Last Updated on June 23, 2024 by Arnav Sharma
May 1, 2024
- General Availability: Azure IoT Edge v1.5.0 (LTS) release
- The latest Long-Term Support (LTS) version of Azure IoT Edge, v1.5, is now generally available. This release includes enhancements for managing and deploying IoT workloads on edge devices, ensuring stability and long-term support for production environments.
May 2, 2024
- General availability: Azure Governance Update – Management Groups
- Azure will start enabling the root management group for tenants that have not enabled it yet. This update leverages best practices for applying Azure Policy, reducing initial setup work for governance and policy enforcement.
May 3, 2024
- Public preview: Azure Virtual Network Manager user-defined route (UDR) management
- UDR management in Azure Virtual Network Manager is now in public preview. This feature allows users to define and manage custom routing behaviors at scale through configuration, simplifying the management of routing across large environments.
May 6, 2024
- General Availability: Microsoft Azure now available from new cloud region in Mexico
- Microsoft has announced the opening of its first hyper-scale cloud region in Mexico, expanding its global infrastructure to provide local customers with improved latency, data residency, and compliance capabilities.
- Azure Front Door log scrubbing of sensitive data is generally available
- Azure Front Door now supports the removal of sensitive data from access logs, enhancing security and compliance for web applications by preventing sensitive information from being logged.
- General Availability: Azure API Center
- Azure API Center is now generally available, providing a centralized solution to manage the challenges of API sprawl. It offers a unified inventory for seamless discovery, consumption, and governance of APIs, regardless of their type, lifecycle stage, or deployment location.
May 7, 2024
- General Availability: Azure Cosmos DB Data Explorer keyboard shortcuts
- Enhance productivity with new shortcut keys in Azure Cosmos DB Data Explorer, making it easier for users to navigate and manage their databases.
- General availability: Azure Cosmos DB API for MongoDB RU supports version 5.0 and 6.0
- Azure Cosmos DB for MongoDB now supports MongoDB versions 5 and 6, providing improved performance and new features for MongoDB-based applications.
- Public preview: Standby pools for Virtual Machine Scale Sets with flexible orchestration
- Standby Pools for Virtual Machine Scale Sets with Flexible Orchestration are in public preview. This feature reduces scale-out latency and increases performance by pre-warming instances, ensuring faster response times during scaling events.
- Azure Ultra Disk Storage is now available in Italy North
- Azure Ultra Disk Storage, known for its high performance and sub-millisecond latency, is now available in the Italy North region, supporting demanding workloads with enhanced storage capabilities.
- Generally Available: Azure Red Hat OpenShift v4.14 at install time
- Azure Red Hat OpenShift version 4.14 is now generally available at install time, offering new features and improvements for Kubernetes-based application development and deployment.
May 8, 2024
- Public preview: Initialization taints in AKS
- Node initialization taints are now available in Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS) to delay scheduling of workloads until node setup is complete, ensuring proper configuration before workloads are assigned.
- General Availability: Support for disabling Windows outboundNAT in AKS
- You can now manually disable Windows outboundNAT when creating new Windows node pools in AKS, giving more control over network configurations.
- Public Preview: NFS Azure Files volume mount support in Azure Container Apps
- Mount NFS file shares in Azure Container Apps to facilitate easier data sharing and persistent storage across container instances.
- General availability: Customer-managed keys on existing accounts
- Configure customer-managed keys for existing Azure Cosmos DB accounts to enhance security and compliance by managing encryption keys.
- Public Preview: SQL Server on Azure VM storage configuration deployment experience with support for Premium SSD v2
- Choose Premium SSD v2 with NVMe support for better performance and storage options on SQL Server on Azure Virtual Machines.
- General availability: Latest version of the TimeScaleDB extension on Azure Database for PostgreSQL – Flexible Server
- Enhancements for time-series data handling and improved performance with the latest TimeScaleDB extension.
- General availability: Latest PostgreSQL minor versions supported by Azure Database for PostgreSQL – Flexible Server
- Supports PostgreSQL minor versions 16.2, 15.6, 14.11, 13.14, and 12.18 for better database management and performance.
