Introduction
In this article, I will show a complete demo of deploying an ASP.NET 8 MVC application to Azure App Services. The flow is simple:
- Create a ready-to-use MVC project
- Create an Azure App Service from the Azure portal
- Connect the app service in Visual Studio publish settings
- Publish the project
There are multiple deployment methods for Azure App Service, but this guide focuses on Visual Studio's default publish workflow.
What Is App Service?
Azure App Service is an HTTP-based service for hosting web applications, REST APIs, and mobile backends. You can build in multiple stacks such as .NET, Java, Node.js, PHP, and Python, and run apps on Windows or Linux environments.
App Service also provides:
- Security and load balancing
- Auto-scaling and automated management
- CI/CD integration with Azure DevOps, GitHub, Docker Hub, and more
- Staging environments, custom domains, and TLS/SSL support
Read more in Microsoft's official documentation.
Create ASP.NET 8 MVC Application
As shown below, I created a simple ASP.NET 8 MVC application and added an extra paragraph for demo output.
When running the project locally, the output looks like this:
Create Azure App Service
Log in to the Azure portal: https://portal.azure.com/
On the home screen, you will often see a direct option to create App Services.
If it is not visible, search for App Services in the top search bar.
Open App Services and click Create. For this demo, select a basic Web App.
Basic Details
Provide the required project settings:
- Subscription: select the subscription where the app service will be created
- Resource Group: pick an existing group or create a new one
- Name of App Service: provide a unique service name (used in the domain)
- Publish: select Code for code-based deployment
- Runtime Stack: choose .NET 8 for this project
- Operating System: choose Windows or Linux
- Region: select your deployment region
- Windows Plan: pick an app service plan matching region and OS
- Pricing Plan: choose based on traffic needs (Free tier for demo)
These are enough to create the app service. Other tabs like database, deployment, and networking are optional and can be configured now or later.
Database
For this demo, no database is required, so this section is skipped.
Deployment
You can configure CI/CD so commits from GitHub or another source control system auto-deploy to App Service.
For this example, deployment settings are left unconfigured.
Networking
In networking settings, define whether your app should be publicly accessible.
If public access is turned off, users cannot access the app using the default public endpoint. This can be changed after creation.
Monitoring
Monitoring can be enabled to track app health, diagnostics, and other telemetry. This may add extra cost.
Tags
Tags are key/value pairs used to organize resources and improve management across environments.
Review and Create
Review all settings and click Create to provision your App Service.
After creation completes, click Go to Resource.
This opens the App Service dashboard with all configuration details.
Deploy Project on Azure App Service
There are many deployment options for App Service, including CI/CD, FTP, and Visual Studio publish. In this guide, deployment is done using Visual Studio by creating a publish profile.
Option 1: Import Publish Profile
First, download the publish profile from the Azure App Service overview page.
In Visual Studio, right-click the project and select Publish.
In the publish wizard, choose Import Profile and click Next.
Select the downloaded publish profile file and click Finish. A publish profile is added to the project.
Option 2: Add Publish Profile Using Azure Account
You can also fetch App Service details directly from Azure in Visual Studio.
First, sign in to Visual Studio with the Microsoft account that owns the App Service.
Then right-click the project and select Publish.
Select Azure and click Next.
Choose the appropriate App Service category. Since this demo uses Windows App Service, select Azure App Service (Windows).
Select the target App Service from your account and click Finish.
A new publish profile is created in the solution. Click Publish to deploy.
After successful publishing, Visual Studio shows deployment success. You can open the site from the Open Site button or copied URL.
The deployed app now runs on your Azure App Service domain.
Conclusion
In this guide, we walked through creating an Azure App Service and deploying an ASP.NET MVC app using Visual Studio publish profiles. With this workflow, you can quickly host your app online and streamline your deployment process.