How to Import an Azure Service Bus Topic into Terraform

Import Azure Service Bus Topic with Terraback (recommended)

Terraback reverse-engineers your live infrastructure: it reads the Azure Service Bus resource with read-only credentials, generates the HCL, and produces the exact import block. Two commands take you from a live Azure Service Bus Topic to managed Terraform.

terraback scan all azure --subscription-id YOUR_ID

terraback azure import --method bulk

The Terraform import block

Terraback emits a Terraform 1.5+ import block like the one below. Because the block lives in your configuration, the import is reviewable in a pull request and repeatable across environments.

import {
  to = azurerm_servicebus_topic.events
  id = "/subscriptions/00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000/resourceGroups/prod-rg/providers/Microsoft.ServiceBus/namespaces/prod-sbns/topics/events"
}

Example azurerm_servicebus_topic configuration

Here is a realistic Azure Service Bus Topic block. Terraback generates a fuller version from your actual resource attributes; this is a minimal, valid starting point.

resource "azurerm_servicebus_topic" "events" {
  name         = "events"
  namespace_id = azurerm_servicebus_namespace.main.id
}

Gotchas when importing a Azure Service Bus Topic

• Provider 4.x uses namespace_id, not namespace_name/resource_group_name; the import ID nests under .../namespaces/<ns>/topics/<name>.
• Subscriptions on the topic are separate azurerm_servicebus_subscription resources, and their filters are azurerm_servicebus_subscription_rule resources.
• Topics require the Standard or Premium SKU; the Basic SKU supports queues only.
• enable_partitioning is immutable and only available on certain SKUs.

Doing it manually with terraform import

The native approach is to write the azurerm_servicebus_topic block by hand, then run terraform import azurerm_servicebus_topic.example <import-id> for every resource, one at a time. That works for a handful of resources, but it does not scale: you author all the HCL yourself and repeat the command for each item. Terraback generates the HCL and the import blocks for your whole account in one pass.

Import other Azure resources