Google ACE Deploying and Implementing a Cloud Solution Practice Question
An engineer needs to create a GKE cluster with 3 nodes of machine type e2-medium in the us-central1 region. Which command should they use?
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
✓
gcloud container clusters create my-cluster --num-nodes=3 --machine-type=e2-medium --region=us-central1
The correct command is 'gcloud container clusters create my-cluster --num-nodes=3 --machine-type=e2-medium --region=us-central1'. The --zone flag is for zonal clusters, not regional. The other options either use wrong zone or wrong flags.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✓
gcloud container clusters create my-cluster --num-nodes=3 --machine-type=e2-medium --region=us-central1
Why this is correct
This command creates a regional GKE cluster in the us-central1 region, using --region rather than --zone. The --num-nodes=3 flag sets three e2-medium nodes in the cluster, and the regional scope means the control plane is replicated across the zones in us-central1, providing higher availability. This is the only option that correctly combines the required node specification with a regional location.
- ✗
gcloud container clusters create my-cluster --num-nodes=3 --machine-type=e2-medium
Why it's wrong here
This command is missing a required location flag. GKE cluster creation needs either --region or --zone; without one, the gcloud command will fail or, if a default compute zone is configured, silently create a zonal cluster instead of the regional cluster the engineer needs. Even with the correct node count and machine type, the lack of an explicit regional location makes this command invalid or non-regional.
- ✗
gcloud container clusters create my-cluster --num-nodes=3 --machine-type=e2-medium --region=us-central1-a
Why it's wrong here
The --region flag expects a region name such as us-central1 or europe-west1, not a zone name. Passing us-central1-a as the region value is invalid because that is a specific zone within a region, not the region itself, so GKE will reject the command before creating any cluster. To create a regional cluster, you must specify the region without the zone suffix, as in --region=us-central1.
- ✗
gcloud container clusters create my-cluster --num-nodes=3 --machine-type=e2-medium --zone=us-central1-a
Why it's wrong here
The --zone=us-central1-a flag explicitly creates a zonal cluster, meaning both the control plane and all nodes are confined to a single availability zone. This is not a regional cluster and therefore does not provide the multi-zone resilience expected from a regional deployment, even though the node count is set to three. For a regional cluster, the command must use --region with a valid region name, not --zone with a specific zone.
Go deeper
Related to this question
Learn chapter
Compute Engine Machine Types and Families
Key term
GKE
GKE is Google's managed Kubernetes service that automates deploying, scaling, and managing containerized applications in the cloud.
Key term
Region
A region is a distinct geographic location where a cloud provider operates multiple data centers that are connected by low-latency networks and provide cloud services.
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Written by Johnson Ajibi, MSc IT Security
Senior Network & Security Engineer · founder of Courseiva
This ACE practice question is part of Courseiva's free Google Cloud 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 ACE exam.