PAS-C01 Migration Practice Question
A company wants to migrate its on-premises VMware virtual machines to AWS. They need to retain the current operating system and applications. Which AWS service should they use?
⚠ Common exam trap
A common mix-up: candidates confuse AWS Application Migration Service (MGN) with SMS, but MGN requires an agent and is not VMware-specific, whereas SMS is the agentless, VMware-native service that directly integrates with vCenter for VM discovery and replication.
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
✓
AWS Server Migration Service (SMS)
AWS Server Migration Service (SMS) is the correct choice because it is specifically designed to migrate on-premises VMware virtual machines to AWS while preserving the operating system, applications, and system configurations. It uses agentless replication via the VMware vCenter connector to create Amazon Machine Images (AMIs) from the source VMs, enabling a lift-and-shift migration without reinstallation or reconfiguration.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✓
AWS Server Migration Service (SMS)
Why this is correct
SMS replicates VMware VMs to AWS.
- ✗
AWS Application Migration Service (MGN)
Why it's wrong here
MGN is agent-based, while SMS is agentless for VMware.
- ✗
AWS Database Migration Service (DMS)
Why it's wrong here
DMS is for databases, not VMs.
- ✗
AWS DataSync
Why it's wrong here
DataSync is for file transfers.
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JA
Written by Johnson Ajibi, MSc IT Security
Senior Network & Security Engineer · founder of Courseiva
This PAS-C01 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 PAS-C01 exam.