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How to Prepare for AWS Solution Architect Associate (SAA-C01)?

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AWS Certified Solutions Architect Professional Exam

AWS Solution Architect Associate (SAA-C01) is updated to SAA-C03.

AWS Solution Architect Associate

Cloud services are experiencing a swift global surge, whether utilized for information sharing or data storage. Among these services, Amazon Web Services (AWS) stands out as a prominently employed option, facilitating the development and deployment of diverse cloud-based applications. The attainment of AWS certification yields substantial growth advantages, benefiting both enterprises and individuals. Within this article, you will gain insight into the pros, curriculum, and suggestions pertinent to achieving the AWS Certified Solution Architect Associate certification.

Why Amazon Web Services?

In the contemporary landscape, numerous companies have unveiled their cloud services, sparking intense competition to secure the leading position. Amazon Web Services (AWS) has remarkably established itself as a premier cloud service provider, leaving a profound impact on both individuals and organizations. Debuting in 2006 with a significant 40% market share, AWS offers a gateway for organizations to employ programming models and databases, alongside hybrid capabilities. Prominent attributes of AWS encompass data encryption and a robust firewall system, ensuring the utmost security for files. Despite formidable rivals like Google Cloud, IBM, and Azure, AWS has diligently upheld its market reputation.

AWS Solution Architect Associate

The AWS Solution Architect Associate exam holds a distinguished position as one of the most sought-after certifications. It is meticulously tailored for professionals equipped with the prowess to fashion scalable and economically viable distributed systems on the AWS platform. This certification examination serves as a conduit for refining your expertise and understanding of leveraging AWS technologies for the seamless deployment of applications.

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Exam Eligibility

Eligibility criteria for AWS Solution Architect Associate exam is,

  • A prerequisite entails possessing a minimum of one year’s worth of experience in crafting AWS-based systems.
  • A proficient command of at least one programming language at an advanced level is essential.
  • Capability in delineating optimal strategies for AWS applications is a requisite.

Exam Pattern

The examination for AWS Solution Architect Associate comprises questions of the multiple-choice type.

This is divided into types of questions,

  • Multiple choice questions, in this you have select one correct option out of four options.
  • Multiple response questions, in this there can be multiple correct answers from the options given.
Official Amazon AWS Practice Questions

Exam Scoring

  • Test takers are required to choose one or more optimal responses from the provided options, aligning with the nature of the questions.
  • There is an absence of penalization for incorrect answers within the examination.
  • Unanswered questions will be considered as inaccuracies in the scoring.
  • Additionally, there may be content that holds no assigned score or is designated as non-scoring.

Exam Result

  • The exam’s scoring range spans from 100 to 1000 points.
  • To secure a passing grade, a minimum of 65% on a percentage basis is required.
  • The score report for the exam adopts a tabular format, detailing the performance of each section.
  • Notably, there is no stipulation regarding the passage of individual sections; emphasis rests on achieving the overall passing score.
  • Each section within the exam carries a distinct weight, as evidenced by the varying number of questions assigned to each.
  • The AWS Solution Architect Associate Exam adheres to a binary pass or fail outcome.
  • Scoring within the exam adheres to the minimal benchmarks set by AWS experts, in accordance with established best practices and guidelines.

Exam Retake Policy

Should you seek to undertake the certification exam again, a waiting period of 14 days between attempts is mandatory. There is no limitation to the number of attempts you can make until successful certification is attained. It’s noteworthy that a complete fee is requisite for each endeavor at the exam.

Exam Objective

Individuals in this exam are examined using the following structure,

  • Crafting solutions aligned with user requisites through the application of architectural design principles.
  • Formulating and implementing robust, well-secured applications utilizing AWS technologies.
  • Developing instructive implementation guidelines for project-related best practices within the organization.
  • Proficiency in designing economically efficient, expandable distributed systems on the AWS platform.

Exam Registration

Steps to register,

  • You have to sign in to aws.training.
  • After that click on Certification on the top.
  • Then click on AWS Certification account, Schedule new exam.
  • Check for the exam you want to take and click schedule at Pearson VUI button or PSI.

