SOA-C02 Deployment, Provisioning, and Automation Practice Question
A SysOps administrator is deploying a new web application using AWS Elastic Beanstalk. The application requires a high-performance relational database that can scale read capacity. The administrator needs to ensure that the database is highly available and can handle read replicas. The administrator creates an Elastic Beanstalk environment and adds an Amazon RDS DB instance. However, the database is deployed in a single Availability Zone. The administrator wants to modify the environment to use a Multi-AZ deployment for high availability and add read replicas. The administrator has the following options. Which option should the administrator choose?
⚠ Common exam trap
SOA-C02 often tests the misconception that Elastic Beanstalk can reconfigure an attached RDS instance in place (e.g., 'just enable Multi-AZ in the environment config'), when in reality the database must be recreated and the environment repointed.
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 a new Multi-AZ RDS DB instance with read replicas outside of Elastic Beanstalk. Update the environment's environment properties to point to the new database. Then delete the old DB instance.
Elastic Beanstalk does not support converting an existing single-AZ RDS instance to Multi-AZ or adding read replicas through environment configuration changes. The supported approach is to create a new Multi-AZ RDS instance (with read replicas) outside of Elastic Beanstalk, then repoint the environment's connection properties to the new database and decommission the old one. This gives the administrator full control over the RDS configuration while keeping the Beanstalk application connected.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✗
Increase the DB instance class size to improve performance and then create a read replica.
Why it's wrong here
Scaling up the DB instance class only increases compute and memory capacity, which does not introduce redundancy or automatic failover. A read replica is an independent database instance used for offloading read traffic and cannot serve as a synchronous standby; it also requires automated backups to be enabled on the source. This approach neither provides high availability nor addresses Multi-AZ failover, so it fails the requirement.
- ✗
Create a read replica of the existing DB instance and then modify the environment to use the replica.
Why it's wrong here
A read replica is not a Multi-AZ standby and does not provide automatic failover; it is an asynchronous copy that can be manually promoted, but that process involves downtime and data loss risk. Moreover, Elastic Beanstalk does not support dynamically pointing an environment to a read replica without changing the environment's database configuration or using external endpoints. Since the source already lacks Multi-AZ, using a replica still leaves you without redundancy in the primary instance.
- ✓
Create a new Multi-AZ RDS DB instance with read replicas outside of Elastic Beanstalk. Update the environment's environment properties to point to the new database. Then delete the old DB instance.
Why this is correct
Decoupling the database from Elastic Beanstalk is the recommended approach because it gives you full control over RDS features like Multi-AZ failover and read replicas. By creating a separate Multi-AZ RDS instance, you enable synchronous standby replication and automatic failover, and adding read replicas handles read scaling. Updating environment properties (e.g., RDS_HOSTNAME) to reference the new database makes the application use it, and deleting the old EB-managed DB avoids abandoned resources. This solution satisfies high availability and is a standard production practice.
- ✗
Modify the Elastic Beanstalk environment configuration to enable Multi-AZ for the existing DB instance.
Why it's wrong here
Elastic Beanstalk's integrated RDS database is created with the environment and is not configurable for Multi-AZ after launch; the Multi-AZ option is not available for existing environments. You cannot modify an EB-managed DB instance's multi-AZ setting through the environment configuration or the RDS console because it is tied to the environment's lifecycle. To achieve high availability, you must provision a separate Multi-AZ RDS instance external to Elastic Beanstalk and then update the environment's application settings.
Go deeper
Related to this question
About these practice questions
Courseiva writes every SOA-C02 question from scratch — 1,169 in total, each with an explanation and a wrong-answer breakdown. None are copied from real exams or dumps. Learn why practice questions differ from exam dumps →
JA
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 SOA-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 SOA-C02 exam.