This blog post series highlights the key announcements and major updates related to Azure Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) and Azure Local, as officially released by Microsoft in the past two weeks.
Azure
General
Perth Azure Extended Zone
Microsoft has announced the General Availability (GA) of the Perth Azure Extended Zone. Azure Extended Zones are small-footprint extensions of Azure placed in metro areas, industry hubs, or specific jurisdictions to support low-latency and data residency workloads. They offer a selection of services across virtual machines (VMs), containers, networking, storage, and other Azure capabilities, enabling latency-sensitive and throughput-intensive applications to run closer to end users while staying within data residency boundaries.
Networking
Default outbound access retirement date extended to March 31, 2026
Microsoft has extended the retirement date for default outbound access to March 31, 2026, replacing the previously communicated September 30, 2025 deadline and aligning the change with the broader Azure Virtual Network (VNet) updates. Starting on March 31, 2026, newly created VNets will default to using private subnets, meaning customers must configure explicit outbound connectivity (for example, through Azure NAT Gateway, User Defined Routes (UDR), or other outbound methods) to reach public internet endpoints or Microsoft services. Default outbound access will be disabled by default (but not removed), and environments that do not implement an outbound method may lose internet connectivity—particularly impacting Azure Batch pools and nodes configured with simplified node communication without public IP addresses. Microsoft recommends reviewing current Batch pool configurations and planning the deployment of an explicit outbound method ahead of the March 2026 deadline.
FIPS compliant mode for Application Gateway V2 SKUs
Azure Application Gateway v2 now supports Federal Information Processing Standard (FIPS) 140-2 mode, a US government standard that defines minimum security requirements for cryptographic modules in IT products and systems. FIPS mode can be enabled during deployment or at any time afterward; when enabled, the gateway uses only FIPS-compliant Transport Layer Security (TLS) policies (both predefined and custom), strengthening cryptographic posture and helping organizations meet security and compliance expectations such as those associated with the Federal Risk and Authorization Management Program (FedRAMP).
Azure Load Balancer bandwidth metrics now support Protocol dimension
Bandwidth metrics for Azure Load Balancer are now published with the metric dimension Protocol, providing more granular visibility into traffic characteristics. When viewing or retrieving Byte, Packet, and SYN Count metrics in the Azure portal, users can now filter and analyze results by protocol, where Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) traffic is identified as Protocol=6 and User Datagram Protocol (UDP) traffic as Protocol=17. This added dimension improves alerting, monitoring, and troubleshooting by making it easier to differentiate traffic patterns, and it is available across all Azure public regions, China cloud regions, and Government cloud regions.
Storage
Zonal placement for Azure file shares in Azure Files Premium LRS in select regions
Zonal placement for Azure Files Premium Locally Redundant Storage (LRS) is now Generally Available (GA) in select regions, providing explicit control over zone locality by pinning storage accounts to a specific availability zone. This capability helps customers build more resilient architectures with improved fault isolation and more predictable low-latency performance for mission-critical workloads. By aligning compute and storage within the same zone, deployments can achieve 10–40% lower latency compared to cross-zone configurations, while also enabling more consistent zone-aware design for higher availability.
Azure Blob Storage Secure File Transfer Protocol (SFTP) – Resumable Uploads
Resumable uploads for Azure Blob Storage Secure File Transfer Protocol (SFTP) are now Generally Available (GA). This feature allows users to resume file uploads from the point of failure after a partial transfer interruption by reopening the partially uploaded file and continuing to write the remaining content. The capability helps optimize transfer time and conserve network bandwidth, especially in environments with unreliable connectivity or when moving large datasets such as multimedia or seismic files. Azure Blob Storage SFTP supports multiple transfer modes for this feature—Write, Write + Create, and Append—to enable resuming uploads by continuing from a specific offset, creating the file if it does not exist, or appending data to the end of an existing file.
Azure Local
Azure Local: Features and improvements in 2511
Microsoft has released the November 2025 update for hyperconverged deployments of Azure Local, identified as version 12.2511.1002.502. Starting with release 2511, both new and existing Azure Local deployments run on the new Operating System (OS) version 26100.7171, introduced with the 2504 release, and the 2511 OS image is available for download from the Azure portal. Microsoft notes that deployments also require a driver compatible with OS version 26100.7171 (or Windows Server 2025); if a compatible driver is not available, customers can use the 2503 image. For customers who purchased Integrated System or Premier solution hardware from the Azure Local Catalog via a Microsoft hardware partner, the OS is expected to be preinstalled, and Microsoft recommends working with the Original Equipment Manufacturer (OEM) to obtain an OS image compatible with build 12.2511.1002.502 and a driver compatible with OS version 26100.7171 or Windows Server 2025. Build 12.2511.1002.502 also improves the reliability of deployment and update administrative actions, and both 12.2511.1002.5 and 12.2511.1002.502 remain supported (with no additional action required for environments already on 12.2511.1002.5). In addition, the release updates the platform to .NET 8.0.22 for both .NET Runtime and ASP.NET Core, and includes broader reliability improvements and bug fixes.
Conclusion
Over the past two weeks, Microsoft has introduced a slew of updates and announcements pertaining to Azure Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) and Azure Local. These developments underscore the tech giant’s unwavering commitment to enhancing its cloud offerings and adapting to the ever-evolving needs of businesses and developers. Users of Azure can anticipate improved functionalities, streamlined services, and enriched features as a result of these changes. Stay tuned for more insights as I continue to monitor and report on Azure’s progression in the cloud sphere.
