MicrosoftThe name change from 'Azure Active Directory' to 'Microsoft Entra ID' makes sense because AAD has nothing to do with Azure resources and little to do with Active Directory.
AAD is THE key component to everything Azure. It provides the tenant to attach subscriptions to. It provides the rights management for any Azure services (identities, service principals, roles) so that you can access or delegate access to services. Saying that is has "nothing to do with Azure resources" is completely false.
You're right in that AD and AAD has nothing to do with each other. They are built different and work entirely different. The one thing they have in common is that they are directory services. It made sense that they derived the name from the existing platform they have (AD) so that people can grasp the concept of that new cloud service immediately after reading the name. I agree that it is not always easy to explaing to laymen that they are very different things. But with Entra you still have to do all of the explaining, just other parts of it.
I don't believe the name change marks the end of the world, but I don't see a general improvement, just changes in what parts we professionals have to explain. Therefore I would have preferred to keep the established name, rather than change anything without having a net improvement.
