Azure – automate VM start up and shutdown on a schedule

Hi there

in this article I’m covering how to save costs on your VM environment by scheduling a time to start and stop your VM on a schedule.

Create an Azure Automation account

go to Azure Portal home \ marketplace \ search for automation
create an azure automation account
give it a name:
finish the wizard
wait until the azure automation account is created and go to the resource

Create and publish a runbook

go to Azure Portal home \ marketplace \ search for automation
go to your azure resource group
select the azure automation account you created
click on runbooks
click on create a runbook “+”
give it a name, at resource type select Powershell and give it a descripton and click create
at the next screen “cmdlets”
paste the following code (powershell commands that’ll parse the VM name, Azure Resource group – where the vm is located and the parameters to start or stop the vm) than click save and publish

Param(
 [string]$VmName,
 [string]$ResourceGroupName,
 [ValidateSet("Start", "Shutdown")]
 [string]$VmAction
)
# Authenticate Azure Automation Account
$Conn = Get-AutomationConnection -Name AzureRunAsConnection
Add-AzureRMAccount -ServicePrincipal -Tenant $Conn.TenantID `
-ApplicationID $Conn.ApplicationID -CertificateThumbprint $Conn.CertificateThumbprint
# Start VM
IF ($VmAction -eq "Start") {
    Start-AzureRmVM -Name $VmName -ResourceGroupName $ResourceGroupName
}
# Stop VM
IF ($VmAction -eq "Shutdown") {
    Stop-AzureRmVM -Name $VmName -ResourceGroupName $ResourceGroupName -Force
}

Create your recurring schedule

under the runbook
select Schedules blade under Resources menu
you need to create two different schecules one to start and another to stop the vm daily:
- daily01 : starts the vm daily at 9 AM EST on my scenario
- daily02: stops the vm daily at 6 PM EST on my scenario