Azure Load Balancer

microsoftdocs/azure-load-balancer

Expert knowledge for Azure Load Balancer development including troubleshooting, best practices, decision making, architecture & design patterns, limits & quotas, security, configuration, integrations & coding patterns, and deployment. Use when configuring LB rules/probes, SNAT/outbound, VMSS backends, IMDS/metrics APIs, or DDoS/NSG protection, and other Azure Load Balancer related development tasks. Not for Azure Application Gateway (use azure-application-gateway), Azure Front Door (use azure-front-door), Azure Traffic Manager (use azure-traffic-manager), Azure Virtual Network (use azure-virtual-network).

3k tokens

context cost

the whole folder, loaded on every use

files

instructions only

copies elsewhere

how many repositories repackaged it

681

stars on the repo

on the repository, not the skill itself

Install

one command, takes just this skill from the repository

npx skills add https://github.com/MicrosoftDocs/Agent-Skills --skill azure-load-balancer

The instruction itself

12 sections, as written by the author

Azure Load Balancer Skill

This skill provides expert guidance for Azure Load Balancer. 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), 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-L44 | Diagnosing and fixing Azure Load Balancer issues: deployment errors, health events/logs, probes, connectivity/backend traffic, SNAT/timeouts, IMDS errors, and resource health/availability. |

| Best Practices | L45-L51 | Guidance on deploying Azure Load Balancer with VM scale sets, configuring inbound NAT, and building custom HTTP/HTTPS health probes (Python) using recommended best practices. |

| Decision Making | L52-L59 | Guidance on choosing the right Load Balancer SKU, upgrading Basic to Standard, migrating from AWS NLB, and moving from inbound NAT rules v1 to v2. |

| Architecture & Design Patterns | L60-L64 | Design patterns for traffic distribution and session affinity, plus guidance for configuring outbound internet connectivity and SNAT behavior with Azure Load Balancer. |

| Limits & Quotas | L65-L73 | Health probe tuning, SNAT port and outbound limits, TCP idle timeouts, and TCP reset behaviors/FAQs for Azure Load Balancer capacity and connection handling. |

| Security | L74-L79 | Securing Azure Load Balancer with NSGs and other controls, and enabling/configuring Azure DDoS Protection to defend against volumetric and protocol attacks. |

| Configuration | L80-L99 | Configuring Azure Load Balancer behavior: backends/frontends (including cross-subscription), rules, health probes, traffic distribution, outbound/SNAT, monitoring, and IPv6/DHCPv6 settings. |

| Integrations & Coding Patterns | L100-L108 | Code samples and patterns for probing health, reading load balancer/VM metadata via IMDS, and retrieving Azure Load Balancer metrics using CLI and REST APIs |

| Deployment | L109-L113 | Guides for deploying Load Balancers: replicating configurations across regions and automating upgrades from Basic to Standard using PowerShell. |

Troubleshooting

| Topic | URL |

|-------|-----|

| Interpret Azure Load Balancer health event logs | https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/load-balancer/load-balancer-health-event-logs |

| Monitor and alert on LoadBalancerHealthEvent logs | https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/load-balancer/load-balancer-monitor-alert-health-event-logs |

| Use metrics, alerts, and health to diagnose Azure Load Balancer | https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/load-balancer/load-balancer-standard-diagnostics |

| Test Azure Public Load Balancer frontend reachability | https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/load-balancer/load-balancer-test-frontend-reachability |

Best Practices

| Topic | URL |

|-------|-----|

| Configure inbound NAT rules for VM scale sets | https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/load-balancer/configure-inbound-nat-rules-vm-scale-set |

| Apply Azure Load Balancer deployment best practices | https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/load-balancer/load-balancer-best-practices |

| Use Azure Standard Load Balancer with virtual machine scale sets | https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/load-balancer/load-balancer-standard-virtual-machine-scale-sets |

Decision Making

| Topic | URL |

|-------|-----|

| Plan and execute upgrade from Basic to Standard Load Balancer | https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/load-balancer/load-balancer-basic-upgrade-guidance |

| Decide and migrate from inbound NAT rules v1 to v2 | https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/load-balancer/load-balancer-nat-pool-migration |

| Migrate AWS Network Load Balancer workloads to Azure Load Balancer | https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/load-balancer/network-load-balancing-aws-to-azure-how-to |

| Choose the right Azure Load Balancer SKU | https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/load-balancer/skus |