AWS Solution Architect Associate Certification Course Content or Domains

Domains covered in AWS Solution Architect Associate are,

Updated Course outline

  • Design Secure Architectures 30%
  • Design Resilient Architectures 26%
  • Design High-Performing Architectures 24%
  • Design Cost-Optimized Architectures 20%

Preparation

AWS Solution Architect Associate exam preparation can be done using free resources available online.

Reference Books

For AWS Solution Architect Associate exam there are many reference books which are available and some of them are,

  • AWS Web Services for Dummies: A Wiley Brand by Bernard Golden
  • AWS Basics: Beginners Guide by Gordon Wong
  • AWS Certified Solutions Architect Associate All-in-One Exam Guide by Joyjeet Banerjee
  • Amazon Web Services in Action by Andreas Wittig and Michael Wittig 
  • Learning AWS – Design, Build, and Deploy Responsive Applications using AWS Cloud Components by Aurobindo Sarkar and Amit Shah

Free Online Notes and Tutorials

There are many resources which are available online for the exam and 

Course Provider

There are many online training available for the exam which provide a full assistance to the course such as,

  • Simplilearn
  • Udemy
  • Pluralsight

Exam Q&A

Many websites have good information and topic related to the certification such as,

  • Answers.com
  • Quora
  • Stackoverflow

Practice sets

To enhance your readiness for the exam evaluations, practice sets can be employed for more effective preparation. These test resources offered by practice test providers furnish an assessment of your proficiency and understanding pertaining to the AWS Solution Architect Associate exam. You can explore practice sets available on Amazon to facilitate this process.

At Testprep Training you can have access to practice sets of questions on AWS Solution Architect Associate in two ways,

AWS Free Training

There are many free training that is provided by AWS for Solution Architect Associate exam at https://aws.amazon.com/training/. These training required registration and are available at zero cost.

AWS Architect Learning Path

AWS has designed Architect learning path for solution architect, solution design engineers and individuals who wants to learn designing applications and system on AWS. 

learning-paths_architect_combined.8aef9e5a292422b17411b2cec6d1009ea786e422

AWS Whitepapers

For AWS Solutions Architect Associate whitepapers are available at https://aws.amazon.com/whitepapers/?whitepapers-main.sort-by=item.additionalFields.sortDate&whitepapers-main.sort-order=desc

You can you this link to get free AWS whitepapers.

New AWS Certified Solutions Architect – Associate (SAA-C03) Exam Course Outline

Domain 1: Design Secure Architectures
Task Statement 1: Design secure access to AWS resources.

Knowledge of:

Skills in:

Task Statement 2: Design secure workloads and applications.

Knowledge of:

Skills in:

Task Statement 3: Determine appropriate data security controls.

Knowledge of:

Skills in:

Domain 2: Design Resilient Architectures
Task Statement 1: Design scalable and loosely coupled architectures.

Knowledge of:

Skills in:

  • Designing event-driven, microservice, and/or multi-tier architectures based on requirements (AWS Documentation: Event-Driven Architecture)
  • Determining scaling strategies for components used in an architecture design
  • Determining the AWS services required to achieve loose coupling based on requirements (AWS Documentation: Loosely Coupled Scenarios)
  • Determining when to use containers (AWS Documentation: Determining task size)
  • Determining when to use serverless technologies and patterns
  • Recommending appropriate compute, storage, networking, and database technologies based on requirements
  • Using purpose-built AWS services for workloads (AWS Documentation: Database)
Task Statement 2: Design highly available and/or fault-tolerant architectures.

Knowledge of:

Skills in:

  • Determining automation strategies to ensure infrastructure integrity (AWS Documentation: Protecting Compute)
  • Determining the AWS services required to provide a highly available and/or fault-tolerant architecture across AWS Regions or Availability Zones (AWS Documentation: Architecture guidelines and decisions)
  • Identifying metrics based on business requirements to deliver a highly available solution
  • Implementing designs to mitigate single points of failure (AWS Documentation: Withstand Component Failures)
  • Implementing strategies to ensure the durability and availability of data (for example, backups)
  • Selecting an appropriate DR strategy to meet business requirements (AWS Documentation: Plan for Disaster Recovery (DR))
  • Using AWS services that improve the reliability of legacy applications and applications not built for the cloud (for example, when application changes are not possible)
  • Using purpose-built AWS services for workloads (AWS Documentation: Database)
Domain 3: Design High-Performing Architectures
Task Statement 1: Determine high-performing and/or scalable storage solutions.

