Define your naming convention
A good name for a resource helps you to quickly identify its type, its associated workload, its environment, and the Azure region where it runs. To do so, names should follow a consistent format—a naming convention—that is composed of important information about each resource. The information in the names ideally includes whatever you need to identify specific instances of resources. For example, a public IP address (PIP) for a production SharePoint workload in the West US region might be pip-sharepoint-prod-westus-001.
Diagram 1: Example of components in an Azure resource name.
Note
Consider that not all Azure resources can follow the same patterns. Make sure you understand the limitations of the resource types you are working with.
To learn more, see Naming rules and restrictions for Azure resources.
Recommended naming components
When you construct your naming convention, identify the key pieces of information that you want to capture in a resource name. Different information is relevant for different resource types, and not all established naming components can be used for each resource type. Establish a standard naming convention for your environment that is easy to follow, concise, and useful for recognizing information that's relevant to the deployed resource.
The following list provides examples of naming components that are useful when you construct resource names:
| Naming component | Description |
|---|---|
| Organization | Top-level name of the organization, normally utilized as the top management group or, in smaller organizations, part of the naming convention. Example: contoso |
| Business unit or department | Top-level division of your company that owns the subscription or the workload that the resource belongs to. In smaller organizations, this component might represent a single corporate, top-level organizational element. Examples: fin, mktg, product, it, corp |
| Resource type | An abbreviation that represents the type of Azure resource or asset. This component is often a prefix or suffix in the name. For more information, see Recommended abbreviations for Azure resource types. Examples: rg, vm |
| Workload, application, or project | Name of a workload, application, or project that the resource is a part of. Examples: navigator, emissions, sharepoint, hadoop |
| Environment | The stage of the development lifecycle for the workload that the resource supports. Examples: prod, dev, qa, stage, test |
| Region | The region or cloud provider where the resource is deployed. Examples: westus, eastus2, westeu, usva, ustx |
| Instance | The instance count for a specific resource, to differentiate it from other resources that have the same naming convention and naming components. Examples, 01, 001 |
Naming considerations
In addition to defining the naming components, you must also consider the order in which the naming components are listed and what type of delimiters (if any) should appear between components. Also take into account the different naming rules that are associated with resources types.
Scope
All Azure resource types have a scope that defines the level of that resource. Also, a resource must have a unique name within its scope.
Scope levels for Azure resource names:
Global: Unique across all of Azure.
Example: Name of PaaS resources with public IP endpoints across all of Azure, because that name is the initial default public DNS name.
Resource group: Unique within the resource group.
Example: All virtual networks in a resource group must have a unique name for routing within that resource group.
Resource: Unique within the parent resource.
Example: All subnets within a virtual network must have unique names to avoid segment overlap.
Diagram 2: Scope levels for Azure resource names.
For example, a virtual network has the scope of a resource group, which means that there can be only one network named vnet-prod-westus-001 in a specific resource group. Other resource groups can also have virtual networks named vnet-prod-westus-001, but each resource group can have only one with that name. Subnets are scoped to virtual networks, so each subnet within a virtual network must have a distinct name.
Some resource names have a global scope, such as a name for a Platform as a Service (PaaS) that has a public endpoint or a virtual machine DNS label. A resource in a global scope must have a name that's unique across the entire Azure platform.
Azure naming rules
Azure naming rules vary depending on the resource type. It's important to understand naming rules for each resource type to avoid confusion and delays.
For example, resource names for different resource types might have different length limits. We recommend that you keep the length of naming components short or abbreviating names to prevent exceeding resource name length limits.
When you construct your naming convention, identify the key pieces of information that you want to reflect in a resource name. Different information is relevant for different resource types.
Recommendations:
- Understand naming rules and restrictions: Balancing the context of a name with its scope and length limit is important when developing your naming conventions. For more information, see Naming rules and restrictions for Azure resources.
- Use recommended resource abbreviations: Abbreviations can help you keep resource names within length limits and make them easier to read. For more information, see Recommended abbreviations for Azure resource types.
- Consider naming consistency for VMs: If you're working with VMs in Azure, we recommend keeping names consistent even though VM names in Azure can be longer than the allowed NetBIOS name of the VM. For more information and for other restrictions, see Naming conventions in Active Directory for computers, domains, sites, and OUs - Computer names.
- Use the Azure Naming Tool: The Azure Naming Tool is a tool that helps you generate names for Azure resources based on a naming convention. For more information, see Azure Naming Tool.
Example names
Consider these examples when you define your naming convention. The examples are based on the naming components and considerations that are described in this article.
The following examples are intended to provide visualization of a naming convention, but actual conventions vary by organization. For more examples, see the Azure Naming Tool.
