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azure-vm-scalesets

Expert knowledge for Azure Virtual Machine Scale Sets development including troubleshooting, best practices, decision making, architecture & design patterns, limits & quotas, security, configuration, integrations & coding patterns, and deployment. Use when configuring autoscale/standby pools, zone-balancing, disk encryption with Key Vault, or rolling upgrades, and other Azure Virtual Machine Scale Sets related development tasks. Not for Azure Virtual Machines (use azure-virtual-machines), Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS) (use azure-kubernetes-service), Azure Container Instances (use azure-container-instances), Azure App Service (use azure-app-service).

The English summary is being prepared. Showing the original description.

MicrosoftDocs/Agent-Skills

Works withAzure Kubernetes

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SKILL.md (original)

Review the instructions the agent will receive before you install.

Azure Virtual Machine Scale Sets Skill

This skill provides expert guidance for Azure Virtual Machine Scale Sets. Covers troubleshooting, best practices, decision making, architecture & design patterns, limits & quotas, security, configuration, integrations & coding patterns, and deployment. It combines local quick-reference content with remote documentation fetching capabilities.

How to Use This Skill

IMPORTANT for Agent: Use the Category Index below to locate relevant sections. For categories with line ranges (e.g., L35-L120), use read_file with the specified lines. For categories with file links (e.g., [security.md](security.md)), use read_file on the linked reference file

IMPORTANT for Agent: If metadata.generated_at is more than 3 months old, suggest the user pull the latest version from the repository. If mcp_microsoftdocs tools are not available, suggest the user install it: Installation Guide

This skill requires network access to fetch documentation content:

Preferred: Use mcp_microsoftdocs:microsoft_docs_fetch with query string from=learn-agent-skill. Returns Markdown.
Fallback: Use fetch_webpage with query string from=learn-agent-skill&accept=text/markdown. Returns Markdown.

Category Index

Category	Lines	Description
Troubleshooting	L37-L43	Diagnosing and fixing issues with VMSS instance mix, standby pools behavior, and autoscale (rules, scaling delays, capacity mismatches, and common error scenarios).
Best Practices	L44-L49	Configuring rolling upgrades for VM scale sets, tuning MaxSurge settings, and strategies to minimize downtime and maintain high availability during production updates.
Decision Making	L50-L67	Guidance on choosing VM scale set modes, availability, upgrade and autoscale strategies, Spot/Hybrid benefits, and cost/performance tradeoffs for different deployment scenarios.
Architecture & Design Patterns	L68-L73	Designing VM scale sets for high availability and low latency using automatic zone balancing and proximity placement groups for optimal placement and resilience.
Limits & Quotas	L74-L79	Scale set capacity, instance, and resource limits; placement group behavior; scaling constraints; and how limits affect deployment, availability, and distribution of VMs.
Security	L80-L91	Encrypting VMSS disks (CLI, PowerShell, ARM), configuring Azure Disk Encryption with Key Vault and extensions, and securing scale sets via Azure Policy and RBAC for standby pools.
Configuration	L92-L134	Configuring VM scale sets: templates, networking, disks, zones, upgrades, autoscale, standby pools, instance mix/protection, health/maintenance, and CLI/PowerShell/API management.
Integrations & Coding Patterns	L135-L140	Configuring VM scale set standby pools with Log Analytics for monitoring and integrating scale sets with Azure DSC extension for automated configuration management.
Deployment	L141-L147	Creating VM scale sets from generalized/specialized Shared Image Gallery images, migrating flexible sets to zonal, and deploying/rolling out applications to scale set instances

Troubleshooting

Topic	URL
FAQ and troubleshooting for VM scale set instance mix	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/instance-mix-faq-troubleshooting
FAQ and troubleshooting for VM scale set standby pools	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/standby-pools-faq
Troubleshoot autoscale issues in Azure VM scale sets	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/virtual-machine-scale-sets-troubleshoot

Best Practices

Topic	URL
Configure rolling upgrades for production scale sets	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/virtual-machine-scale-sets-configure-rolling-upgrades
Use MaxSurge rolling upgrades to improve uptime	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/virtual-machine-scale-sets-maxsurge

