SAP-C02 Continuous Improvement for Existing Solutions Practice Question
A company runs a web application on EC2 instances behind an ALB. The application uses an Amazon Aurora MySQL database. The operations team notices that the database CPU utilization is consistently above 80% during business hours. The team needs to reduce database load without changing the application code. Which TWO actions should the team take? (Select TWO.)
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
✓
Create an Aurora read replica and direct read queries to it.
Creating an Aurora read replica offloads read queries from the primary DB instance, reducing CPU load on it. Option C is correct because implementing an ElastiCache for Redis caching layer reduces the number of repeated read queries hitting the database, further lowering CPU utilization. Option B is wrong: while increasing the DB instance class could provide more CPU resources, it does not reduce load—it only scales up, which is not a best practice for immediate load reduction without code changes. Option D is wrong because Performance Insights is a monitoring tool for identifying performance bottlenecks, not a direct mechanism to reduce database load. Option E is wrong because increasing the Auto Scaling group size only scales the application tier, which would increase traffic to the database, worsening the CPU issue.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✓
Create an Aurora read replica and direct read queries to it.
Why this is correct
Read replicas offload read traffic from the primary instance.
- ✗
Increase the DB instance class to a larger size.
Why it's wrong here
Scaling up is reactive and may incur cost without solving the root cause.
- ✓
Implement an ElastiCache for Redis caching layer to cache frequent queries.
Why this is correct
Caching reduces database read load.
- ✗
Enable Amazon RDS Performance Insights to identify slow queries.
Why it's wrong here
Performance Insights helps identify issues but does not reduce load.
- ✗
Increase the Auto Scaling group maximum size to handle more traffic.
Why it's wrong here
More web servers increase database load, not decrease.
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Written by Johnson Ajibi, MSc IT Security
Senior Network & Security Engineer · founder of Courseiva
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.