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---
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title: What is Azure Load Balancer?
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titleSuffix: Azure Load Balancer
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description: Overview of Azure Load Balancer features, architecture, and implementation. Learn how the Load Balancer works and how to use it in the cloud.
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description: Get an overview of Azure Load Balancer features, architecture, and implementation. Learn how the service works and how to use it in the cloud.
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services: load-balancer
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author: mbender-ms
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ms.service: azure-load-balancer
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*Load balancing* refers to efficiently distributing incoming network traffic across a group of backend servers or resources.
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Azure Load Balancer operates at layer 4 of the Open Systems Interconnection (OSI) model. It's the single point of contact for clients. Load balancer distributes inbound flows that arrive at the load balancer's front end to backend pool instances. These flows are according to configured load-balancing rules and health probes. The backend pool instances can be Azure Virtual Machines or instances in a Virtual Machine Scale Set.
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Azure Load Balancer operates at layer 4 of the Open Systems Interconnection (OSI) model. It's the single point of contact for clients. The service distributes inbound flows that arrive at the load balancer's frontend to backend pool instances. These flows are distributed according to configured load-balancing rules and health probes. The backend pool instances can be Azure virtual machines (VMs) or virtual machine scale sets.
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A **[public load balancer](./components.md#frontend-ip-configurations)** can provide outbound connections for virtual machines (VMs) inside your virtual network. These connections are accomplished by translating their private IP addresses to public IP addresses. Public Load Balancers are used to load balance internet traffic to your VMs.
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A [public load balancer](./components.md#frontend-ip-configurations) can provide both inbound and outbound connectivity for the VMs inside your virtual network. For inbound traffic scenarios, Azure Load Balancer can load balance internet traffic to your VMs. For outbound traffic scenarios, the service can translate the VMs' private IP addresses to public IP addresses for any outbound connections that originate from your VMs.
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An **[internal (or private) load balancer](./components.md#frontend-ip-configurations)** is used in scenarios where private IPs are needed at the frontend only. Internal load balancers are used to load balance traffic inside a virtual network. A load balancer frontend can be accessed from an on-premises network in a hybrid scenario.
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Alternatively, an [internal (or private) load balancer](./components.md#frontend-ip-configurations) can provide inbound connectivity to your VMs in private network connectivity scenarios, such as accessing a load balancer frontend from an on-premises network in a hybrid scenario. Internal load balancers are used to load balance traffic inside a virtual network.
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:::image type="content" source="media/load-balancer-overview/load-balancer.png" alt-text="Diagram depicts a load balancer directing traffic.":::
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:::image type="content" source="media/load-balancer-overview/load-balancer.png" alt-text="Diagram that depicts a load balancer directing traffic.":::
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For more information on the individual load balancer components, see [Azure Load Balancer components](./components.md).
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For more information on the service's individual components, see [Azure Load Balancer components](./components.md).
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## Why use Azure Load Balancer?
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With Azure Load Balancer, you can scale your applications and create highly available services.
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Load balancer supports both inbound and outbound scenarios. Load balancer provides low latency and high throughput, and scales up to millions of flows for all TCP and UDP applications.
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Key scenarios that you can accomplish using Azure Standard Load Balancer include:
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With Azure Load Balancer, you can scale your applications and create highly available services.
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- Load balance **[internal](./quickstart-load-balancer-standard-internal-portal.md)** and **[external](./quickstart-load-balancer-standard-public-portal.md)** traffic to Azure virtual machines.
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The service supports both inbound and outbound scenarios. It provides low latency and high throughput, and it scales up to millions of flows for all TCP and UDP applications.
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- Pass-through load balancing which results in ultra-low latency.
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Key scenarios that you can accomplish by using Azure Standard Load Balancer include:
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- Increase availability by distributing resources **[within](./tutorial-load-balancer-standard-public-zonal-portal.md)** and **[across](./quickstart-load-balancer-standard-public-portal.md)** zones.
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- Load balance [internal](./quickstart-load-balancer-standard-internal-portal.md) and [external](./quickstart-load-balancer-standard-public-portal.md) traffic to Azure virtual machines.
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- Configure **[outbound connectivity](./load-balancer-outbound-connections.md)** for Azure virtual machines.
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- Use pass-through load balancing, which results in ultralow latency.
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- Use **[health probes](./load-balancer-custom-probe-overview.md)** to monitor load-balanced resources.
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- Increase availability by distributing resources [within](./tutorial-load-balancer-standard-public-zonal-portal.md) and [across](./quickstart-load-balancer-standard-public-portal.md) zones.
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- Employ **[port forwarding](./tutorial-load-balancer-port-forwarding-portal.md)** to access virtual machines in a virtual network by public IP address and port.
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- Configure [outbound connectivity](./load-balancer-outbound-connections.md) for Azure virtual machines.
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- Enable support for **[load-balancing](./virtual-network-ipv4-ipv6-dual-stack-standard-load-balancer-powershell.md)** of **[IPv6](../virtual-network/ip-services/ipv6-overview.md)**.
