Check gallery and scale-set compatibility before enabling image soft delete

Source facts

Compute Gallery soft delete is a preview for images, not VM application recovery. Its seven-day retention period cannot currently be changed. Microsoft excludes Flexible-orchestration scale sets and prevents enablement when gallery, definition, and version locations differ. A gallery or definition containing soft-deleted resources cannot be deleted. The feature also requires registration and API version 2024-03-03 or newer. Microsoft Learn.

Applicability

The preview is not supported in National Clouds. Evaluate it only under the organization’s preview policy and check the remaining platform limitations. Identify the gallery’s resource hierarchy, image consumers, and intended recovery object. Do not interpret image protection as coverage for VM applications or every scale-set design.

DSE recommendation

Inventory gallery locations and consuming scale-set orchestration before approving this preview protection. Have the recovery owner document excluded assets and choose a separate recovery approach for them. Review gallery cleanup procedures so a blocked parent deletion prompts investigation of retained children rather than an automatic permanent-delete step. Record the fixed recovery interval in the operating procedure.

Verification

On an eligible nonproduction gallery, rehearse the supported image deletion and recovery path with a disposable version. Verify the recovered image’s intended use and record the actual result. Inspect the soft-deleted inventory before any parent-resource cleanup. Treat permanent deletion and disabling protection as separately authorized decisions, not troubleshooting defaults, and preserve the compatibility review with the recovery evidence.

Official references

Microsoft Learn: Soft Delete in Azure Compute Gallery preview. Source reviewed September 9, 2026.