SAA-C03 Design Cost-Optimized Architectures Practice Question
A company is designing a global application. They need to replicate 1 TB of data monthly between two AWS Regions. What is the most cost-effective way to minimize data transfer costs?
⚠ Common exam trap
SAA-C03 often tests the misconception that VPC Peering or Direct Connect reduce inter-region data transfer costs, but they do not; only reducing the data volume (e.g., via compression) directly lowers costs.
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
✓
Compress the data before transferring it between regions.
Compressing data before transferring it between regions reduces the volume of data transferred, thereby lowering data transfer costs. AWS charges for data transfer out from a region, so reducing the number of bytes transferred directly reduces costs. Compression is a simple and effective method to minimize data transfer costs for large datasets.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✗
Use AWS Direct Connect to link the two regions together.
Why it's wrong here
Direct Connect is intended for linking on-premises data centers to AWS, not for inter-region traffic within the AWS cloud. Setting up Direct Connect involves significant monthly port fees and physical infrastructure costs, which would be far more expensive than standard inter-region data transfer fees for 1 TB of data.
- ✓
Compress the data before transferring it between regions.
Why this is correct
Since inter-region data transfer is billed based on the amount of data (GB) moved across the network, reducing the size of the payload through compression directly reduces the cost. This is a simple, software-based optimization that requires no additional AWS infrastructure and scales effectively with the volume of data.
- ✗
Use an Amazon CloudFront distribution to cache data between regions.
Why it's wrong here
CloudFront is a Content Delivery Network designed to cache data closer to end-users (at Edge Locations), not to facilitate bulk data replication between two specific AWS Regions. Using CloudFront for this purpose would likely increase costs due to additional request fees and egress charges from the origin to the CDN.
- ✗
Deploy a VPC Peering connection between the two regions.
Why it's wrong here
While VPC Peering allows for private communication between regions, it does not reduce the data transfer cost. AWS charges the same standard inter-region data transfer rates for traffic over a VPC Peer as it does for traffic over the public internet or a Transit Gateway, so this doesn't solve the cost problem.
About these practice questions
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JA
Written and reviewed by Johnson Ajibi, MSc IT Security
Senior Network & Security Engineer · founder of Courseiva
Last reviewed September 2026 · checked against the official Amazon Web Services exam blueprint
This SAA-C03 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 SAA-C03 exam.