๐ Azure Virtual Machine Scale Sets (VMSS) - Scaling Made Simple
May 15, 2025About 2 min
๐ Azure Virtual Machine Scale Sets (VMSS) - Scaling Made Simple ๊ด๋ จ
Load Balancing with Azure Application Gateway and Azure Load Balancer - When to Use Each One
Youโve probably heard someone mention load balancing when talking about cloud apps. Maybe even names like Azure Load Balancer, Azure Application Gateway, or something about Virtual Machines and Scale Sets. ๐ตโ๐ซ It all sounds important...but also a l...
Load Balancing with Azure Application Gateway and Azure Load Balancer - When to Use Each One
Youโve probably heard someone mention load balancing when talking about cloud apps. Maybe even names like Azure Load Balancer, Azure Application Gateway, or something about Virtual Machines and Scale Sets. ๐ตโ๐ซ It all sounds important...but also a l...
Okay - so weโve talked about horizontal scaling: adding multiple VMs to handle growing traffic. Sounds great, right?
But hereโs the thing: manually spinning up and configuring 5, 10, or 100 VMs... every time your app gets busy? Yeah, thatโs not fun ๐
Enter: Virtual Machine Scale Sets (VMSS)
VMSS is Azureโs way of automating horizontal scaling. Instead of creating each VM one by one, you define a template, and Azure takes care of the rest:
- How many VMs to start with
- How to configure them (OS, apps, settings) โ๏ธ
- When to add or remove VMs based on traffic ๐๐
A Simple Analogy ๐ง
Think of VMSS like a juice dispenser at a party:
- At first, it pours into 2 cups (VMs)
- If 10 guests show up? It starts filling 5 cups
- Party slows down? Back to 2 cups again
You never have to refill manually - the dispenser adjusts on its own. ๐
How It Works (Without the Jargon ๐)
- You set the rules: โIf CPU usage goes above 70%, add 2 more VMs.โ
- Azure watches traffic and adjusts the number of VMs automatically.
- All VMs are identical - like clones, all running the same app setup.
- It works with Azure Load Balancer to spread traffic across all these VMs smoothly.
Real-Life Example: Food Delivery App ๐๐ฑ
Youโve built an app where users order food. During lunch and dinner, traffic explodes.
With VMSS:
- You start with 3 VMs in the morning
- At 12PM, Azure sees high CPU usage, so it spins up 5 more VMs
- At 3PM, traffic drops, so Azure removes the extra VMs
You only pay for what you use. And users get a smooth experience - no delays, no crashes ๐๐พ
