentioned above, these are virtual machines, so will have all normal charges associated for virtual machines such as compute, storage, bandwidth, etc. https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/pricing/details/virtual-machines/windows/
5. Azure Virtual Desktop workspace--there is no charge for this, it is part of Microsoft AVD infrastructure.

-TP