This content originally appeared on DEV Community and was authored by Nagesh Raj
I scored 825/1000 on the AWS Solutions Architect Associate (SAA-C03) exam — but only after making every mistake in the book. Here’s what I wish I knew before wasting 40+ hours on useless study tactics.
1. The Exam is Scenario-Based (Not Fact Recall)
What I Thought: “I need to memorize every AWS service and its limits.”
Reality: 80% of questions are real-world scenarios like:
Your company needs a multi-region database with the lowest latency. Which service combo should you use?
Tip: Focus on use cases for:
S3 (storage tiers, lifecycle policies)
EC2 (instance types, spot vs. reserved)
RDS vs. DynamoDB (when to use each, key differences)
2. Skip These Low-Yield Topics
Wasted time on AWS Snowball, OpsWorks, and Mechanical Turk — zero questions on them.
Priority Topics:
High: VPC, IAM, S3, EC2, RDS, Lambda, EFS, FSx (Underrated!)
Medium: CloudFront, SQS/SNS, KMS, DirectConnect
Low: AWS Organizations, WorkSpaces
3. The “Rule of 5” for VPCs
VPC questions are 20%+ of the exam. Master:
- Subnets (public vs. private)
- NAT Gateway vs. Instance (cost vs. control)
- Security Groups (stateful) vs. NACLs (stateless)
- VPC Peering (no transitive routing!)
- Direct Connect vs. VPN (speed vs. cost)
4. EC2 Pricing Tricks
Spot Instances:
- Cheapest (up to 90% off) but can be terminated anytime.
- Use for stateless, fault-tolerant workloads (e.g., batch processing).
Reserved Instances:
- Save up to 75% if you commit to 1–3 years.
- Convertible RIs let you change instance types.
5. The 3-Step Exam Strategy
- Flag long questions (come back later).
- Eliminate 2 wrong answers first (can’t stress this enough).
- Watch for absolutes (“always”, “never” = usually wrong).
Final Tips:
Practice, Practice, Practice — The best and most effective way to guarantee a great score is to take as many practice tests as you can. Review the answers for questions you get wrong or just guessed.
You will feel nervous couple of hours before the exam, but trust your preparation and go for it! You got this! All the best :’)
This content originally appeared on DEV Community and was authored by Nagesh Raj