SAA-C03 Design High-Performing Architectures Practice Question

Answer analysis

Option-by-option breakdown

For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.

• ✓

  Enable Lambda provisioned concurrency on a published alias used by the API, and set a minimum provisioned concurrency greater than zero.

  Why this is correct

  Provisioned concurrency keeps a defined number of Lambda execution environments initialized and ready behind a specific alias. When traffic ramps up—especially after inactivity—invocations can use pre-initialized environments, reducing or eliminating cold starts for those requests.

• ✗

  Increase the Lambda function’s memory setting; cold starts will always be eliminated regardless of traffic patterns.

  Why it's wrong here

  Increasing memory can improve CPU allocation and may reduce execution duration and sometimes initialization time. However, it does not guarantee that initialized environments are available after idle periods. Cold starts can still occur without provisioned concurrency.

• ✗

  Switch the Lambda runtime to a newer language version and remove any VPC configuration so the function never cold starts.

  Why it's wrong here

  Changing the runtime or removing VPC configuration can reduce initialization overhead in some cases (for example, by reducing ENI setup time for VPC). However, these changes do not provide deterministic warm capacity. Cold starts can still happen depending on traffic patterns and scale-down behavior.

• ✗

  Set an API Gateway stage variable to "warm" the function at request time, which forces immediate initialization.

  Why it's wrong here

  API Gateway stage variables do not create a pre-initialized warm pool of Lambda execution environments. Even if the application reads a stage variable, it still cannot deterministically avoid cold starts without a Lambda feature such as provisioned concurrency.