- A
AWS Trusted Advisor
Why wrong: AWS Trusted Advisor provides best-practice checks including cost optimization, but its checks for underutilized instances are based on simple thresholds, not machine learning. It does not provide per-instance right-sizing recommendations with savings estimates.
- B
AWS Cost Explorer
Why wrong: AWS Cost Explorer provides cost and usage reports, as well as Reserved Instance and Savings Plan recommendations. It does not recommend downsizing existing On-Demand instances.
- C
AWS Compute Optimizer
Correct. AWS Compute Optimizer uses ML to analyze utilization patterns and recommends optimal instance types and sizes, including downsizing opportunities, along with estimated savings.
- D
AWS Budgets
Why wrong: AWS Budgets allows you to set cost or usage thresholds and receive alerts. It does not analyze resource utilization or provide right-sizing recommendations.
AWS Compute Optimizer: Automated Right-Sizing and Savings Estimates
This CLF-C02 practice question tests your understanding of billing, pricing, and support. Match the stated requirement to the specific cloud service, access model, or configuration option — many options are valid in isolation but not for this scenario. After answering, compare your reasoning against the explanation and wrong-answer breakdown below. Once you have made your selection, read the full explanation to reinforce the concept and understand why each distractor is designed to mislead on exam day.
A company runs a production web application on a fleet of Amazon EC2 instances. The operations team has observed that most instances have an average CPU utilization below 10% over the past month. They want to receive automated, ML-based recommendations for downsizing these instances to smaller instance types to reduce costs without compromising performance. The team also wants to see the estimated monthly savings for each recommendation. Which AWS service should the operations team use?
Answer choices
Why each option matters
Answer the question above first, then reveal the full breakdown to understand why each option is right or wrong.
Correct answer & explanation
AWS Compute Optimizer
AWS Compute Optimizer is the correct service because it uses machine learning to analyze historical utilization metrics (such as CPU, memory, and network) of EC2 instances and provides actionable recommendations to downsize or rightsize instances. It specifically generates estimated monthly savings for each recommendation, directly addressing the need for automated, ML-based downsizing suggestions without compromising performance.
Key principle: Answer the scenario, not the keyword: identify the specific constraint before choosing the most familiar-sounding option.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✗
AWS Trusted Advisor
Why it's wrong here
AWS Trusted Advisor provides best-practice checks including cost optimization, but its checks for underutilized instances are based on simple thresholds, not machine learning. It does not provide per-instance right-sizing recommendations with savings estimates.
When this WOULD be correct
A company wants a one-time assessment of their AWS account against best practices, including cost optimization, security, and fault tolerance, without needing ML-driven or historical utilization analysis.
- ✗
AWS Cost Explorer
Why it's wrong here
AWS Cost Explorer provides cost and usage reports, as well as Reserved Instance and Savings Plan recommendations. It does not recommend downsizing existing On-Demand instances.
When this WOULD be correct
AWS Cost Explorer would be correct if the question asked for a service to visualize historical EC2 spending, identify cost trends, or create custom cost reports to manually analyze downsizing opportunities, without requiring ML-based recommendations.
- ✓
AWS Compute Optimizer
Why this is correct
Correct. AWS Compute Optimizer uses ML to analyze utilization patterns and recommends optimal instance types and sizes, including downsizing opportunities, along with estimated savings.
Related concept
Read the scenario before looking for a memorised answer.
- ✗
AWS Budgets
Why it's wrong here
AWS Budgets allows you to set cost or usage thresholds and receive alerts. It does not analyze resource utilization or provide right-sizing recommendations.
When this WOULD be correct
A company wants to set a monthly spending limit for its EC2 usage and receive notifications when costs approach or exceed that limit. AWS Budgets would be the correct service to create a cost budget with alerts.
Option-by-option analysis
Why each answer is right or wrong
Understanding why wrong answers are wrong — and when they would be correct — is what separates a 750 score from a 900. The CLF-C02 exam frequently reuses these exact scenarios with slightly different constraints.
✓AWS Compute OptimizerCorrect answer▾
Why this is correct
Correct. AWS Compute Optimizer uses ML to analyze utilization patterns and recommends optimal instance types and sizes, including downsizing opportunities, along with estimated savings.
✗AWS Trusted AdvisorWrong answer — click to see why▾
Why this is wrong here
AWS Trusted Advisor provides general best-practice checks, including cost optimization, but it does not offer ML-based recommendations for downsizing EC2 instances based on historical utilization patterns.
★ When this WOULD be the correct answer
A company wants a one-time assessment of their AWS account against best practices, including cost optimization, security, and fault tolerance, without needing ML-driven or historical utilization analysis.
Why candidates choose this
Candidates may confuse Trusted Advisor's cost optimization checks with Compute Optimizer's ML-based recommendations, assuming Trusted Advisor provides similar instance sizing advice.
✗AWS Cost ExplorerWrong answer — click to see why▾
Why this is wrong here
AWS Cost Explorer provides cost and usage data but does not generate ML-based recommendations for downsizing EC2 instances. It lacks the automated, performance-aware optimization logic needed for this scenario.
★ When this WOULD be the correct answer
AWS Cost Explorer would be correct if the question asked for a service to visualize historical EC2 spending, identify cost trends, or create custom cost reports to manually analyze downsizing opportunities, without requiring ML-based recommendations.