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- Use [health probes](./load-balancer-custom-probe-overview.md) to monitor load-balanced resources.
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- Standard load balancer provides multi-dimensional metrics through [Azure Monitor](/azure/azure-monitor/overview). These metrics can be filtered, grouped, and broken out for a given dimension. They provide current and historic insights into performance and health of your service. [Insights for Azure Load Balancer](./load-balancer-insights.md) offers a preconfigured dashboard with useful visualizations for these metrics. Resource Health is also supported. Review **[Standard load balancer diagnostics](load-balancer-standard-diagnostics.md)** for more details.
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- Employ [port forwarding](./tutorial-load-balancer-port-forwarding-portal.md) to access virtual machines in a virtual network by public IP address and port.
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- Load balance services on **[multiple ports, multiple IP addresses, or both](./load-balancer-multivip-overview.md)**.
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- Enable support for [load balancing](./virtual-network-ipv4-ipv6-dual-stack-standard-load-balancer-powershell.md) of [IPv6](../virtual-network/ip-services/ipv6-overview.md).
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- Move **[internal](./move-across-regions-internal-load-balancer-portal.md)** and **[external](./move-across-regions-external-load-balancer-portal.md)** load balancer resources across Azure regions.
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- Use multidimensional metrics through [Azure Monitor](/azure/azure-monitor/overview). You can filter, group, and break out these metrics for a particular dimension. They provide current and historic insights into performance and health of your service.
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- Load balance TCP and UDP flow on all ports simultaneously using **[HA ports](./load-balancer-ha-ports-overview.md)**.
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[Insights for Azure Load Balancer](./load-balancer-insights.md) offer a preconfigured dashboard with useful visualizations for these metrics. Resource Health is also supported. For more details, review [Standard load balancer diagnostics](load-balancer-standard-diagnostics.md).
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- Load balance services on [multiple ports, multiple IP addresses, or both](./load-balancer-multivip-overview.md).
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- Move [internal](./move-across-regions-internal-load-balancer-portal.md) and [external](./move-across-regions-external-load-balancer-portal.md) load balancer resources across Azure regions.
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- Load balance TCP and UDP flow on all ports simultaneously by using [high-availability ports](./load-balancer-ha-ports-overview.md).
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- Chain Standard Load Balancer and [Gateway Load Balancer](./tutorial-gateway-portal.md).
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### <a name="securebydefault"></a>Secure by default
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### <a name="securebydefault"></a>Security by default
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* Standard load balancer is built on the zero trust network security model.
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- Standard Load Balancer is built on the Zero Trust network security model.
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* Standard Load Balancer is secure by default and part of your virtual network. The virtual network is a private and isolated network.
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- Standard Load Balancer is part of your virtual network, which is private and isolated for security.
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* Standard load balancers and standard public IP addresses are closed to inbound connections unless opened by Network Security Groups. NSGs are used to explicitly permit allowed traffic. If you don't have an NSG on a subnet or NIC of your virtual machine resource, traffic isn't allowed to reach this resource. To learn about NSGs and how to apply them to your scenario, see [Network Security Groups](../virtual-network/network-security-groups-overview.md).
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- Standard load balancers and standard public IP addresses are closed to inbound connections, unless network security groups (NSGs) open them. You use NSGs to explicitly permit allowed traffic. If you don't have an NSG on a subnet or network interface card (NIC) of your virtual machine resource, traffic isn't allowed to reach the resource. To learn about NSGs and how to apply them to your scenario, see [Network security groups](../virtual-network/network-security-groups-overview.md).
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* Basic load balancer is open to the internet by default.
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- Basic Load Balancer is open to the internet by default.
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* Load balancer doesn't store customer data.
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- Azure Load Balancer doesn't store customer data.
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## Pricing and SLA
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For standard load balancer pricing information, see [Load balancer pricing](https://azure.microsoft.com/pricing/details/load-balancer/).
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Basic load balancer is offered at no charge.
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See [SLA for load balancer](https://aka.ms/lbsla). Basic load balancer has no SLA.
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For Standard Load Balancer pricing information, see [Load Balancer pricing](https://azure.microsoft.com/pricing/details/load-balancer/). For service-level agreements (SLAs), see the [Microsoft licensing information for online services](https://aka.ms/lbsla).
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Basic Load Balancer is offered at no charge and has no SLA.
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## What's new?
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Subscribe to the RSS feed and view the latest Azure Load Balancer updates on the [Azure Updates](https://azure.microsoft.com/updates/?category=networking&query=load%20balancer) page.
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## Next steps
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## Related content
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> [!div class="nextstepaction"]
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> [Create a public standard load balancer](quickstart-load-balancer-standard-public-portal.md)
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> [Azure Load Balancer components](./components.md)
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- [Create a public load balancer](quickstart-load-balancer-standard-public-portal.md)
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- [Azure Load Balancer components](./components.md)

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