Question 407 of 1,660
SAP-C02 Continuous Improvement for Existing Solutions Practice Question
A company has a serverless application using AWS Lambda, API Gateway, and DynamoDB. During a traffic spike, some API requests fail with 5xx errors. The CloudWatch logs show 'ProvisionedThroughputExceededException' for DynamoDB. The team wants to handle this gracefully without losing requests. What should they do?
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
✓
Enable auto scaling for DynamoDB and implement retry logic with exponential backoff in the Lambda function.
It combines DynamoDB auto scaling to adjust capacity during traffic spikes with retry logic and exponential backoff in the Lambda function to handle transient ProvisionedThroughputExceededException errors gracefully without losing requests. Option B is wrong because fixing capacity to a high value is costly and inefficient; it doesn't adapt to variable traffic. Option C is wrong because using an SQS queue between API Gateway and Lambda would buffer requests but does not directly address the DynamoDB throughput exception; it would only shift the problem. Option D is wrong because API Gateway cannot automatically retry failed requests; retries must be implemented in the backend.
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 auto scaling for DynamoDB and implement retry logic with exponential backoff in the Lambda function.
Why this is correct
Auto scaling handles capacity, retries handle transient errors.
- ✗
Increase the provisioned read/write capacity of the DynamoDB table to a high fixed value.
Why it's wrong here
Costly and may still be exceeded during extreme spikes.
- ✗
Use an SQS queue between API Gateway and Lambda to buffer requests.
Why it's wrong here
This does not directly address DynamoDB throttling.
- ✗
Configure API Gateway to automatically retry failed requests.
Why it's wrong here
API Gateway does not automatically retry.
Quick reference
Cloud Service Model Comparison
| Model | You Manage | Provider Manages | Examples |
|---|---|---|---|
| IaaS | OS, runtime, apps, data | Hardware, hypervisor, networking | EC2, Azure VMs, GCP Compute Engine |
| PaaS | Apps and data | OS, runtime, middleware, hardware | Elastic Beanstalk, Azure App Service |
| SaaS | Data and settings only | Everything else | Microsoft 365, Salesforce, Workday |
| FaaS / Serverless | Function code only | Infra, scaling, runtime | Lambda, Azure Functions, Cloud Run |
| CaaS | Containers and apps | Kubernetes, OS, hardware | EKS, AKS, GKE |
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Last reviewed: Jun 20, 2026
This SAP-C02 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 SAP-C02 exam.
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