Yes, Azure Databricks compute policies let you define “quota-like” limits, but only within Databricks, not Azure subscription quotas themselves. You still rely on Azure’s own quota system for vCPU/VM core limits at the subscription level.​

What you can limit in compute policies

Within a compute policy, you can enforce several limits that effectively act as quotas for end users:

• Max compute resources per user: A setting on the policy that caps how many clusters / compute resources a user can create with that policy; if the user exceeds it, new creations fail rather than auto‑terminating old clusters.​

• Max DBUs per hour (per compute): You can constrain attributes such as dbus_per_hour or use the policy UI “Max DBUs per hour” to cap the maximum cost/size of clusters or other compute created with that policy.​

• Instance count / size: Policy JSON can restrict node types and limit min/max worker counts, which indirectly limits per‑cluster capacity and spend.​

What you cannot do in compute policies

• No direct Azure quota management: Compute policies cannot change or define Azure subscription‑level quotas (vCPU, VM family limits, etc.); those are still managed through the Azure Portal and support requests.​

• No global spend cap: Policies do not act as a full tenant‑wide budget or cost cap; they only constrain compute created under each policy and do not terminate running resources when you tighten limits.​

Related: serverless quotas

For serverless compute, Azure Databricks also has serverless DBU/hour quotas enforced at the account/region level, which are separate from compute policies and managed via Azure support requests rather than policy JSON.​