Example names: General
| Asset type | Scope | Format and examples |
|---|---|---|
| Management group | Business unit and/or environment |
mg-<business unit>[-<environment>] mg-mktg mg-hr mg-corp-prod mg-fin-client |
| Subscription | Account / enterprise agreement | <business unit>-<subscription purpose>-<###> mktg-prod-001 corp-shared-001 fin-client-001 |
| Resource group | Subscription | rg-<app or service name>-<subscription purpose>-<###> rg-mktgsharepoint-prod-001 rg-acctlookupsvc-shared-001 rg-ad-dir-services-shared-001 |
| API management service instance | Global | apim-<app or service name> apim-navigator-prod |
| Managed identity | Resource group | id-<app or service name>-<environment>-<region name>-<###> id-appcn-keda-prod-eastus2-001 |
Example names: Networking
| Asset type | Scope | Format and examples |
|---|---|---|
| Virtual network | Resource group | vnet-<subscription purpose>-<region>-<###> vnet-shared-eastus2-001 vnet-prod-westus-001 vnet-client-eastus2-001 |
| Subnet | Virtual network | snet-<subscription purpose>-<region>-<###> snet-shared-eastus2-001 snet-prod-westus-001 snet-client-eastus2-001 |
| Network interface (NIC) | Resource group | nic-<##>-<vm name>-<subscription purpose>-<###> nic-01-dc1-shared-001 nic-02-vmhadoop1-prod-001 nic-02-vmtest1-client-001 |
| Public IP address | Resource group | pip-<vm name or app name>-<environment>-<region>-<###> pip-dc1-shared-eastus2-001 pip-hadoop-prod-westus-001 |
| Load balancer (external) | Resource group | lbe-<app name or role>-<environment>-<###> lbe-navigator-prod-001 lbe-sharepoint-dev-001 |
| Network security group (NSG) | Subnet or NIC | nsg-<policy name or app name>-<###> nsg-weballow-001 nsg-rdpallow-001 nsg-sqlallow-001 nsg-dnsblocked-001 |
| Local network gateway | Virtual gateway | lgw-<subscription purpose>-<region>-<###> lgw-shared-eastus2-001 lgw-prod-westus-001 lgw-client-eastus2-001 |
| Virtual network gateway | Virtual network | vgw-<subscription purpose>-<region>-<###> vgw-shared-eastus2-001 vgw-prod-westus-001 vgw-client-eastus2-001 |
| VPN connection | Resource group | vcn-<subscription1 purpose>>-<region1>-to-<subscription2 purpose>>-<region2>- vcn-shared-eastus2-to-shared-westus vcn-prod-eastus2-to-prod-westus |
| Route table | Resource group | rt-<route table name> rt-navigator rt-sharepoint |
| DNS label | Global | <DNS A record for VM>.<region>.cloudapp.azure.com dc1.westus.cloudapp.azure.com web1.eastus2.cloudapp.azure.com |
Example names: Compute and web
| Asset type | Scope | Format and examples |
|---|---|---|
| Virtual machine | Resource group | vm-<workload, application, or project>-<environment>-<###> vm-sql-test-001 vm-hadoop-prod-001 vm-sharepoint-dev-001 |
| Web app | Global | app-<workload, application, or project>-<environment>-<###>.azurewebsites.net app-navigator-prod-001.azurewebsites.net app-accountlookup-dev-001.azurewebsites.net |
| Function app | Global | func-<workload, application, or project>-<environment>-<###>.azurewebsites.net func-navigator-prod-001.azurewebsites.net func-accountlookup-dev-001.azurewebsites.net |
Example names: Databases
| Asset type | Scope | Format and examples |
|---|---|---|
| Azure SQL database | Azure SQL Server | sqldb-<workload, application, or project>-<environment> sqldb-users-prod sqldb-users-dev |
| Azure Cosmos DB database | Global | cosmos-<workload, application, or project>-<environment> cosmos-navigator-prod cosmos-emissions-dev |
| Azure Cache for Redis instance | Global | redis-<workload, application, or project>-<environment> redis-navigator-prod redis-emissions-dev |
Example names: Storage
| Asset type | Scope | Format and examples |
|---|---|---|
| Storage account (general use) | Global | st<workload, application, or project><###> stnavigatordata001 stemissionsoutput001 |
| Azure StorSimple | Global | ssimp<workload, application, or project><environment> ssimpnavigatorprod ssimpemissionsdev |
| Azure Container Registry | Global | cr<workload, application, or project><environment><###> crnavigatorprod001 |
Example names: AI and machine learning
| Asset type | Scope | Format and examples |
|---|---|---|
| Azure AI Search | Global | srch-<workload, application, or project>-<environment> srch-navigator-prod srch-emissions-dev |
| Azure OpenAI Service | Resource group | oai-<workload, application, or project>-<environment> oai-navigator-prod oai-emissions-dev |
| Azure Machine Learning workspace | Resource group | mlw-<workload, application, or project>-<environment> mlw-navigator-prod mlw-emissions-dev |
Example names: Analytics and IoT
| Asset type | Scope | Format and examples |
|---|---|---|
| Azure Analysis Services | Global | as<app name><environment> asnavigatorprod asemissionsdev |
| Azure Data Factory | Global | adf-<workload, application, or project>-<environment> adf-navigator-prod adf-emissions-dev |
| Azure Synapse Analytics workspaces | Resource group | synw-<workload, application, or project>-<environment> synw-navigator-prod synw-emissions-dev |
| Data Lake Storage account | Global | dls<workload, application, or project><environment> dlsnavigatorprod dlsemissionsdev |
| IoT hub | Global | iot-<workload, application, or project>-<environment> iot-navigator-prod iot-emissions-dev |
Example names: Integration
| Asset type | Scope | Format and Examples |
|---|---|---|
| Service Bus namespace | Global | sbns-<workload, application, or project>-<environment>.servicebus.windows.net sbns-navigator-prod.servicebus.windows.net sbns-emissions-dev.servicebus.windows.net |
| Service Bus queue | Service Bus | sbq-<workload, application, or project> sbq-navigator |
| Service Bus topic | Service Bus | sbt-<workload, application, or project> sbt-navigator |
Next step
A good next step is to look at recommended abbreviations for Azure resources. Abbreviations can help you keep resource names within length limits and make them easier to read.