SAA-C03 Practice Question: Unattached EBS volumes continue to incur charges.
This SAA-C03 practice question tests your understanding of design cost-optimized architectures. Read the scenario carefully and evaluate each option against the stated constraints before committing to an answer. A key principle to apply: unattached EBS volumes continue to incur charges.. 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 log archive has old unattached EBS volumes and many stale snapshots. Which two actions reduce storage cost without affecting running instances?
Answer the question above first, then reveal the full breakdown to understand why each option is right or wrong.
Correct answer & explanation
✓
Delete unattached EBS volumes after verifying they are no longer needed
Unattached EBS volumes incur storage costs even when not in use, as EBS pricing is based on provisioned capacity per GB-month. Deleting them after verifying they are no longer needed eliminates this cost without affecting running instances, since attached volumes are untouched. This directly addresses the question's requirement to reduce storage costs without impacting running workloads.
Key principle: Unattached EBS volumes continue to incur charges.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
✗
Stop all EC2 instances in the account
Why it's wrong here
Stopping instances does not remove EBS volume or snapshot charges.
✗
Disable CloudTrail logging
Why it's wrong here
Disabling audit logging is not a storage cost optimization for EBS and weakens governance.
✓
Delete unattached EBS volumes after verifying they are no longer needed
Why this is correct
Unattached volumes continue to incur charges until deleted.
Related concept
Unattached EBS volumes continue to incur charges.
✓
Apply snapshot lifecycle policies to expire obsolete snapshots
Why this is correct
Lifecycle policies can automate cleanup of old snapshots.
Related concept
Unattached EBS volumes continue to incur charges.
Common exam traps
Common exam trap: answer the scenario, not the keyword
AWS often tests the misconception that stopping instances or disabling services like CloudTrail reduces storage costs, but the trap here is that only direct actions on the storage resources themselves (deleting volumes and expiring snapshots) affect EBS and snapshot billing.
Detailed technical explanation
How to think about this question
EBS snapshots are stored incrementally in Amazon S3, but you are billed for the total data size of all snapshots (including shared snapshots) based on the original volume's data. Snapshot lifecycle policies (DLM) can automate the deletion of obsolete snapshots based on age or count, reducing costs by removing redundant snapshots that are no longer needed for backup or compliance. Unattached EBS volumes continue to incur per-GB-month charges until explicitly deleted, as there is no automatic cleanup for orphaned volumes.
Deleting unattached EBS volumes is a direct cost reduction.
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
Unattached EBS volumes continue to incur charges.
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.
Review unattached EBS volumes continue to incur charges., then practise related SAA-C03 questions on the same topic to reinforce the concept.
Design Cost-Optimized Architectures — This question tests Design Cost-Optimized Architectures — Unattached EBS volumes continue to incur charges..
What is the correct answer to this question?
The correct answer is: Delete unattached EBS volumes after verifying they are no longer needed — Unattached EBS volumes incur storage costs even when not in use, as EBS pricing is based on provisioned capacity per GB-month. Deleting them after verifying they are no longer needed eliminates this cost without affecting running instances, since attached volumes are untouched. This directly addresses the question's requirement to reduce storage costs without impacting running workloads.
What should I do if I get this SAA-C03 question wrong?
Review unattached EBS volumes continue to incur charges., then practise related SAA-C03 questions on the same topic to reinforce the concept.
What is the key concept behind this question?
Unattached EBS volumes continue to incur charges.
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Question Discussion
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