AWS Cloud Practitioner Certification Exam Guide

We all know Amazon. Besides selling kitchenware and clothes, Amazon also offers a cloud computing platform called Amazon Web Services, more commonly abbreviated as AWS. It is the most popular cloud service provider and is much ahead of its competitors like Microsoft Azure and Google Cloud.

AWS currently caters to around one-half of the world's cloud needs, thus making this platform in great demand. AWS cloud practitioner certification assists individuals with essential cloud implementation services. This training covers most of the fundamental knowledge you should know when using the Cloud. AWS cloud practitioner training offers candidates and understanding of the AWS Cloud without letting them dive deep into the technicalities.

Being AWS certified does not essentially means that you are restricted to working with Amazon Web Services only or for the companies that use AWS services. This training is quite extensive and helps you establish your cloud computing expertise in the cloud industry as a whole.

A Comprehensive Exam Guide for AWS Cloud Practitioner Certification

An AWS certification establishes that you have specific knowledge, skills, and abilities for the required cloud job roles. AWS issues this credential once you successfully pass your AWS Certification Exam. This exam establishes your knowledge for the following tasks:

• Value of the AWS Cloud
• Understanding of the ASW shared responsibility model
• Determining practices for security
• Understanding cloud costs, economics, and billing practices
• Maintaining the core AWS services, along with computing network, databases, and storage
• To help identify AWS services for the most common use cases
• The certification shows that you are capable of various documentation, such as white papers for technical documentation

AWS Cloud Practitioner Certification Exam Pre-requisites

Candidates looking to pass this exam must have a basic knowledge of the AWS platform. You also must have:

• An experience of at least six months for AWS Cloud services
• Basic understanding of IT services and expertise in using them on the AWS cloud platform
• Knowledge of AWS core services and use cases
• The ability to estimate the effect of AWS services on an organization

Domains of AWS Cloud Practitioner Training

The AWS exam is divided into four domains:

Cloud Concepts (26%):

Under this domain, you will learn what cloud computing is and the differences between on-premises IT infrastructures and AWS Cloud. One of the essential things you will know is that how it works as an on-demand pricing module. That is, AWS offers 'pay as you go', where clients only have to pay for the resources they use.The pricing model is one of the significant differences, as with IT infrastructures, you have to pay upfront for all the services and network gear equipment. You also have to consider the maintenance cost. While with AWS Cloud services, you pay only for the services you use and do not have to worry about maintenance and equipment costs.

Security and Compliance (25%):

Securing the data on the Cloud is essential while running your infrastructure on the AWS Cloud. Here you will understand AWS shared responsibilities and compliance concepts. AWS offers many security-related services, including AWS Web Application Firewall (WAF), AWS Shield, and AWS Inspector. You will learn about each security level, its works, and how they differ from each other.You will be able to find resources about security concepts and services online and to identify how you can secure AWS Cloud infrastructure. AWS recommends utilizing resources with the 'Principle of Least Privilege.' This principle ascertains to provide access permissions for users with bare necessities required for their work. Always remember that AWS is responsible only for the security of the Cloud, while the users are responsible for security in the Cloud.

Technology (33%):

This is the most extensive AWS cloud practitioner certification exam domain, with almost one-third of the questions covering this domain. Under this domain, you will go through to deploy resources in the AWS Cloud, get familiar with the AWS global infrastructure, and understand the standard concepts of AWS.While defining the AWS global infrastructure, you need to learn methods of deploying and operating the AWS cloud. Apart from identifying core AWS services, you will go through the resources for technical support.

In short, this domain teaches everything from how to deploy resources in the AWS Cloud to Core AWS services. This training also focuses on the categories of Compute, Storage, Security, Networking, Content Delivery, and Databases.

Billing and Pricing (16%):

Shortest of all the four domains, you need to go through this domain to understand the various pricing models for AWS. The three most common charges that occur while using the AWS Cloud are Compute, Storage, and Data Out.The more data you need to transfer, the lesser you have to pay as an average per gigabyte of data transmitted. As for computing charges, users usually have to pay per hour costs, and for data storage and transfer, they need to pay per gigabyte of data.AWS offers resources like the AWS Cost Explorer, AWS Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) calculator, and AWS Simple Monthly Calculator. All these help customers estimate the costs associated with moving their IT infrastructure to the AWS Cloud. There is also a consolidated billing procedure, where you have one paying account to receive bills from multiple linked accounts as a single monthly bill, thus making an organization eligible for volume pricing discounts.

AWS Cloud Practitioner Certification Exam Overview

This is a foundation-level exam where you have to answer 50 questions in 90 minutes. You can take this exam online or at a testing center by paying USD 100 per attempt. You have to score at least 70% to pass this exam. Languages for this exam include English, French, German, Japanese, Italian, and Chinese.

There are two types of questions in the AWS exam.

• Multiple Choice Questions: These types of questions have only one correct answer, while three other answers are considered distractors, as they are incorrect.
•  Multiple Response Questions: The questions have two or more correct responses out of five or with more response options.

While providing your answers, you have to select one or more responses that best explain the question. Distractors or incorrect answers are meant to confuse candidates with incomplete knowledge or skill. Questions left unanswered are scored as wrong, while there is no negative marking for incorrect answers. Moreover, AWS Cloud Practitioner Certification Exam furthermore includes 15 unscored questions. These questions do not impact your overall score. AWS has designed this pattern to help them collect information for your performance on these unscored questions. They evaluate your answers to these questions as a reference for future use.

Exam Results: As stated earlier, the minimum passing score is 700 out of 1000. The exam is evaluated against a minimum standard established by AWS professionals in accordance with industry best practices and guidelines. Your total score shows how you performed in the exam as a whole.

Your exam report also contains a table of classifications of your performance over each domain. This information is provided as general feedback about your exam performance. The exam

features a compensatory scoring model, meaning that you need not score passing marks in each section but must pass overall.

Each section of the AWS exam has a specific number of questions and can have more questions than others. The scoring table allows you to go through general information highlighting your strengths and weaknesses in each domain. The feedback will help you work in the future on your skills accordingly.

Passing AWS Exam :

AWS recommends that an individual must have a minimum of six months of experience with AWS Cloud in any role. This will help them understand the terminology and explore all the study points required to understand the exam content.

There are many resources that can help you prepare for this exam. AWS has also published an exam guide, which you can download. This guide contains sample questions and white papers. You can also consider an excellent reputed training institute like Knowlathon that can help you prepare for your AWS cloud practitioner certification exam in an easy way. Knowlathon breaks down the exam into the respective domain areas and builds a study plan accordingly. Remember to focus on each domain. Despite the different percentages, each part is equally important and can affect your overall score.

Benefits of AWS Cloud Practitioner

Training AWS Cloud Practitioner Certification can help boost your career. If you are looking to find a new role or want to showcase your skills as a relevant individual in the technical area, this certification will certainly help you. AWS-certified individuals are in high demand these days, despite this being the fundamental credential.As an AWS-certified professional, you will have many perks and advantages and a higher salary. This certification not only offers you good pay but also opens the door to several other technical roles with even greater pay scales for your future. The average salary of an AWS Cloud Practitioner in India ranges between Rs 6.50 Lacs to 9.5 Lacs. AWS Certified Practitioner salary is considered one of the top ten highest-paid certifications in the U.S.