Knowledge of:

  • Hybrid storage solutions to meet business requirements (AWS Documentation: Hybrid Cloud Storage)
  • Storage services with appropriate use cases (for example, Amazon S3, Amazon Elastic File System [Amazon EFS], Amazon Elastic Block Store [Amazon EBS]) (AWS Documentation: Storage)
  • Storage types with associated characteristics (for example, object, file, block)

Skills in:

  • Determining storage services and configurations that meet performance demands (AWS Documentation: Storage Architecture Selection)
  • Determining storage services that can scale to accommodate future needs (AWS Documentation: Storage)
Task Statement 2: Design high-performing and elastic compute solutions.

Knowledge of:

  • AWS compute services with appropriate use cases (for example, AWS Batch, Amazon EMR, Fargate) (AWS Documentation: AWS Batch on AWS Fargate, Compute Services)
  • Distributed computing concepts supported by AWS global infrastructure and edge services (AWS Documentation: Global infrastructure)
  • Queuing and messaging concepts (for example, publish/subscribe) (AWS Documentation: Pub/Sub Messaging)
  • Scalability capabilities with appropriate use cases (for example, Amazon EC2 Auto Scaling, AWS Auto Scaling) (AWS Documentation: Amazon EC2 Auto Scaling)
  • Serverless technologies and patterns (for example, Lambda, Fargate) (AWS Documentation: Serverless)
  • The orchestration of containers (for example, Amazon ECS, Amazon EKS) (AWS Documentation: Orchestrating the containers)

Skills in:

  • Decoupling workloads so that components can scale independently (AWS Documentation: Event-Driven Architecture)
  • Identifying metrics and conditions to perform scaling actions (AWS Documentation: Monitor CloudWatch metrics)
  • Selecting the appropriate compute options and features (for example, EC2 instance types) to meet business requirements (AWS Documentation: Amazon EC2 Instance Types)
  • Selecting the appropriate resource type and size (for example, the amount of Lambda memory) to meet business requirements
Task Statement 3: Determine high-performing database solutions.

Knowledge of:

  • AWS global infrastructure (for example, Availability Zones, AWS Regions) (AWS Documentation: Global infrastructure)
  • Caching strategies and services (for example, Amazon ElastiCache) (AWS Documentation: Caching strategies)
  • Data access patterns (for example, read-intensive compared with write-intensive) (AWS Documentation: Best practices for Amazon RDS)
  • Database capacity planning (for example, capacity units, instance types, Provisioned IOPS)
  • Database connections and proxies (AWS Documentation: Using Amazon RDS Proxy)
  • Database engines with appropriate use cases (for example, heterogeneous migrations, homogeneous migrations) (AWS Documentation: Heterogeneous database migration)
  • Database replication (for example, read replicas) (AWS Documentation: Working with read replicas)
  • Database types and services (for example, serverless, relational compared with non-relational, in-memory) (AWS Documentation: Database)

Skills in:

  • Configuring read replicas to meet business requirements
  • Designing database architectures (AWS Documentation: Database Architecture Selection)
  • Determining an appropriate database engine (for example, MySQL compared with PostgreSQL) (AWS Documentation: Best practices for Amazon RDS)
  • Determining an appropriate database type (for example, Amazon Aurora, Amazon DynamoDB)
  • Integrating caching to meet business requirements
Task Statement 4: Determine high-performing and/or scalable network architectures.

Knowledge of:

  • Edge networking services with appropriate use cases (for example, Amazon CloudFront, AWS Global Accelerator) (AWS Documentation: Edge networking with AWS)
  • How to design network architecture (for example, subnet tiers, routing, IP addressing) (AWS Documentation: VPC with public and private subnets (NAT))
  • Load balancing concepts (for example, Application Load Balancer) (AWS Documentation: Application Load Balancer)
  • Network connection options (for example, AWS VPN, Direct Connect, AWS PrivateLink) (AWS Documentation: AWS Direct Connect)

Skills in:

Task Statement 5: Determine high-performing data ingestion and transformation solutions.

Knowledge of:

Skills in:

Domain 4: Design Cost-Optimized Architectures
Task Statement 1: Design cost-optimized storage solutions.

