SAP-C02 Design for New Solutions Practice Question
A company is designing a new serverless application that processes orders from an e-commerce website. The application uses AWS Lambda functions that are invoked by Amazon API Gateway. The company expects a sudden spike in traffic during a flash sale. Which TWO strategies should be used to ensure the application can handle the spike without errors? (Choose two.)
⚠ Common exam trap
Many exam-takers confuse provisioned concurrency (which reduces cold starts) with reserved concurrency (which guarantees capacity and prevents throttling), leading them to select Option E instead of Option A.
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
✓
Set Lambda reserved concurrency to a value that matches the expected peak load.
Lambda reserved concurrency guarantees a fixed number of concurrent executions for the function, preventing it from being throttled by other functions in the account. By setting reserved concurrency to match the expected peak load, the application ensures that all requests during the flash sale can be processed without hitting account-level concurrency limits.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✓
Set Lambda reserved concurrency to a value that matches the expected peak load.
Why this is correct
Reserved concurrency limits the maximum concurrent executions, preventing throttling and uncontrolled scaling.
- ✗
Increase the Lambda function timeout to 15 minutes.
Why it's wrong here
Timeout affects execution duration, not concurrency handling.
- ✓
Enable usage plans and throttling in API Gateway to limit requests.
Why this is correct
Throttling protects the backend from being overwhelmed by too many requests.
- ✗
Use Amazon SQS to buffer requests and decouple the frontend.
Why it's wrong here
SQS buffering helps but does not address Lambda concurrency limits; also adds latency.
- ✗
Configure Lambda provisioned concurrency to pre-warm instances.
Why it's wrong here
Provisioned concurrency is for latency-sensitive applications, not for handling spikes.
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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