May 10, 2024
- Cloud Services (classic) deployment model is retiring on 31 August 2024
- Migrate to App Service Environment v3 by 31 August 2024, as the Cloud Services (classic) deployment model will be retired.
- General Availability of GPT-4 Turbo with Vision on Azure OpenAI Service
- GPT-4 Turbo with Vision, capable of processing both text and image inputs, is now generally available on Azure OpenAI Service. This multimodal model supports various industries with enhanced efficiency and innovation.
May 13, 2024
- Generally Available: Ubuntu 24.04 LTS for Azure Virtual Machines
- Ubuntu 24.04 LTS, the latest long-term support release from Canonical, is now available for Azure Virtual Machines, providing updated features and security enhancements.
- Public Preview: Azure Site Recovery support for Azure Trusted Launch VMs (Windows OS)
- Azure Site Recovery now supports Trusted Launch VMs, enhancing security and compliance for disaster recovery solutions.
- Public preview: Azure Application Gateway v2 Basic SKU
- A cost-effective Application Load Balancer solution for developers or small enterprises that do not require high scalability or advanced features.
- General availability: Azure Bastion Developer SKU
- The Bastion Developer SKU offers a cost-effective and streamlined version of the Bastion service, providing secure and seamless RDP and SSH connectivity to VMs.
May 14, 2024
- Public preview: Sensitive data protection for Azure Front Door Web Application Firewall
- Log scrubbing for Azure Front Door WAF is in public preview, protecting sensitive data by removing it from WAF logs.
- Introducing GPT-4o: OpenAI’s new flagship multimodal model now in preview on Azure
- GPT-4o, integrating text, vision, and audio capabilities, is now available in preview on Azure OpenAI Service. This multimodal model sets a new standard for generative and conversational AI experiences.
- Azure Front Door server variable enhancement generally available
- Supports capturing URL path and URL case transformation in rule sets and server variables, enhancing routing and request handling capabilities.
May 15, 2024
- The availability of Azure compute reservations will continue until further notice
- Azure compute reservation exchanges for Azure Virtual Machine, Azure Dedicated Host, and Azure App Service, initially planned to end on January 1, 2024, will continue until further notice.
May 16, 2024
- General availability: ExpressRoute Seamless Gateway Migration
- ExpressRoute customers can now deploy a second gateway to the Gateway Subnet, enabling a seamless migration to an Az-enabled Gateway SKU and upgrading Public IP configurations.
May 19, 2024
- Public Preview: Migrate virtual machine backups using standard backup policy to enhanced backup policy
- Azure Backup now supports migrating virtual machine backups from standard backup policies to enhanced backup policies, improving backup management and capabilities.
May 21, 2024
- GA Support for gRPC APIs in Azure API Management Self-hosted Gateway
- gRPC support in Azure API Management through the self-hosted gateway is now generally available, enabling seamless management of gRPC services as APIs.
- GA Azure OpenAI Emit Token Metric policy in Azure API Management
- The Emit Token Metric policy for Azure OpenAI is now generally available, allowing configuration of token usage metrics to be sent directly to Azure Application Insights.
- GA Import Azure OpenAI endpoints as APIs in Azure API Management
- Import Azure OpenAI endpoints as an API with a single click, streamlining the integration process.
- GA Azure OpenAI Token Limit Policy in Azure API Management
- Manage and enforce limits on API consumers based on their usage of OpenAI tokens.
- GA Improved Onboarding Experience on VS Code for Azure Logic Apps Standard
- Enhancements in the Logic Apps standard VS Code extension streamline the transition from cloud to local development environments.
- Public Preview: Azure Logic Apps Standard .NET 8 Custom Code Support
- Supports calling .NET 8 custom code in Logic Apps Standard, expanding built-in action capabilities.
- Public Preview: Azure Logic Apps Standard Support for Zero Downtime deployment scenarios
- Ensures continuous availability and responsiveness during updates or maintenance activities.