Decision Making

Topic	URL
Apply Azure Hybrid Benefit to Linux scale sets	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/azure-hybrid-benefit-linux
Migrate workloads to Flexible orchestration scale sets	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/flexible-virtual-machine-scale-sets-migration-resources
Decide when to use instance mix in VM scale sets	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/instance-mix-overview
Compare Uniform and Flexible VMSS APIs	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/orchestration-modes-api-comparison
Use Spot Placement Score to plan deployments	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/spot-placement-score
Balance Spot and standard VMs with Priority Mix	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/spot-priority-mix
Use standby pools to reduce VM scale set latency	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/standby-pools-overview
Use Spot VMs in scale sets for cost savings	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/use-spot
Select autoscale options for Azure VM scale sets	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/virtual-machine-scale-sets-autoscale-overview
Design and choose features for VM Scale Sets	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/virtual-machine-scale-sets-design-overview
Choose and configure fault domains for scale sets	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/virtual-machine-scale-sets-manage-fault-domains
Choose orchestration mode for Azure VM scale sets	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/virtual-machine-scale-sets-orchestration-modes
Choose upgrade policy modes for VM Scale Sets	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/virtual-machine-scale-sets-upgrade-policy
Choose availability zone options for VM Scale Sets	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/virtual-machine-scale-sets-use-availability-zones

Architecture & Design Patterns

Topic	URL
Use automatic zone balance for VM scale sets	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/auto-zone-balance-overview
Use proximity placement groups with scale sets	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/proximity-placement-groups

Limits & Quotas

Topic	URL
Reference limits and behaviors for VM Scale Sets	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/virtual-machine-scale-sets-faq
Understand placement groups and scale set capacity limits	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/virtual-machine-scale-sets-placement-groups

Security

Topic	URL
Create and encrypt VM Scale Sets via ARM	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/disk-encryption-azure-resource-manager
Encrypt VM Scale Set disks with Azure CLI	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/disk-encryption-cli
Sequence extensions for VMSS disk encryption	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/disk-encryption-extension-sequencing
Configure Key Vault for VMSS disk encryption	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/disk-encryption-key-vault
Enable Azure Disk Encryption for VM Scale Sets	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/disk-encryption-overview
Encrypt VM Scale Set disks with PowerShell	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/disk-encryption-powershell
Apply built-in Azure Policy to VM Scale Sets	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/policy-reference
Configure RBAC permissions for VM scale set standby pools	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/standby-pools-configure-permissions

