SAP-C02 Design for New Solutions Practice Question
A company wants to deploy a new web application on AWS that uses a microservices architecture. The company expects rapid growth and wants to decouple services to allow independent scaling and development. The team wants to use Docker containers for consistency across environments. Which solution should a Solutions Architect recommend?
⚠ Common exam trap
The trap is assuming that any container service (like Lightsail or Beanstalk) is suitable for microservices; candidates may overlook that ECS/Fargate provides the orchestration and scaling needed for independent services.
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
✓
Use Amazon ECS with Fargate to run each microservice as a separate task definition, with service auto scaling.
Amazon ECS with Fargate allows running containers without managing servers, and each microservice can be defined as a separate task definition with its own scaling policies. This decouples services, supports independent scaling, and provides container consistency across environments. Fargate eliminates infrastructure management, making it ideal for rapid growth and microservices.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✗
Use Amazon Lightsail containers to deploy each microservice as a container service.
Why it's wrong here
Amazon Lightsail containers lack the native orchestration and granular scaling capabilities required to decouple microservices for rapid growth. This service is designed for low-complexity workloads or small-scale applications where predictable pricing is prioritised over advanced cluster management. It would be a valid choice for a developer needing to host a single, standalone container instance without the operational overhead of managing complex networking or orchestration layers.
- ✗
Deploy each microservice on separate EC2 instances behind an Application Load Balancer.
Why it's wrong here
Running each microservice on separate EC2 instances gives no container orchestration, so Docker consistency is lost and scaling stays manual per instance. It is tempting because EC2 with an ALB suits simple, monolithic, long-running workloads where per-service scheduling, discovery and independent scaling are not required.
- ✓
Use Amazon ECS with Fargate to run each microservice as a separate task definition, with service auto scaling.
Why this is correct
ECS with Fargate runs each microservice as a separate task definition, giving independent scaling and deployment without managing EC2 instances. Fargate provides serverless container hosting, and service auto scaling handles rapid growth, satisfying the Docker consistency and decoupling requirements.
- ✗
Use AWS Elastic Beanstalk with Docker platform to deploy each microservice as a separate environment.
Why it's wrong here
Elastic Beanstalk environments each run a full application stack, so per-microservice environments duplicate provisioning and lack service discovery or independent container scaling. It suits monolithic Docker apps needing managed capacity, not microservices requiring orchestration, discovery and per-service scaling.
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Written and reviewed by Johnson Ajibi, MSc IT Security
Senior Network & Security Engineer · founder of Courseiva
Last reviewed September 2026 · checked against the official Amazon Web Services exam blueprint
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.