The answer is AWS Global Accelerator because it is the only AWS service designed to optimize low-latency multi-region UDP traffic for real-time applications like gaming. Global Accelerator uses Anycast IP addresses to route UDP traffic over the AWS global network, directing packets to the nearest healthy endpoint and minimizing both latency and jitter. On the AWS Certified Advanced Networking Specialty ANS-C01 exam, this question tests your understanding of traffic optimization for non-HTTP protocols—a common trap is confusing Global Accelerator with Amazon CloudFront, which does not natively support UDP. Remember that CloudFront is for HTTP/HTTPS and TCP, while Global Accelerator handles UDP and TCP at the network layer. A useful memory tip: think of Global Accelerator as the “UDP-friendly express lane” that bypasses the public internet, whereas CloudFront is the “HTTP cache stop.”
ANS-C01 Network Design Practice Question
This ANS-C01 practice question tests your understanding of network design. 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 is designing a network for a real-time gaming application that requires the lowest possible latency across AWS Regions. The application uses UDP traffic. Which AWS service should be used to optimize traffic routing?
Answer the question above first, then reveal the full breakdown to understand why each option is right or wrong.
Correct answer & explanation
✓
AWS Global Accelerator.
AWS Global Accelerator uses the Anycast IP address concept to route UDP traffic over the AWS global network, minimizing latency by directing traffic to the nearest healthy endpoint. It is specifically designed for real-time applications like gaming that require low latency and jitter, and it supports UDP traffic natively.
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 Direct Connect with multiple connections.
Why it's wrong here
Direct Connect is for on-premises to AWS, not inter-region optimization.
✓
AWS Global Accelerator.
Why this is correct
Global Accelerator supports UDP and uses the AWS backbone to reduce latency.
Related concept
Read the scenario before looking for a memorised answer.
✗
Amazon Route 53 with latency-based routing.
Why it's wrong here
Route 53 only controls DNS resolution, not traffic path.
Common exam trap: answer the scenario, not the keyword
AWS often tests the misconception that DNS-based routing (like Route 53 latency routing) provides the same latency optimization as Global Accelerator, but the trap is that DNS routing only affects the initial resolution and does not control the actual network path for ongoing UDP traffic, while Global Accelerator optimizes every packet in real time.
Detailed technical explanation
How to think about this question
AWS Global Accelerator leverages the AWS global network backbone and Anycast static IPs to route traffic to the optimal edge location, reducing latency by up to 60% compared to public internet routing. It uses TCP and UDP port configurations to maintain flow stickiness and health checks, ensuring traffic is sent to the closest healthy endpoint without DNS caching issues. In a real-world gaming scenario, this means players connect to a single Anycast IP, and Global Accelerator dynamically routes their UDP packets to the nearest AWS Region with game servers, bypassing internet congestion.
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 healthcare organisation deploys an application with a public-facing web tier and a private database tier. The database subnet has no public IP and only accepts connections from the web tier's security group. Questions like this test whether you can design cloud network isolation using VNets/VPCs, subnets, and security group rules.
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.
Network Design — This question tests Network Design — Read the scenario before looking for a memorised answer..
What is the correct answer to this question?
The correct answer is: AWS Global Accelerator. — AWS Global Accelerator uses the Anycast IP address concept to route UDP traffic over the AWS global network, minimizing latency by directing traffic to the nearest healthy endpoint. It is specifically designed for real-time applications like gaming that require low latency and jitter, and it supports UDP traffic natively.
What should I do if I get this ANS-C01 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 →
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 is designing a network for a real-time gaming application that requires extremely low latency between players. The application will be deployed on EC2 instances in multiple AWS regions. Which AWS service provides the best latency performance by using the AWS global network and anycast IPs?
hard
A.AWS Direct Connect
✓ B.AWS Global Accelerator
C.Amazon CloudFront
D.Amazon Route 53 Latency Routing
Why B: AWS Global Accelerator uses the AWS global network and anycast IPs to route traffic to the optimal edge location, then over the AWS backbone to the nearest healthy endpoint. This minimizes internet hops and latency, making it ideal for real-time gaming applications that require consistent low latency across multiple regions.
Variation 2. A company is designing a network for a real-time gaming application that requires low latency and high throughput between game servers in multiple regions. The application uses UDP traffic. Which AWS service should be used to route traffic between regions?
hard
A.AWS Transit Gateway
✓ B.AWS Global Accelerator
C.Amazon CloudFront
D.Amazon Route 53
Why B: AWS Global Accelerator uses the Anycast IP address and the AWS global network to route UDP traffic from users to the optimal regional endpoint, minimizing latency and jitter. It is designed for real-time applications like gaming that require low-latency and high-throughput UDP traffic between regions, as it bypasses the public internet and leverages AWS's internal backbone.
Variation 3. A company is designing a global application that will serve users across North America and Europe. The application consists of a static website hosted on Amazon S3, a REST API hosted on Amazon API Gateway, and a backend application running on EC2 instances in an Auto Scaling group behind an Application Load Balancer (ALB). The company wants to minimize latency for users by serving content from the closest AWS region. They also want to ensure high availability and automatic failover if a region becomes unavailable. The company is considering using Amazon Route 53 with a latency-based routing policy. However, they are concerned about DNS caching and propagation delays during failover. Which additional service should they use to improve the failover experience and provide a single endpoint for users?
hard
A.Use a Network Load Balancer in each region and configure Route 53 with failover routing
B.Use Amazon CloudFront with multiple origins pointing to the S3 bucket and the ALB in each region
C.Use Lambda@Edge to dynamically route traffic based on the user's location
✓ D.Use AWS Global Accelerator to provide a static IP address and route traffic to the ALB in the closest healthy region
Why D: AWS Global Accelerator uses the AWS global network to route traffic to the closest healthy endpoint via the Anycast static IP addresses, bypassing DNS caching and propagation delays. It provides a single fixed endpoint for users and integrates with the ALB in each region, automatically failing over to the next healthy region within seconds when health checks fail.
Last reviewed: Jun 30, 2026
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This ANS-C01 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 ANS-C01 exam.
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