Azure Firewall logo

Azure Firewall

by Microsoft · Since 2018
No reviews yet
ActiveAvailable globallyOn-premise
Quick facts
VendorMicrosoft
Year launched2018
StatusActive
LocationRedmond, Washington US
Countries servedGlobal
Languages38
IntegrationsN/A
Free tierN/A
Free trialN/A
Contact salesYES

About Azure Firewall

Azure Firewall is a cloud-native network security platform from Microsoft that protects, monitors, and reports on the Azure Virtual Network resources. It combines global firewall security to help protect digital assets, threat intelligence-based filtering, and deployability to scale in minutes so users can respond quickly to evolving threats. This solution also provides visibility into firewall health and activity, ensuring optimal security. Key capabilities: global firewall security threat intelligence-based filtering quick deployment and scaling detailed monitoring and reporting integration with Microsoft Foundry Best for: enterprises that need reliable network security and monitoring in their Azure environments.

Azure Firewall stands out as a powerful cloud-native network security solution designed to safeguard resources across Azure Virtual Networks. Its stateful firewall architecture, combined with real-time threat intelligence, gives organizations strong protection against malicious traffic and emerging cyber threats. The platform’s ability to inspect encrypted traffic through advanced TLS inspection significantly boosts security, making it a suitable choice for environments where deep packet analysis is a priority. Additionally, its seamless scalability and centralized rule management make it easy for teams to handle large, distributed cloud infrastructures without sacrificing control or visibility. Despite its strengths, Azure Firewall comes with considerations that organizations must evaluate. Features such as TLS inspection and IDPS may introduce performance overhead, particularly in environments with heavy encrypted traffic. Its consumption-based billing model can also become costly during high-usage periods. Furthermore, complex deployments often demand specialized networking knowledge, which may not be readily available in smaller technical teams. Integrating multiple Azure services to unlock full functionality can add architectural complexity and increase operational costs.

Pros & Cons

Pros
  • Provides highly reliable stateful firewall protection with full session awareness for accurate traffic filtering.
  • Delivers real-time threat intelligence to proactively block malicious domains and IP addresses.
  • Automatically scales in the cloud to handle increased workloads without manual configuration.
  • Performs deep TLS inspection to detect malware hidden in encrypted traffic.
  • Centralizes security rule management across multiple virtual networks for simplified administration.
Cons
  • TLS inspection can cause performance overhead due to the resource-intensive decryption and re-encryption process.
  • Consumption-based billing may increase operational costs during periods of heavy network traffic.
  • Complex enterprise deployments may require specialized cloud networking knowledge for proper configuration.
  • TLS decryption may raise compliance concerns for organizations handling strictly confidential data.
  • Some advanced features need multiple Azure services working together, increasing architectural complexity.

Features

Key features

Stateful firewall service

Provides centralized, stateful inspection across Azure Virtual Networks

Threat-intelligence filtering

Blocks or alerts on traffic from known malicious IPs and domains

TLS inspection

Decrypts, inspects, and re-encrypts traffic to stop malware in encrypted sessions

Unified management

Centrally manages security rules across multiple virtual networks

Intrusion detection and prevention (IDPS)

Detects threats using signatures and can block attacks

Scalable cloud-native deployment

Easily deploys and scales without limits in Azure

Inbound and outbound traffic filtering

Controls access for all directions including hybrid networks

Additional features

Stateful firewall capability

Provides full stateful packet and application-level inspection

Threat-intelligence–based filtering

Uses Microsoft intelligence to detect and block malicious sources

High availability

Built-in redundancy ensures continuous protection

Unrestricted cloud scalability

Automatically scales to meet variable traffic loads

TLS inspection

Prevents malware transmission by examining encrypted connections

Centralized rule management

Applies consistent network and app rules across subscriptions and VNets

Hybrid connectivity protection

Secures traffic through Azure VPN and ExpressRoute gateways

Inbound and outbound filtering

Applies policies to all incoming and outgoing network flows

Spoke-to-spoke filtering

Controls traffic between internal Azure virtual network spokes

Outbound traffic decryption and scanning

Inspects user traffic before sending it to destinations

URL filtering and web categories

Allows or blocks websites by category (e.g., gambling, social media)

Real-time IDPS monitoring

Detects and optionally blocks threats on all ports and protocols

Encrypted-traffic inspection via TLS

Enables deeper inspection for protected traffic flows

Advanced threat protection

Uses Microsoft’s global threat signals to stop evolving risks and zero-day attacks

Compliance-ready security controls

Built for sensitive and regulated environments

Logging and monitoring

Generates logs and alerts for auditing and analytics

Simple deployment

Launches a firewall in minutes via Azure portal

Cost-effective billing model

Charges per-hour plus traffic-based consumption fees

Integration with Azure Firewall Manager

Provides centralized policy and route management

Works with Azure DDoS Protection

Enhances layered security with DDoS mitigation services

Pricing

Free trial
Free version
Request a quote
Promo Offer

Countries & Languages

Global
Countries served
38
Interface languages
14
Billing currencies

Interface languages

EnglishSpanishFrenchGermanItalianDutchPortugueseChinese (Simplified)Chinese (Traditional)JapaneseKoreanRussianTurkishArabicHindiIndonesianThaiVietnamesePolishSwedishNorwegianDanishFinnishGreekHebrewHungarianCzechSlovakSlovenianCroatianSerbianBulgarianRomanianUkrainianEstonianLatvianLithuanianMaltese.

Billing currencies

🇺🇸USD🇪🇺EUR🇬🇧GBP🇯🇵JPY🇦🇺AUD🇨🇦CAD🇨🇳CNY🇮🇳INR🇧🇷BRL🇷🇺RUB🇲🇽MXN🇰🇷KRW🇨🇭CHF🇸🇪SEK

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