Knowledge of:

  • Access options (for example, an S3 bucket with Requester Pays object storage) (AWS Documentation: Using Requester Pays buckets for storage transfers and usage)
  • AWS cost management service features (for example, cost allocation tags, multi-account billing) (AWS Documentation: Using Cost Allocation Tags)
  • AWS cost management tools with appropriate use cases (for example, AWS Cost Explorer, AWS Budgets, AWS Cost and Usage Report) (AWS Documentation: Analyzing your costs with AWS Cost Explorer)
  • AWS storage services with appropriate use cases (for example, Amazon FSx, Amazon EFS, Amazon S3, Amazon EBS) (AWS Documentation: Storage)
  • Backup strategies (AWS Documentation: AWS Backup)
  • Block storage options (for example, hard disk drive [HDD] volume types, solid state drive [SSD] volume types) (AWS Documentation: Amazon EBS volume types)
  • Data lifecycles (AWS Documentation: Amazon Data Lifecycle Manager)
  • Hybrid storage options (for example, DataSync, Transfer Family, Storage Gateway)
  • Storage access patterns
  • Storage tiering (for example, cold tiering for object storage) (AWS Documentation: Using Amazon S3 storage classes)
  • Storage types with associated characteristics (for example, object, file, block) (AWS Documentation: Storage)

Skills in:

Task Statement 2: Design cost-optimized compute solutions.

Knowledge of:

  • AWS cost management service features (for example, cost allocation tags, multi-account billing) (AWS Documentation: Using Cost Allocation Tags)
  • AWS cost management tools with appropriate use cases (for example, Cost Explorer, AWS Budgets, AWS Cost and Usage Report) (AWS Documentation: AWS Cost Explorer)
  • AWS global infrastructure (for example, Availability Zones, AWS Regions) (AWS Documentation: Global infrastructure)
  • AWS purchasing options (for example, Spot Instances, Reserved Instances, Savings Plans) (AWS Documentation: Instance purchasing options)
  • Distributed compute strategies (for example, edge processing) (AWS Documentation: Amazon SageMaker Distributed Training Libraries)
  • Hybrid compute options (for example, AWS Outposts, AWS Snowball Edge) (AWS Documentation: Compute Services)
  • Instance types, families, and sizes (for example, memory optimized, compute optimized, virtualization) (AWS Documentation: Memory optimized instances)
  • Optimization of compute utilization (for example, containers, serverless computing, microservices)
  • Scaling strategies (for example, auto scaling, hibernation) (AWS Documentation: Warm pools for Amazon EC2 Auto Scaling)

Skills in:

  • Determining an appropriate load balancing strategy (for example, Application Load Balancer [Layer 7] compared with Network Load Balancer [Layer 4] compared with Gateway Load Balancer) (AWS Documentation: Elastic Load Balancing FAQs)
  • Determining appropriate scaling methods and strategies for elastic workloads (for example, horizontal compared with vertical, EC2 hibernation) (AWS Documentation: Best practices for EC2 Spot)
  • Determining cost-effective AWS compute services with appropriate use cases (for example, Lambda, Amazon EC2, Fargate)
  • Determining the required availability for different classes of workloads (for example, production workloads, non-production workloads) (AWS Documentation: Workloads)
  • Selecting the appropriate instance family for a workload
  • Selecting the appropriate instance size for a workload (AWS Documentation: Tips for Right Sizing)
Task Statement 3: Design cost-optimized database solutions.

Knowledge of:

  • AWS cost management service features (for example, cost allocation tags, multi-account billing) (AWS Documentation: Using Cost Allocation Tags)
  • AWS cost management tools with appropriate use cases (for example, Cost Explorer, AWS Budgets, AWS Cost and Usage Report) (AWS Documentation: AWS Cost Explorer)
  • Caching strategies (AWS Documentation: Caching strategies)
  • Data retention policies
  • Database capacity planning (for example, capacity units) (AWS Documentation: Read/write capacity mode)
  • Database connections and proxies (AWS Documentation: Using Amazon RDS Proxy)
  • Database engines with appropriate use cases (for example, heterogeneous migrations, homogeneous migrations) (AWS Documentation: Heterogeneous database migration)
  • Database replication (for example, read replicas) (AWS Documentation: Working with read replicas)
  • Database types and services (for example, relational compared with non-relational, Aurora, DynamoDB) (AWS Documentation: Database)

Skills in:

  • Designing appropriate backup and retention policies (for example, snapshot frequency)
  • Determining an appropriate database engine (for example, MySQL compared with PostgreSQL) (AWS Documentation: Best practices for Amazon RDS)
  • Determining cost-effective AWS database services with appropriate use cases (for example, DynamoDB compared with Amazon RDS, serverless)
  • Determining cost-effective AWS database types (for example, time series format, columnar format) (AWS Documentation: AWS Cloud Databases)
  • Migrating database schemas and data to different locations and/or different database engines (AWS Documentation: Best practices for AWS Database Migration Service)
Task Statement 4: Design cost-optimized network architectures.