- Public Preview: Azure Logic Apps Standard Deployment Scripting Tools in VS Code
- Streamlines development, testing, and storage of Standard logic app workflows within VS Code.
- Public Preview: Azure Logic Apps Monitoring Dashboard for Workflow Monitoring, Troubleshooting, and Resubmissions
- UI dashboards for monitoring, diagnosing, and troubleshooting Logic Apps workflows.
- GA EDI capabilities in Azure Logic Apps Standard
- Supports processing B2B workloads with built-in operations for handling single and batched EDI messages.
- Public Preview: Azure Service Bus Enhancements
- Batch delete feature streamlines message management and improves operational efficiency.
- Public Preview: Azure Integration Account Enhancements
- Enhancements provide increased flexibility, resilience, and security in managing integration artifacts.
- Public preview: Dynamic sessions in Azure Container Apps
- Offers fast, ephemeral, sandboxed compute without managing infrastructure.
- Public Preview: Next-Gen Dashboards Experience in Azure Portal
- Adds a new dashboards experience within the Azure Portal, available in parallel with the current experience.
- Public Preview: Set Java log levels in Azure Container Apps
- Dynamically set Java application log levels in Azure Container Apps.
- Public Preview: Monitor apps with Java metrics in Azure Container Apps
- Use Azure Monitor to view Java metrics in Azure Container Apps.
- Generally Available: Azure Functions Support for HTTP Streams in Node.js
- Stream HTTP requests to and responses from Functions Apps.
- Generally Available: Azure Functions extension for Dapr
- Use Dapr’s cloud-native building block API with Azure Functions.
- Public Preview: Azure Functions Flex Consumption
- A new hosting plan providing fast scaling and networking features with a serverless billing model.
- Public preview: Get started with Azure Functions using Visual Studio Code for the Web
- Fully browser-based end-to-end development environment for Azure Functions, starting from the Azure Portal.
May 27, 2024
- Announcing General Availability of Graph Semantics in Kusto
- Enhances understanding of complex datasets and uncovers hidden patterns using graph semantics in Kusto.
- Azure Firewall: New Regions Availability
- Azure Firewall Basic, Standard, Premium, and Azure Firewall Manager are now generally available in four new regions.
- Public preview of the App Configuration Extension for AKS
- Manage Azure App Configuration Kubernetes Provider on AKS clusters via Azure Resource Manager.
- Azure portal now offers in-context observability for AKS object overviews
- View key performance metrics for AKS resources in context within the Azure Portal.
- Public preview: Managed Prometheus visualizations for Azure Monitor container insights
- Supports out-of-the-box visualizations using managed Prometheus.
- Preview: Windows gRPC support is now available on App Service
- gRPC support for App Service Windows is now in preview, facilitating the development of high-performance RPC services.
- Public preview: Azure Log Analytics enhances resilience with workspace replication across regions
- Enhances workspace resilience by enabling operation switch to another region if the primary region is not healthy.
- Expanding extensibility model to Pulumi in Azure Deployment Environments
- Integrates Pulumi for managing infrastructure in Azure Deployment Environments.
- Public preview: Azure Firewall integration in Microsoft Copilot for Security
- Helps analysts perform detailed investigations using natural language questions in Copilot for Security.
- Public preview: Azure Web Application Firewall (WAF) integration in Microsoft Copilot for Security
- Provides analysis of Azure WAF rules and attacks blocked, with natural language explanations.
- Public preview: Aspire dashboard support in Azure Container Apps
- Access the Aspire dashboard in Azure Portal for Azure Container Apps.
- Public preview: Azure Functions support for HTTP streams in Python
- Use HTTP streams in Python for processing large data streams and delivering dynamic content.
- Azure Static Web Apps offers new Dedicated plan in preview
- Enterprise-grade features for advanced use cases in Azure Static Web Apps.
- New Azure Event Grid capabilities support IoT solutions, event sources
- Additional support for Azure Event Hubs enables running existing Kafka workloads.