Configuration

Topic	URL
Alert on Automatic Instance Repairs ServiceState changes	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/alert-rules-automatic-repairs-service-state
Define VM scale set configuration with ARM templates	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/flexible-virtual-machine-scale-sets-rest-api
Configure instance mix for Azure VM scale sets	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/instance-mix-create
Update instance mix settings on Azure VM scale sets	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/instance-mix-update
Inspect instance mix configuration on VM scale sets	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/instance-mix-view
Enable resilient create and delete for scale sets	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/resilient-vm-create-delete
Create and configure standby pools for VM scale sets	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/standby-pools-create
Retrieve standby pool and instance details for VM scale sets	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/standby-pools-get-details
Understand and query standby pool health state in VM scale sets	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/standby-pools-health-state
Get prediction results to size VM scale set standby pools	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/standby-pools-prediction-results
Configure Spot instances in VM scale set standby pools	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/standby-pools-spot-instances
Update or delete standby pools for Azure VM scale sets	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/standby-pools-update-delete
Configure attached data disks for VM Scale Sets	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/virtual-machine-scale-sets-attached-disks
Configure automatic instance repairs for scale sets	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/virtual-machine-scale-sets-automatic-instance-repairs
Configure automatic OS image upgrades for VMSS	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/virtual-machine-scale-sets-automatic-upgrade
Configure automatic zone placement for VM Scale Sets	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/virtual-machine-scale-sets-automatic-zone-placement
Change upgrade policy mode on existing scale sets	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/virtual-machine-scale-sets-change-upgrade-policy
Configure customer-selected zones for VM Scale Sets	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/virtual-machine-scale-sets-configure-customer-selected-zones
Sequence VM extensions in Azure scale sets	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/virtual-machine-scale-sets-extension-sequencing
Configure Application Health extension for scale sets	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/virtual-machine-scale-sets-health-extension
Understand and use instance IDs in scale sets	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/virtual-machine-scale-sets-instance-ids
Configure instance protection on VM Scale Sets	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/virtual-machine-scale-sets-instance-protection
Handle maintenance notifications for VM Scale Sets	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/virtual-machine-scale-sets-maintenance-notifications
Manage VM Scale Sets using Azure CLI commands	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/virtual-machine-scale-sets-manage-cli
Manage VM Scale Sets with Azure PowerShell	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/virtual-machine-scale-sets-manage-powershell
Reference custom images in scale set templates	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/virtual-machine-scale-sets-mvss-custom-image
Use existing virtual networks in VMSS templates	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/virtual-machine-scale-sets-mvss-existing-vnet
Configure guest-metric autoscale for Linux VM scale sets	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/virtual-machine-scale-sets-mvss-guest-based-autoscale-linux
Author basic ARM templates for VM Scale Sets	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/virtual-machine-scale-sets-mvss-start
Configure networking for Azure VM Scale Sets	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/virtual-machine-scale-sets-networking
Perform manual instance upgrades in VM Scale Sets	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/virtual-machine-scale-sets-perform-manual-upgrades
Reimage virtual machines in a scale set	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/virtual-machine-scale-sets-reimage-virtual-machine
Configure custom metrics for rolling upgrades	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/virtual-machine-scale-sets-rolling-upgrade-custom-metrics
Configure scale-in policies for Azure VM scale sets	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/virtual-machine-scale-sets-scale-in-policy
Define scaling profiles for Azure VM scale sets	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/virtual-machine-scale-sets-scaling-profile
Set upgrade policy mode on VM Scale Sets	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/virtual-machine-scale-sets-set-upgrade-policy
Enable terminate notifications for scale set instances	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/virtual-machine-scale-sets-terminate-notification
Modify VM Scale Set model and configuration via APIs	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/virtual-machine-scale-sets-upgrade-scale-set
Configure and manage zone balancing in scale sets	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/virtual-machine-scale-sets-zone-balancing

Integrations & Coding Patterns

Topic	URL
Integrate VM scale set standby pools with Azure Log Analytics	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/standby-pools-monitor-pool-events
Integrate VM Scale Sets with Azure DSC extension	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/virtual-machine-scale-sets-dsc

Deployment

Topic	URL
Create scale sets from generalized gallery images	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/instance-generalized-image-version
Create scale sets from specialized gallery images	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/instance-specialized-image-version
Migrate regional flexible scale sets to zonal	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/migrate-scale-set-flex-to-availability-zones
Deploy applications to VM Scale Set instances	https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/virtual-machine-scale-sets-deploy-app

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Install

Install with a command

npx skills add https://github.com/MicrosoftDocs/Agent-Skills --skill azure-vm-scalesets

Paste it into your terminal and run it (requires Node.js). You can choose which agents to install it for, such as Claude Code or Codex.

Ask your agent

Please install the following Agent Skill.
https://github.com/MicrosoftDocs/Agent-Skills/tree/main/skills/azure-vm-scalesets

First review SKILL.md and the bundled files and confirm there is nothing suspicious (such as sending data externally or reading credentials). Then place it in ~/.claude/skills/azure-vm-scalesets/ for Claude Code, or ~/.agents/skills/azure-vm-scalesets/ for Codex.

Send this text to Claude Code or Codex as is. It checks the contents before installing.

View source on GitHub

Repository: MicrosoftDocs/Agent-Skills
Stars: 787
Forks: 128
Category: DevOps
License: CC-BY-4.0
Original language: English
Last updated: Oct 19, 2026

A skill is a set of instructions and scripts for an agent. cccskills does not guarantee that skills are safe. Review the contents before you install.