Question 1easymulti select
Full question →easymulti selectObjective-mapped
A web application runs on an Auto Scaling group behind an Application Load Balancer. The business wants the service to keep running if one Availability Zone goes down. Which two changes should you make? Select two.
Answer choices
Why each option matters
Good practice is not just finding the correct option. The wrong answers often show the exact trap the exam wants you to fall into.
A
Best answer
Place the Auto Scaling group in subnets across at least two Availability Zones.
Spreading the Auto Scaling group across multiple Availability Zones lets EC2 capacity remain available if one Zone fails. The group can continue launching and serving instances in the remaining healthy Zone, which improves availability without changing the application itself.
B
Best answer
Attach the Application Load Balancer to subnets in at least two Availability Zones.
An ALB should span multiple Availability Zones so it can keep receiving traffic even if one Zone becomes unavailable. Elastic Load Balancing automatically routes requests only to healthy targets in surviving Zones, which improves resilience during a Zone outage.
C
Distractor review
Increase the instance size so each server can handle more traffic alone.
A larger instance may improve capacity, but it does not protect against an Availability Zone failure. If the Zone goes down, all instances in that Zone are still lost regardless of their size.
D
Distractor review
Disable ALB health checks so instances stay registered longer.
Health checks are useful for removing unhealthy targets quickly. Disabling them would make failover and recovery worse because the load balancer could keep sending traffic to broken instances.
E
Distractor review
Run the whole stack in one Availability Zone for simpler networking.
A single Availability Zone creates a clear single point of failure. Simplicity may be appealing, but it does not meet the goal of surviving a Zone outage.
Common exam trap
Common exam trap: usable hosts are not the same as total addresses
Subnetting questions often tempt you into counting all addresses. In normal IPv4 subnets, the network and broadcast addresses are not usable host addresses.
Technical deep dive
How to think about this question
Subnetting questions test whether you can identify the network, broadcast address, usable range, mask and correct subnet. Slow down enough to calculate the block size correctly.
KKey Concepts to Remember
- CIDR notation defines the prefix length.
- Block size helps identify subnet boundaries.
- Network and broadcast addresses are not usable hosts in normal IPv4 subnets.
- The required host count determines the smallest suitable subnet.
TExam Day Tips
- Write the block size before choosing the subnet.
- Check whether the question asks for hosts, subnets or a specific address range.
- Do not confuse /24, /25, /26 and /27 host counts.
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More questions from this exam
Keep practising from the same exam bank, or move into a focused topic page if this question exposed a weak area.
Question 1
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Question 2
A team wants to run containerized services with AWS-managed orchestration and autoscaling. They do NOT require Kubernetes compatibility. Which AWS service choice is most appropriate to meet these goals?
Question 3
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Question 4
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Question 5
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Question 6
A solutions architect is designing an S3 bucket for a healthcare document service. The objects must never be publicly accessible, even if a developer later adds an overly broad bucket policy. What should the architect configure?
FAQ
Questions learners often ask
What does this SAA-C03 question test?
CIDR notation defines the prefix length.
What is the correct answer to this question?
The correct answer is: Place the Auto Scaling group in subnets across at least two Availability Zones. — The best resilience design is to make both the load balancer and the Auto Scaling group span multiple Availability Zones. If one Zone fails, the ALB can still accept traffic in the remaining Zone and the Auto Scaling group can keep serving or replacing instances there. This is the standard high-availability pattern for EC2-based applications on AWS. Bigger instances do not help if the entire Zone is lost, and disabling health checks reduces recovery speed rather than improving it. Running everything in one Zone is simpler, but it creates a single point of failure and is not resilient to an AZ outage.
What should I do if I get this SAA-C03 question wrong?
Then try more questions from the same exam bank and focus on understanding why the wrong options are tempting.
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