How do Workbooks differ from Azure Dashboards?

Azure Dashboards are simple pinboard-style layouts where you pin individual tiles from metrics, logs, and other Azure blades. Workbooks offer a richer authoring experience with parameterized queries, conditional logic, interactive drill-down, Markdown text blocks, and group layouts. Workbooks support cross-resource queries, template sharing via ARM templates, and version-controlled JSON definitions. Use Dashboards for quick at-a-glance monitoring with pinned widgets. Use Workbooks for interactive reports, runbook-style troubleshooting guides, and detailed analysis that require query parameterization and interactivity.

What parameter types are available in Workbooks?

Workbooks support several parameter types: Text (free-form input), Drop down (static or query-driven options), Subscription picker, Resource Group picker, Resource picker, Time Range, Interval, and Multi-value. Parameters can cascade — one parameter's value can filter the options in another. Query-based parameters run a KQL or ARG query and present the results as selectable options. All parameters can be referenced in subsequent queries using {paramName} syntax. This enables building highly interactive, reusable templates that adapt to the selected scope.

Azure Workbook Template Builder

MonitoringAzure

Build Azure Monitor Workbook templates with parameters, charts, and KQL queries.

Azure Monitor Workbooks Configuration

Build Azure Monitor Workbook template configs with parameters, metrics, queries, and visualizations.

Required Fields

nameresourceGroupdisplayNamesourceIdserializedData.items

{
  "name": "workbook-infra-overview",
  "resourceGroup": "rg-monitoring",
  "location": "eastus2",
  "displayName": "Infrastructure Health Overview",
  "description": "Comprehensive view of VM, AKS, and storage health with cost trends",
  "category": "workbook",
  "sourceId": "/subscriptions/00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000/resourceGroups/rg-monitoring/providers/Microsoft.OperationalInsights/workspaces/law-central-prod",
  "serializedData": {
    "version": "Notebook/1.0",
    "items": [
      {
        "type": "parameter",
        "name": "parameters",
        "parameters": [
          {
            "name": "TimeRange",
            "type": "timerange",
            "defaultValue": "P1D",
            "label": "Time Range"
          },
          {
            "name": "Subscription",
            "type": "subscription",
            "multiSelect": true,
            "label": "Subscription"
          },
          {
            "name": "ResourceGroup",
            "type": "resourcegroup",
            "dependsOn": "Subscription",
            "multiSelect": true,
            "label": "Resource Group"
          }
        ]
      },
      {
        "type": "metric",
        "name": "vmCpuMetric",
        "title": "VM CPU Utilization",
        "resourceType": "Microsoft.Compute/virtualMachines",
        "metrics": [
          {
            "namespace": "Microsoft.Compute/virtualMachines",
            "metric": "Percentage CPU",
            "aggregation": "Average"
          }
        ],
        "visualization": "timechart",
        "gridSettings": {
          "width": "50%"
        }
      },
      {
        "type": "query",
        "name": "failedDeployments",
        "title": "Failed Deployments (Last 24h)",
        "query": "AzureActivity | where TimeGenerated {TimeRange} | where OperationNameValue endswith 'write' | where ActivityStatusValue == 'Failed' | summarize FailedCount = count() by ResourceGroup, ResourceProviderValue, OperationNameValue | sort by FailedCount desc | take 25",
        "visualization": "table",
        "gridSettings": {
          "width": "50%"
        }
      },
      {
        "type": "query",
        "name": "aksNodeHealth",
        "title": "AKS Node Status",
        "query": "KubeNodeInventory | where TimeGenerated > ago(1h) | summarize arg_max(TimeGenerated, *) by Computer, ClusterName | project Computer, ClusterName, Status, KubeletVersion, KubeProxyVersion, OperatingSystem | sort by ClusterName, Computer",
        "visualization": "table",
        "gridSettings": {
          "width": "100%"
        }
      },
      {
        "type": "query",
        "name": "storageCapacity",
        "title": "Storage Account Capacity Trend",
        "query": "StorageBlobCapacity | where TimeGenerated {TimeRange} | summarize AvgCapacityGB = avg(Capacity / 1073741824.0) by bin(TimeGenerated, 1h), AccountName | render timechart",
        "visualization": "timechart",
        "gridSettings": {
          "width": "100%"
        }
      }
    ],
    "styleSettings": {
      "paddingStyle": "narrow",
      "spacingStyle": "narrow"
    }
  },
  "tags": {
    "hidden-title": "Infrastructure Health Overview",
    "environment": "production"
  }
}

Generated Output

Output will appear here...

About This Tool

Azure Monitor Workbooks provide a flexible canvas for creating rich interactive reports and dashboards that combine text, KQL queries, metrics, and parameters into a single shareable view. Workbook templates define reusable layouts with parameterized queries, chart visualizations (time charts, bar charts, grids, maps), conditional visibility, and dynamic content. Unlike simple dashboards, Workbooks support interactive elements — clicking a row in one grid can filter another visualization. The Workbook Template Builder helps you construct template JSON with parameters, query steps, and chart configurations for common monitoring scenarios.

When to Use This Tool

•Building workbook templates with subscription and resource group parameters that dynamically filter all downstream queries
•Creating multi-tab workbooks that combine resource health, performance metrics, and cost analysis in a single view
•Designing interactive troubleshooting guides with conditional steps that appear based on query results

Frequently Asked Questions

How do Workbooks differ from Azure Dashboards?: Azure Dashboards are simple pinboard-style layouts where you pin individual tiles from metrics, logs, and other Azure blades. Workbooks offer a richer authoring experience with parameterized queries, conditional logic, interactive drill-down, Markdown text blocks, and group layouts. Workbooks support cross-resource queries, template sharing via ARM templates, and version-controlled JSON definitions. Use Dashboards for quick at-a-glance monitoring with pinned widgets. Use Workbooks for interactive reports, runbook-style troubleshooting guides, and detailed analysis that require query parameterization and interactivity.
What parameter types are available in Workbooks?: Workbooks support several parameter types: Text (free-form input), Drop down (static or query-driven options), Subscription picker, Resource Group picker, Resource picker, Time Range, Interval, and Multi-value. Parameters can cascade — one parameter's value can filter the options in another. Query-based parameters run a KQL or ARG query and present the results as selectable options. All parameters can be referenced in subsequent queries using {paramName} syntax. This enables building highly interactive, reusable templates that adapt to the selected scope.

Related Learning Guides

Azure Monitor & Application Insights26 min read

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