AWS Certified Solutions Architect Associate ( SAA-C02 ) — Some tips to pass the exam

As part of my strategy to scale up my cloud skills, I have recently completed my AWS Solution Associate Certification with flying colors. During my study, I have learned many new things about various AWS services. This article is my way of contributing back to the community.

This exam validates the ability to build secure and robust AWS solutions using architectural design principles based on customer requirements, strategically design well-architected distributed systems that are scalable, resilient, efficient, and fault-tolerant.

I went through many resources while preparing and I have curated the below tips that will help you get the best possible results.

1. Exam Prep Resources

There are a lot of AWS resources in the market. Go through the review and do some preview to find which course suits you the most.

I took the Udemy course “AWS Certified Solutions Architect Associate SAA-C02 [2022]” by Neal Davis. This course helped me to understand AWS services intuitively with better clarity. I liked the way how the instructor designed and delivered this course for SAA-C02. The theory session, hands-on, Exam Cram and Cheat-Sheets all awesome. With this course, I was able to set a clear boundary of what I need to exactly learn. Before purchasing this course, I had gone through “Ultimate AWS Certified Solutions Architect Associate 2022" Udemy course by Stephane Maarek. I liked and benefited using both courses.

2. Take Your Own Notes

You may not feel the need of taking notes at the beginning. As you progress, you will soon find yourself overwhelmed with information overload, failing to remember features or stuff that you’ve studied earlier. Though the courses usually come with PowerPoint slides or pdf, I still suggest to take your own notes that will help you better remember key points and concepts that are important to you. As many of the AWS services are interconnected each other, notes will help you to mentally connect and compare each other services in shortest possible time frame. Instead taking linear notes, making diagrams and MindMaps could be the best way for exploring AWS.

3. Statistics.

There are lot of statistical information like various EC2 Instance Types, default limits (number of subnets etc) per VPC. You no need to memorize all of them. Intuitive understanding is fine in most of the cases. All the exam questions are scenario based and I did not come across any questions about these statistics during practice exams or real exam.

The below statistics are helpful.

• EBS Volume Types — size, throughput, IOPS.
• S3 Storage class and life cycle rules.
• Min, max, default retention periods for services like SQS, RDS back up etc.
• Numbers of read replicas.
• Lambda service execution time, file size limitation.

4. Comparison of AWS Services

I found TutorialsDojo is quite useful. Comparison of AWS Services will help you to filter out any distractors while choosing more suitable answer. Apart from reading this, try comparing below as well.

• SQS and FireHose
• DataSync and AppSync
• S3 presigned URL and CloudFront signed URL. Though both are entirely different, this kind of similar naming would come as distractors.

5. Practice Exam

The practice tests would help you know what kind of questions and from which perspectives your knowledge will be tested in the real exam. This will help you to validate your exam readiness before going for actual exam.

You can find some of them on Udemy. I used the Practice Exam courses by Neal Davis, Stephane Maarek, Jon Bosco. These practice courses are equally good.

I suggest to go for actual exam only after getting above 80% consistent score with practice exams. As these practice exams are closer to actual exam in terms of complexity, this approach will increase the chance to pass the real exam in first attempt.

6. Get extra time

If you are not a native English speaker, you can get an extra 30 minutes. In the AWS training and certification site, click ‘Request Exam Accommodations’ and request for “ESL +30 MINUTES” (English as a second language). You MUST do it before you schedule your exam, otherwise, you will have to cancel and reschedule.

7. Use Medium

We can find many people sharing their experience with AWS and exam tips in Medium. I have benefited from many of those who shared their knowledge in this platform. It will be useful for you as well.

Final Thoughts

I have worn the “Developer” hat for many years in my professional career. I had used AWS services as part of my work. But this exam journey helped me to understand the Mechanical Sympathy to make much better decisions and bring more optimized solutions - “Understanding the Hardware Makes You a Better Developer”

Jeff Bezos has likened Amazon Web Services to the utility companies of the early 1900s. One hundred years ago, a factory needing electricity would build its own power plant but, once the factories were able to buy electricity from a public utility, the need for pricey private electric plants subsided. AWS is trying to move companies away from physical computing technology and onto the cloud. I am fascinated by zooming out to this big picture, after zooming in with multiple AWS services to the depth that this journey brought to me.

Thank you for reading. Good luck!