Choosing Warm Standby or Pilot Light for 1-Hour RTO and 15-Minute RPO
A company is designing a disaster recovery plan for an application running on AWS. The plan must meet an RTO of 1 hour and an RPO of 15 minutes. Which TWO strategies can achieve these objectives? (Select TWO.)
Quick Answer
The answer is warm standby and pilot light with database replication, as both can achieve a 1-hour RTO and 15-minute RPO when properly configured. Warm standby maintains a scaled-down but fully functional copy of the production environment in a different Region, with database replication—such as Amazon RDS cross-Region read replicas or Aurora Global Database—keeping the RPO under 15 minutes, and the standby can be scaled up within the hour. Pilot light achieves the same by running only the core data layer (e.g., a replicated database) and a minimal application stack, then provisioning the full environment on failover, which still fits the 1-hour window if automation is in place. On the AWS Certified DevOps Engineer Professional DOP-C02 exam, this question tests your ability to distinguish recovery strategies by their infrastructure state and data synchronization methods; a common trap is assuming pilot light cannot meet a 15-minute RPO, but it can with synchronous or near-synchronous database replication. Memory tip: think of warm standby as a “sleeping giant” (already running, just needs resources) and pilot light as a “ready spark” (database live, rest starts on demand)—both can hit your RTO and RPO if replication is fast enough.
⚠ Common exam trap
Watch out — candidates often confuse Multi-AZ deployments (which are high availability within a Region) with cross-Region disaster recovery, failing to recognize that Multi-AZ does not protect against a full Regional outage.
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
✓
Warm standby in a different AWS Region with database replication
(Warm standby) is correct because it maintains a scaled-down but fully functional copy of the production environment in a different AWS Region, with database replication (e.g., Amazon RDS cross-Region read replicas or Aurora Global Database) ensuring an RPO of 15 minutes or less. The standby infrastructure can be scaled up within the 1-hour RTO, as it is already running and configured.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✗
Backup and restore using daily snapshots to a different Region
Why it's wrong here
Daily snapshots exceed 15 min RPO.
- ✓
Warm standby in a different AWS Region with database replication
Why this is correct
Can meet RTO 1 hr and RPO 15 min.
- ✗
Cold standby in a different Region with infrastructure deployed on demand
Why it's wrong here
RTO likely exceeds 1 hour.
- ✓
Pilot light in a different Region with database replication
Why this is correct
Can meet RTO 1 hr and RPO 15 min.
- ✗
Multi-AZ deployment in the same Region
Why it's wrong here
Does not protect against Region failure.
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Same concept, more angles
1 more way this is tested on DOP-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 wants to ensure that its application running on AWS can withstand the failure of an entire AWS Region. Which TWO strategies should the company implement?
easy- ✓ A.Deploy the application in multiple AWS Regions using an active-active or active-passive pattern
- B.Deploy the application across multiple Availability Zones in a single Region
- ✓ C.Replicate data across Regions using services like DynamoDB global tables or RDS cross-Region replication
- D.Use a single CloudFront distribution with multiple origins in the same Region
- E.Configure RDS read replicas in the same Region
Why A: To withstand an entire AWS Region failure, the company should deploy the application in multiple AWS Regions (A) and replicate data across Regions (C). Deploying across multiple Availability Zones (B) protects only within a single Region. A single CloudFront distribution with multiple origins in the same Region (D) does not provide regional failover. RDS read replicas in the same Region (E) are for read scaling, not disaster recovery across Regions.
JA
Written by Johnson Ajibi, MSc IT Security
Senior Network & Security Engineer · founder of Courseiva
This DOP-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 DOP-C02 exam.