Why candidates choose this
Candidates may confuse Cost Explorer's cost analysis capabilities with optimization recommendations, assuming it can suggest instance downsizing because it shows cost data and usage patterns.
✗AWS BudgetsWrong answer — click to see why▾
Why this is wrong here
AWS Budgets allows you to set custom cost and usage budgets and receive alerts when you exceed thresholds, but it does not provide ML-based recommendations for downsizing EC2 instances or estimate savings from specific instance changes.
★ When this WOULD be the correct answer
A company wants to set a monthly spending limit for its EC2 usage and receive notifications when costs approach or exceed that limit. AWS Budgets would be the correct service to create a cost budget with alerts.
Why candidates choose this
Candidates may confuse Budgets with cost optimization tools, thinking that setting a budget will automatically provide recommendations to reduce costs, or they may associate 'savings' with budget alerts.
Analysis generated from the official CLF-C02blueprint and verified against question context. The “when correct” sections are what AI assistants cite when candidates ask “what’s the difference between these options?”
Common exam traps
Common exam trap: answer the scenario, not the keyword
The trap here is that candidates often confuse AWS Trusted Advisor's cost optimization checks with the ML-driven rightsizing capabilities of AWS Compute Optimizer, but Trusted Advisor does not provide per-instance, ML-based recommendations with estimated savings.
Detailed technical explanation
How to think about this question
AWS Compute Optimizer leverages over 70 million data points from AWS and uses a machine learning model trained on billions of anonymized workloads to identify over-provisioned resources. It analyzes CloudWatch metrics (e.g., CPU utilization, memory utilization, network throughput) over a lookback period (default 14 days) and compares them against the performance characteristics of alternative instance types, providing a savings estimate based on On-Demand pricing. A subtle behavior is that Compute Optimizer requires the EC2 instances to have at least 30 hours of historical metric data before generating recommendations, and it can also consider instance families optimized for specific workloads (e.g., compute-optimized, memory-optimized).
KKey Concepts to Remember
- Read the scenario before looking for a memorised answer.
- Find the constraint that changes the correct option.
- Eliminate answers that are true in general but not in this case.
TExam Day Tips
- Watch for words such as best, first, most likely and least administrative effort.
- Review why wrong options are wrong, not only why the correct option is correct.
Key takeaway
Answer the scenario, not the keyword: identify the specific constraint before choosing the most familiar-sounding option.
Real-world example
How this comes up in practice
A startup's cloud architect reviews their monthly bill and notices costs are higher than expected for a long-running batch job. Switching from on-demand instances to Reserved Instances — or using Spot/Preemptible VMs — can reduce compute costs by up to 72 %. Questions like this test whether you understand the tradeoffs between commitment, flexibility, and cost across cloud pricing models.
What to study next
Got this wrong? Here's your next step.
Identify which exam domain this question belongs to, review the core concept, then practise similar questions from the same domain.
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Billing, Pricing, and Support — study guide chapter
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FAQ
Questions learners often ask
What does this CLF-C02 question test?
Billing, Pricing, and Support — This question tests Billing, Pricing, and Support — Read the scenario before looking for a memorised answer..
What is the correct answer to this question?
The correct answer is: AWS Compute Optimizer — AWS Compute Optimizer is the correct service because it uses machine learning to analyze historical utilization metrics (such as CPU, memory, and network) of EC2 instances and provides actionable recommendations to downsize or rightsize instances. It specifically generates estimated monthly savings for each recommendation, directly addressing the need for automated, ML-based downsizing suggestions without compromising performance.
What should I do if I get this CLF-C02 question wrong?
Identify which exam domain this question belongs to, review the core concept, then practise similar questions from the same domain.
What is the key concept behind this question?
Read the scenario before looking for a memorised answer.
About these practice questions
Courseiva creates original exam-style practice questions with explanations and wrong-answer analysis. It does not publish real exam questions, exam dumps, or protected exam content. Learn why practice questions differ from exam dumps →
Same concept, more angles
1 more ways this is tested on CLF-C02
These questions test the same concept from different angles. Work through them to make sure you can recognise it however the exam phrases it.
Variation 1. A company runs 200 Amazon EC2 instances for its web application. The finance team wants to identify instances that are over-provisioned or underutilized to reduce costs. The team needs automated recommendations that consider the instance's CPU, memory, and network utilization patterns over the past 14 days. Which AWS service should the team use?
medium- ✓ A.AWS Compute Optimizer
- B.AWS Trusted Advisor
- C.AWS Cost Explorer
- D.AWS Budgets
Why A: AWS Compute Optimizer is the correct service because it uses machine learning to analyze historical utilization metrics (CPU, memory, network) over a specified lookback period (up to 93 days, but 14 days is supported) and generates actionable recommendations to right-size EC2 instances. It specifically identifies over-provisioned and underutilized instances, directly addressing the finance team's cost-reduction goal with automated, metric-driven insights.
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Last reviewed: Jun 11, 2026
This CLF-C02 practice question is part of Courseiva's free Amazon Web Services certification practice question bank. Courseiva provides original exam-style practice questions with explanations, topic-based practice, mock exams, readiness tracking, and study analytics to help learners prepare for the CLF-C02 exam.
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