Knowledge of:

Skills in:

  • Configuring appropriate NAT gateway types for a network (for example, a single shared NAT gateway compared with NAT gateways for each Availability Zone) (AWS Documentation: NAT gateways)
  • Configuring appropriate network connections (for example, Direct Connect compared with VPN compared with internet) (AWS Documentation: AWS Direct Connect FAQs)
  • Configuring appropriate network routes to minimize network transfer costs (for example, Region to Region, Availability Zone to Availability Zone, private to public, Global Accelerator, VPC endpoints)
  • Determining strategic needs for content delivery networks (CDNs) and edge caching (AWS Documentation: Working with Content Delivery Networks (CDNs))
  • Reviewing existing workloads for network optimizations (AWS Documentation: Optimize over time)
  • Selecting an appropriate throttling strategy (AWS Documentation: Throttle API requests for better throughput)
  • Selecting the appropriate bandwidth allocation for a network device (for example, a single VPN compared with multiple VPNs, Direct Connect speed) (AWS Documentation: Site-to-Site VPN single and multiple connection)

Exam Summary

The AWS Solution Architect Associate exam is primarily tailored for professionals possessing the expertise to create scalable and economically viable distributed systems on the AWS infrastructure. This certification encompasses comprehensive insights into AWS systems and the cloud platform.


Details about the exam,

Exam Code – SAA-C01

Exam Type – Associate

Exam Duration – 130 minutes

Exam Cost – USD $ 150

Exam Eligibility –    

  • Experience of 1 or more years in designing system on AWS.
  • Advanced level knowledge in at least one programming language.
  • Should be able to define best practices for AWS applications. 

Exam Format or Pattern of Questions –

  • Multiple-choice: Has one correct response and other are incorrect
  • Multiple-response: Has two or more correct responses out of available options

Exam Scoring – Scaled score from 100 to 1000

Passing score – 700

Exam Language – English, Japanese, Korean, and Simplified Chinese

Cracking AWS Certification Exam

Succeeding in the AWS certification exam demands more than just studying; it necessitates the development of a strategic approach to attain the certification. Successful clearance of this certification not only opens doors to advanced-level certifications but also amplifies your skill set. Several steps can greatly assist you in conquering the certification exam:

  • Step 1- Make a Blueprint
  • Prior to commencing your exam preparation, engage in research to acquaint yourself with AWS concepts and the exam’s pattern, including its optics. Subsequently, construct a chart organized by topics, delineating both your areas of strength and those requiring improvement.
  • Step 2- Check for websites providing AWS Certification
  • Numerous online platforms offer certifications and training programs to facilitate exam success.
  • For those constrained by budget considerations, certain websites offer complimentary question practice sets.
  • Additionally, these platforms often provide a free trial period allowing users to assess the training materials prior to full purchase.
  • Alternatively, individuals inclined towards self-study can opt to acquire an AWS certification book.
  • Step 3- Understands the concepts
  • This is the important part for passing the certification,
  • You need to visualize and understand the concepts instead of cramming it.
  • Try to get practical knowledge on the topics to get more information about it.
  • Step 4- Practice
  • Practicing on a daily basis will help you learn and understand the concepts more easily.
  • This will help you know about you weak areas and then you can give time to make that part strong.
  • After completing one topic, give it a revision and try to assess yourself on that topic.
  • Step 5- Be punctual
  • Make a schedule for studying and practicing questions. This will help you cover the topics quickly with giving time for practice. 
  • Step 6- Give the exam
  • After completion of the syllabus, take mock test and try to practice as many times as possible. Practice, understand and give the exam.

All the best.

Read How to crack AWS Cloud Practitioner certification?



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