Introduction

Azure Landing Zones provide a strategic foundation for your cloud adoption journey. They represent Microsoft’s recommended approach to setting up your Azure environment with proper governance, security, and operational excellence from day one.

What are Azure Landing Zones?

Azure Landing Zones are pre-configured environments that implement Microsoft’s Cloud Adoption Framework (CAF) best practices. They provide:

  • Governance - Policy-driven compliance and management
  • Security - Defense-in-depth security controls
  • Networking - Hub-and-spoke or Virtual WAN architectures
  • Identity - Centralized identity and access management
  • Operations - Monitoring, logging, and management at scale

Key Components

Management Groups Hierarchy

A well-structured management group hierarchy is the backbone of your Azure governance:

Tenant Root Group
├── Platform
│   ├── Management
│   ├── Connectivity
│   └── Identity
└── Landing Zones
    ├── Corp
    └── Online

Policy Framework

Azure Policy ensures consistent governance across all your subscriptions:

  • Enforce naming conventions
  • Require specific tags
  • Restrict VM SKUs
  • Mandate encryption
  • Control region deployment

Network Topology

Choose between two primary architectures:

Hub-and-Spoke

  • Central hub VNet for shared services
  • Spoke VNets for workloads
  • Azure Firewall or NVA for traffic inspection

Virtual WAN

  • Microsoft-managed hub infrastructure
  • Simplified global connectivity
  • Built-in routing and security

Implementation Approaches

1. Azure Portal Experience (ALZ Accelerator)

The quickest way to deploy a landing zone:

  • Guided UI experience
  • Pre-configured templates
  • Customizable options

2. Terraform

Infrastructure as Code approach:

module "enterprise_scale" {
  source  = "Azure/caf-enterprise-scale/azurerm"
  version = "~> 4.0"

  default_location = "eastus"
  root_parent_id   = data.azurerm_client_config.core.tenant_id
}

3. Bicep/ARM Templates

Native Azure approach for infrastructure deployment.

Best Practices

  1. Start with the Platform - Deploy platform subscriptions first
  2. Implement Policy Gradually - Begin with audit mode, then enforce
  3. Document Decisions - Maintain an architecture decision record
  4. Plan for Scale - Design for multiple business units and regions
  5. Automate Everything - Use CI/CD for landing zone deployments

Common Pitfalls to Avoid

  • Skipping proper planning phase
  • Ignoring network design considerations
  • Implementing too many policies at once
  • Not considering hybrid connectivity requirements
  • Overlooking cost management from the start

Conclusion

Azure Landing Zones are not just about technical implementation—they’re about establishing a foundation for sustainable cloud operations. By investing time in proper landing zone design and deployment, you set your organization up for long-term success in Azure.

Next Steps

In upcoming posts, we’ll dive deeper into:

  • Implementing custom Azure Policies
  • Designing network topologies for complex scenarios
  • Integrating security services into landing zones
  • Migration strategies for existing Azure environments

Have questions about Azure Landing Zones? Feel free to reach out or leave a comment below.