How To Pass The AWS Solutions Architect Associate Exam (SAA-C02)
Have You been considering the AWS Solutions Architect Associate exam? Been putting it off for some time? Or have you just started working with AWS and now feel that it’s time for the exam? I passed the exam just before Christmas 2021… below is a list of things that I found useful and also some revision sites. I’ll also add up the total cost (with all revision material and the exam cost).
What Is The Exam
The Solutions Associate Exam is an Intermediate qualification provided by AWS. The exam covers a good range of topics and once completed you should be comfortable deploying applications to AWS.
The exam consists of 65 questions and you’ll have 130 minutes to answer them, all of the questions are multiple-choice answers. To pass you’ll need to gain 720 points (or 72%). The maximum you can score is 1000 points.
The exam will advise you that you should have a year’s worth of AWS experience before taking the exam. This will no doubt help, but I don’t personally believe it is mandatory. As long as you put plenty of effort into studying anyone can attempt the exam.
My Recomendations For Studying
Choosing which resources you use for study can be the difference between passing and failing. The resources I used are listed below.
Price = $35 per month or $47 per month for cloud labs
If you’ve got no cloud experience I’d highly recommend grabbing the $47 per month option, as this gives you access to an AWS sandbox, that you can practice some of the exercises in. This can help you remember things better for the exam. However, if you’ve done some cloud work before the $35 option will most likely suffice as you can always do testing in your own AWS account if required.
A Cloud Guru does also offer some practice exams. However, they are not the best in quality and tend to be fairly easy compared to the exam.
For better quality practice exams I’d recommend “Tutorials Dojo” (https://portal.tutorialsdojo.com/courses/aws-certified-solutions-architect-associate-practice-exams/)
These can normally be picked up for around $15 USD and are very high standard questions. They will be exactly like the real thing. Ensure you are reading all the reasons why the questions are wrong or even correct as this will help you to remember better and gain a better understanding of the technical concepts.
Time Management
This is always a big one, and really does tend to depend on the person and if you’ve had any prior experience. For me even with prior experience, it took me about 2 months to get ready and I was spending about 2 hours a night studying. This might come as a bit of a shock but even with some prior experience, the exam can be a challenge. It’s very unlikely you will have used all of the services you are going to be tested on,, so there will be some new stuff you need to learn.
If you are coming into the exam totally fresh with no experience at all I’d recommend giving yourself 4-3 months.
However, if you want to put more hours in then it’s possible to do it in a much shorter time. It’s really up to you. Just don’t overwhelm yourself.
Exam Tips
All of the questions will be multiple choice and you can *normally* exclude half of the options just by taking the time to read them. It can sometimes help to read the answers before you look at the question.
Always ask yourself, if the answer is technically correct but sounds really over-complicated to implement then it’s not the answer they are looking for.
Don’t rush, you’ve got 2 mins per question. It does not sound a lot but most people finish the exam with time to spare.
If you do finish with time to spare go over your answers.
The Total Cost
How much did it all cost me? Well, if you followed my exact steps then the total would be 269 USD
- 2 Months of A Cloud Guru Personal Plus Subscription 94 (2 * 47). This options includes lab access.
- Tutorial Dojo Pratice exams 15.
- A little budget for playing in AWS (optional) 10.
- The cost of the exam 150.
Next Steps
After completing the exam you should be fairly confident to be able to deploy and manage things in AWS. If you want to pursue this further then there is a “Solutions Architect Profesional Exam”. Or, a security speciality exam – this is what I’ll be aiming for this year and I’ll write up a guide once I’ve done it.
Good Luck if you plan on taking the exam, don’t panic, study hard and you’ll be fine.