Architecture & Design Patterns

| Topic | URL |

|-------|-----|

| Choose Azure Load Balancer distribution modes | https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/load-balancer/distribution-mode-concepts |

Limits & Quotas

| Topic | URL |

|-------|-----|

| Configure and tune Azure Load Balancer health probes | https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/load-balancer/load-balancer-custom-probe-overview |

| Azure Load Balancer FAQs with limits and behaviors | https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/load-balancer/load-balancer-faqs |

| Understand SNAT port limits for Azure Load Balancer outbound | https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/load-balancer/load-balancer-outbound-connections |

| Configure TCP idle timeout and reset for Azure Load Balancer | https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/load-balancer/load-balancer-tcp-idle-timeout |

| Understand Azure Load Balancer TCP reset behavior | https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/load-balancer/load-balancer-tcp-reset |

Security

| Topic | URL |

|-------|-----|

| Apply security controls to Azure Load Balancer | https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/load-balancer/secure-load-balancer |

| Protect Azure Load Balancer with Azure DDoS Protection | https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/load-balancer/tutorial-protect-load-balancer-ddos |

Configuration

| Topic | URL |

|-------|-----|

| Configure Azure Load Balancer backend pools by IP | https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/load-balancer/backend-pool-management |

| Configure cross-subscription backends for Azure Load Balancer | https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/load-balancer/cross-subscription-how-to-attach-backend |

| Attach cross-subscription frontend IPs to Azure Load Balancer | https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/load-balancer/cross-subscription-how-to-attach-frontend |

| Create global load balancer with cross-subscription backends | https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/load-balancer/cross-subscription-how-to-global-backend |

| Configure cross-subscription internal Azure load balancer | https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/load-balancer/cross-subscription-how-to-internal-load-balancer |

| Configure outbound-only Azure Load Balancer with Bastion | https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/load-balancer/egress-only |

| Configure Azure Load Balancer traffic distribution mode | https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/load-balancer/load-balancer-distribution-mode |

| Configure DHCPv6 on Linux VMs for Azure IPv6 | https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/load-balancer/load-balancer-ipv6-for-linux |

| Configure Azure Load Balancer portal settings | https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/load-balancer/manage |

| Manage Azure Load Balancer backend admin state | https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/load-balancer/manage-admin-state-how-to |

| Configure and manage Azure Load Balancer inbound NAT rules | https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/load-balancer/manage-inbound-nat-rules |

| Configure Azure Load Balancer health probe settings in portal | https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/load-balancer/manage-probes-how-to |

| Configure Azure Load Balancer rule types and properties | https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/load-balancer/manage-rules-how-to |

| Configure monitoring for Azure Load Balancer with Azure Monitor | https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/load-balancer/monitor-load-balancer |

| Reference monitoring metrics and logs for Azure Load Balancer | https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/load-balancer/monitor-load-balancer-reference |

| Configure outbound rules for Azure Load Balancer SNAT | https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/load-balancer/outbound-rules |

Integrations & Coding Patterns

| Topic | URL |

|-------|-----|

| Implement custom HTTP/HTTPS health probes with Python for Azure Load Balancer | https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/load-balancer/create-custom-http-health-probe-howto |

| Use IMDS to retrieve Azure Load Balancer metadata | https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/load-balancer/howto-load-balancer-imds |

| Query load balancer and VM IPs via IMDS | https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/load-balancer/instance-metadata-service-load-balancer |

| Retrieve Azure Load Balancer metrics using Azure Monitor CLI | https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/load-balancer/load-balancer-monitor-metrics-cli |

| Query Azure Load Balancer metrics via REST API | https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/load-balancer/load-balancer-query-metrics-rest-api |

Deployment

| Topic | URL |

|-------|-----|

| Replicate Azure Load Balancer configuration across regions | https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/load-balancer/move-across-regions-azure-load-balancer |

| Automate Basic-to-Standard Load Balancer upgrade with PowerShell | https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/load-balancer/upgrade-basic-standard-with-powershell |

How to use it

Copy the folder

Take microsoftdocs/azure-load-balancer from the repository into ~/.claude/skills for personal use, or into .claude/skills inside a project.

Check the name does not clash

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