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The Microsoft Cloud Adoption Framework (CAF) is a structured roadmap that helps organizations successfully adopt Azure and integrate it into their existing IT environments. It provides best practices and guidance to help organizations make the right decisions for their business throughout the cloud journey.
How does the Cloud Adoption Framework work?
The Cloud Adoption Framework organizes Azure guidance into seven core methodologies that together guide an organization’s cloud journey. The foundational methodologies (Strategy, Plan, Ready, and Adopt) are sequential. They help you define business outcomes, prepare your organization and environment, and deploy workloads to Azure. These phases are where most organizations start and are revisited as cloud adoption matures. Once workloads are running in Azure, the operational methodologies (Govern, Secure, and Manage) define different aspects of your cloud operations that help ensure your Azure environment remains compliant, protected, and optimized over time.
| CAF methodology (phases) | Outcome | How |
|---|---|---|
| 🚀 1. Strategy | Cloud adoption aligned to business goals | Pap business drivers to cloud outcomes. |
| 📝 2. Plan | A plan for cloud adoption | Operating model, cloud skills, migration plan, and cloud cost estimation. |
| 🛠️ 3. Ready | An Azure environment ready for workloads | Azure purchasing, tenant setup, platform landing zone, application landing zones. |
| 🌐 4. Adopt | Workloads in Azure meeting business needs | Migrate, modernize, or build-cloud native workloads. |
| 🛡️ 5. Govern | Control workloads | Assess cloud risks and mitigate with Azure and Microsoft tools. |
| 🔒 6. Secure | Protect workloads | Apply security control with with Azure and Microsoft tools. |
| ⚙️ 7. Manage | Optimize workloads | Administer workloads with Azure and Microsoft tools. |
Why use the Cloud Adoption Framework?
The Cloud Adoption Framework is about adopting cloud technologies and integrating them into your business. It provides proven practices to govern, secure, and manage all workloads. It provides structured processes for migrating, modernizing, and building cloud‑native solutions. Throughout each stage of adoption, the framework guides you to the right tools, architectures, and other resources to help you achieve your organizational goals. The framework integrates with the Well-Architected Framework and Azure Architecture Center.
Who is the Cloud Adoption Framework for?
The Microsoft Cloud Adoption Framework serves organizations across all industries and scales pursuing strategic Azure cloud adoption. This framework adapts to your specific cloud maturity level, from initial Azure evaluation through advanced multicloud optimization strategies. It's designed for anyone in the organization responsible for technology adoption, whether that responsibility spans business strategy, technology governance, cloud integration, or day‑to‑day operations.
| Organization Type | How the framework accelerates success |
|---|---|
| Startups | Build cloud-native applications using best practices. Access Microsoft for Startups for Azure credits and technical resources. |
| Enterprise | Establish a governance foundation to control workloads at enterprise scale. |
Cloud Adoption Framework scenarios
The Cloud Adoption Framework has specific guidance aligned to common scenarios across our customer base.
| CAF Scenario | Purpose |
|---|---|
| AI agents | How and when to adopt AI agents |
| AI adoption | How to adopt AI (generative and nongenerative) |
| Azure Virtual Desktop | How to adopt Azure Virtual Desktop |
| Azure VMware Solution | How to adopt Azure VMware Solution |
| Cloud-Scale Analytics | How to do analytics in the cloud |
| Oracle on Azure | Run Oracle workloads on Azure. |
| SAP on Azure | How to run SAP workloads on Azure |