What is Azure Arc?

Cloud computing has revolutionised the way we store, manage, and process data. However, as more organisations move their workloads to the cloud, managing and monitoring these environments has become increasingly complex. 

This is where Azure Arc comes in, it allows you to manage, secure and monitor all your resources from a single control plane, no matter where they are.  In this post, we’ll explain what Azure Arc is, how it works and the practical ways it helps organisations simplify hybrid and multi-cloud management. 

What is Azure Arc?

Introduced in 2019, Azure Arc is a tool that extends Azure’s management capabilities to resources that aren’t hosted in Azure. This means you can manage on-premises servers, edge devices, and even resources in other cloud platforms using the same tools you already use in Azure.

For example:

• Want to apply Azure Policy to ensure your on-premises servers follow the same configuration rules as your Azure servers? Azure Arc makes it possible.
• Need to buy Extended Security Updates (ESUs) to cover an out of support on-prem server, Azure Arc lets you simplify that process and manage it all through the Azure Portal. 

In short, Azure Arc helps simplify your IT management. It lets you use familiar Azure tools to monitor, secure, and manage resources wherever they live, reducing the need for multiple management systems.

Azure Arc-Enabled Services

Azure Arc provides several services that let you manage resources outside of Azure in a unified way, whether they’re on-premises, at the edge, or in other cloud environments. Here’s an overview of the main Arc-enabled services:

1. Azure Arc–Enabled Servers

With Azure Arc-enabled servers, you can manage Windows and Linux machines hosted outside Azure just like native Azure servers. After installing a lightweight agent on your server, it appears in the Azure portal within a resource group. From there, you can monitor performance, apply security policies, and include the server in your governance and compliance workflows.

2. Azure Arc–Enabled Kubernetes

You can connect and manage Kubernetes clusters anywhere using Azure Arc. Registered clusters can participate in GitOps deployments using the open-source Flux tool, making it easier to standardise configuration across clusters. Arc also supports multiple certified Kubernetes distributions, so you can integrate clusters consistently regardless of where they run.

3. Azure Arc–Enabled Data Services

Azure Arc-enabled Data Services let you run Azure SQL Managed Instances or PostgreSQL on-premises, at the edge, or in other clouds. Using Kubernetes and your existing infrastructure, you can bring Azure data capabilities to your environment, enabling centralised management, updates, and scaling.

4. Azure Arc–Enabled SQL Server

Azure Arc can connect your SQL Server instances outside of Azure, giving you a single view of your SQL estate. You can see details such as version, edition, and run best practice assessments across all your servers to improve compliance and performance.

5. Azure Arc VM Management (including Azure Local)

With Azure Arc VM management, you can create and manage virtual machines that run on Azure Local environments, VMware vSphere, or SCVMM. This allows you to manage hybrid VMs using the familiar Azure portal, even when they’re outside the public cloud.

In summary Azure Arc-enabled services bring Azure management, security, and governance to resources wherever they live. Instead of juggling multiple tools for servers, Kubernetes, or databases across different environments, you can manage everything from a single, consistent control plane.

Benefits of Azure Arc

Azure Arc brings several key benefits for organisations managing hybrid and multi-cloud environments:

Simplified Management: Azure Arc consolidates management of resources that live outside Azure, including on-premises servers, Kubernetes clusters, and databases, into a single control plane. This reduces the need for multiple tools and lets IT teams monitor, configure, and manage resources consistently, wherever they are.

Consistent Security and Governance: You can apply Azure Policy, role-based access control (RBAC), and Defender for Cloud across all connected resources. This ensures that your non-Azure servers, clusters, and databases meet organisational and regulatory standards without having to manage them separately.

Enhanced Querying and Insights: With resources connected through Azure Arc, you can run queries in Azure Resource Graph Explorer to quickly answer questions like:

“Which SQL Servers are running on Linux?” or “Which servers are missing the latest security updates?” This makes auditing and reporting across hybrid environments much easier.

Run Azure Services Anywhere: Azure Arc allows you to run Azure data services, such as SQL Managed Instance or PostgreSQL, on-premises, at the edge, or in other clouds. This is useful when workloads need to stay close to other resources for performance or compliance reasons.

Extended Security Updates (ESU): For organisations still running older Windows Server or SQL Server versions, Azure Arc provides a way to receive Extended Security Updates on servers like Windows Server 2012 or SQL Server 2012, helping maintain security and compliance while planning migrations.

Conclusion

Azure Arc has become a key part of hybrid and multi-cloud management, allowing you to extend Azure’s tools and services to any infrastructure, whether on-premises, at the edge, or in other clouds. By connecting your servers, Kubernetes clusters, and databases to Azure, you gain a unified management experience with consistent security, governance, and monitoring across your entire environment.

Starting small is easy: you can connect just a single server or cluster and explore how Azure Arc helps simplify management and improve visibility. To get hands-on, check out my guides on registering and managing Linux servers with Azure Arc or onboarding a Windows Server to Azure Arc.

With Azure Arc, hybrid and multi-cloud environments are no longer fragmented, they can be managed with the same tools and confidence you already use in Azure.