Instructions:

Enter your data in column C. Hover over cells

for help.
Column D will show the results ( number or
federation servers recommended ).

1. Estimate peak load on system:

During the peak system usage period, I expect this
percentage of my users to authenticate:
within the following period of time:

60%
1 hour

2. Enter information about applications:

Enter estimated number of internal applications (such
as SharePoint (2007 or 2010) or claims aware web
applications)

Enter estimated number of online applications (such

as Office 365 Exchange Online, SharePoint Online or
Lync Online)

3. Enter user counts by type:

Number of
Users

User type
Internal users (AD users authenticating with Windows
integrated authentication)
External users (AD users from your organization
authenticating with username and password through a
proxy hosted in a DMZ or perimeter network)
with home realm discovery? (y/n)

0
y

Users from partner organizations (accessing federated

applications hosted by your organization)
with home realm discovery? (y/n)
Users from a SAML 2.0 identity provider
-orActive Directory users authenticating to a SAML 2.0
relying party

0
y

Total number of federation servers recommended:

For sizing advanced scenarios, see raw data throughput values on the next sheet

0.60
3600

Number of
Federation Servers
Recommended

Example Scenario

AD FS will allow my AD users to authenticate to

SharePoint (2007 or 2010), custom (WIF based)
0.00 web applications, or Office 365

0.00
AD FS will allow my partners to authenticate to
SharePoint (2007 or 2010) or custom (WIF based)
web applications hosted by my organization.
0.00
AD FS will provide interoperability with a
federation product or application that uses the
SAML 2.0 protocol
0.00
0.00

put values on the next sheet

Raw data (throughput in req/s, used in calculations)

Home Realm Discovery
WSFederation Forms proxy
WSFederation Forms
WSFederation Windows
SamlP Forms proxy
SamlP Forms
SamlP Windows (Query) Request
SamlP Artifact Service + Resolution
WSTrust2005 Username/Password Mixed proxy
WSTrust13 Kerberos Mixed
WSTrust2005 Windows Transport
WSFederation Federation Provider
WSTrust13 Issued Token Mixed Symmetric SHA256

168
71
147
192
121
120
133
130
242
600
658
227
507

WSFederation Forms (behind proxy)

WSFederation Federation provider (behind proxy)

71
157

How to use the spreadsheet

To use the AD FS 2.0 Capacity Planning Sizing Spreadsheet:
1.Download and then open the spreadsheet, go to the "ADFS Calculator" tab.

2.In the cells under the label Estimate Peak Load on System, you will enter
characteristics of what you expect the peak load on your AD FS deployment to be.
First, click the cell labeled "During the peak system usage period, I expect this
percentage of my users to authenticate:" and select a percentage of users you would
expect to login during a "peak" timeframe. Next, in the cell labeled "within the
following period of time:" select a duration for that timeframe. For example, you may
estimate that 40% of your users will login within 15 minutes, or that 60% will login
within 1 hour. This defines the peak load profile for which your sizing recommendation
will be calculated.

3.In the cells beneath the label Enter information about applications, you will
enter the number of applications for which you expect to provide federated
authentication via AD FS. First, enter the number of applications internal to your
organization in numeric form, for example 1 or 5. Then, enter the number of online
(software as a service) applications in numeric form. For example, if you plan to use
SharePoint, Exchange, and Lync Online, enter 3.

4.In the Number of Users column, type a number on each row that applies to the
type of user and access method. This column should contain the number of defined
users, not the peak users per second. If access attempts made to the application must
first go through the home realm discovery page, type Y. If you are unsure of this
selection, type Y.

Result: The total number of recommended federation servers will appear in the lower
right cell. The number of servers required for each scenario will appear at the far right
on the corresponding row.

Configuration environment used during AD FS 2.0 testing

The number of federation servers that this spreadsheet will
recommend is based on the hardware and network specifications
that the AD FS product team used during testing. The team used
the following computer hardware, software and network
configuration to gather performance and scalability data in tests
of the federation server.
Dual Quad Core 2.27GHz (8 cores)
16GB RAM **

Windows Server 2008 R2, Enterprise Edition

Gigabit Network
The product team used the following configuration to gather performance and scalability data for the
Quad Core 2.24GHz (4 cores)
4GB RAM
Windows Server 2008 R2, Enterprise Edition
Gigabit Network
Note
Capacity recommendations for AD FS 2.0 servers can vary considerably, depending on
the specifications you choose for the hardware and network configuration used in a
given environment. As a point of reference, the sizing guidance provided in this
content is based on a utilization target of 80% on the computers specified above.
** Memory and disk space requirements for federation servers are modest, and they
are not likely to be a driving factor in hardware decisions. The estimates contained in
the AD FS capacity planning sizing spreadsheet can be used to estimate the
recommended number of federation servers with more moderate memory
specifications, such as 4 GB.

scalability data for the federation server proxy.