Creating a subscription that can access GPU compute

Question

Hi, I've been back and forth with various support requests on this issue and somehow I haven't been able to resolve it. Hoping you can help.

I have compute credits through Microsoft for Startups, and I created a subscription that taps these credits. I've come to understand that I can't provision GPU compute with free credits - that's fine. I am happy to pay for GPU compute with a credit card or whatever is easiest. The support teams keep telling me to create a "pay-as-you-go" subscription to get access to GPU quotas, and I've tried to do this, but every time I create a new subscription with what I thought was pay-as-you-go status, I keep getting denied GPU quota due to being on a "benefits" account.

In short, I just want to pay you money to get access to GPU compute. How do I set up a subscription that allows me to do that.

Thank you,

Ryan

Answer 1

Hello Ryan,

Thank you for your patience, and I appreciate the detailed context you’ve provided — it really helped in identifying the root cause.

Based on our review, the behavior you’re experiencing is due to how subscriptions are classified under the Microsoft for Startups Founders Hub program. Subscriptions created within this program are treated as sponsorship/benefits subscriptions, and these are not eligible for GPU quota allocation. Even when a payment method is added or a new subscription is created under the same tenant, it may still inherit this classification — which is why your GPU quota requests are being declined.

To proceed with GPU-enabled compute, you will need to use a true Pay-As-You-Go (PAYG) subscription that is completely independent of the sponsorship enrollment.

Recommended Approach

The most reliable way to achieve this is:

• Create a new Azure account (using a different email address not associated with your current startup subscription).
• Set up a Pay-As-You-Go subscription with a valid credit card (standard Azure offer, not linked to any benefits program).
• Once the subscription is active, submit a GPU quota request from: Azure Portal → Subscriptions → Usage + quotas → Request increase

At that point, you should be able to request access to GPU VM families such as NC, ND, or NV series.

Reference Documentation

• Create a new Azure subscription: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/cost-management-billing/manage/create-subscription
• Azure VM quotas and quota requests: https://learn.microsoft.com/azure/virtual-machines/quotas
• Increase VM-family vCPU quotas: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/quotas/per-vm-quota-requests

Hope this helps! Please let me know if you have any queries.