- Microsoft Dev Box introduces new ready-to-code and enterprise management capabilities
- New capabilities for developer productivity and enterprise management.
- Public Preview – Azure Compute Fleet
- Optimizes Azure compute resources across different VM types, availability zones, and pricing models.
- Public Preview Azure OpenAI Semantic Caching policy in Azure API Management
- Optimizes token usage by leveraging semantic caching for prompts with similar meanings.
- GA Circuit Breaker in Azure API Management
- Enhances the resilience of API environments with the circuit breaker feature.
- GA OData API type in Azure API Management
- Extends Azure API Management capabilities to include OData APIs, allowing standard API protections and OData-specific policies.
- GA Load Balancer in Azure API Management
- Allows creating backend pools and distributing load across multiple endpoints, enhancing the management of API integrations.
May 28, 2024
- Generally Available: Azure NetApp Files support for large volumes up to 500TiB in size
- Supports creating large volumes between 50TiB to 500TiB, providing enhanced storage capacity for data-intensive applications.
- General availability: Activity log alerts can now run in EU Data Boundary
- Ensures alert metadata and processing remain within the EU Data Boundary, enhancing data residency and compliance.
- General Availability: VM Hibernation for General Purpose VMs
- Hibernate VMs when not in use to save compute costs while persisting the in-memory state.
- General Availability: Azure API Center Extension for VS Code
- A new extension for Visual Studio Code to build, discover, try, and consume APIs in your API center, enhancing developer productivity.
May 29, 2024
- Public Preview: Kubernetes Metadata and Logs Filtering in Azure Monitor – Container Insights
- Gain richer context and improved visibility into Kubernetes workloads with metadata and logs filtering in Azure Monitor.
- General Availability: Azure NetApp Files backup
- Expands data protection capabilities with a fully managed backup solution for long-term snapshot archive, recovery, and compliance.
- Public preview: Azure Load Balancer health event logs
- Supports health event logs to identify and troubleshoot ongoing issues affecting load balancer resources.
- Generally Available: Azure Chaos Studio supports a new Pause Process fault for Windows virtual machines
- Supports a new Pause Process fault for Windows VMs, enhancing chaos engineering capabilities.
- Public preview: Advanced Container Networking Services for Azure Kubernetes Services (AKS)
- A suite of services for observability, security, and compliance in containerized applications, with Advanced Network Observability as the first feature.
- General availability: Azure NetApp Files support for large volumes up to 500TiB in size
- Supports creating large volumes between 50TiB to 500TiB for data-intensive applications.
- General availability: Activity log alerts can now run in EU Data Boundary
- Ensures alert metadata and processing remain within the EU Data Boundary, enhancing data residency and compliance.
- General Availability: VM Hibernation for General Purpose VMs
- Hibernate VMs to save compute costs while persisting the in-memory state.
- General Availability: Azure API Center Extension for VS Code
- A new extension for Visual Studio Code to build, discover, try, and consume APIs in your API center, enhancing developer productivity.
May 30, 2024
- Public Preview: Analyze data using Log Analytics Simple mode
- Azure Monitor Logs introduces Simple mode, allowing users to utilize Azure Monitor Logs in a simple, point-and-click experience, eliminating the need for KQL for most common use cases.
- Feature Update: Azure Action Groups
- Users of Azure Action Groups with the notification type Email Resource Manager Role may notice that different or more users are receiving notifications.
- Public preview: Azure Load Balancer now supports Admin State
- The new Load Balancer Admin State feature allows users to override health probe behavior on a per backend pool instance basis, making maintenance easier.
- Public preview: Azure NetApp Files support for Active Directory connection per NetApp account
- Now supports connecting a NetApp account to its own distinct Active Directory Forest and Domain, enabling multi-forest and multi-domain support.
- Azure Virtual Network Manager’s virtual network verifier is now in public preview
- The virtual network verifier feature allows users to check if their network policies allow or disallow traffic between Azure network resources.
- Public preview: Azure Bastion Premium
- The Premium SKU for Azure Bastion secures highly sensitive workloads with advanced monitoring and security features.