Cloud Digital Leader Google Cloud Products and Services Practice Question
A developer wants to deploy a containerized web application that can automatically scale to zero when there are no requests, and charges only for resources used during request processing. Which Google Cloud compute service 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
✓
Cloud Run
Cloud Run is a serverless container platform that scales to zero and charges per request. Google Kubernetes Engine and Compute Engine require running instances, and App Engine Standard is a platform as a service but not container-based.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✗
Compute Engine
Why it's wrong here
Compute Engine provisions virtual machines with fixed resources that run continuously. To scale, you must manually resize the managed instance group or configure autoscalers, but even the smallest VM remains allocated and billed while idle. It cannot scale to zero instances, so it is not a cost-effective choice for a web application with sporadic or low traffic.
- ✗
Google Kubernetes Engine (GKE)
Why it's wrong here
Google Kubernetes Engine runs a managed Kubernetes control plane and a pool of worker nodes, typically Compute Engine VMs. While it offers container orchestration, autoscaling, and cluster features, it requires at least one node to run workloads and cannot scale to zero without deleting the entire cluster. This makes it overkill for a simple containerized web app where you want minimal cost and operational overhead when idle.
- ✓
Cloud Run
Why this is correct
Cloud Run is a fully managed serverless container platform that executes your container only when a request arrives. It automatically scales down to zero instances during idle periods, meaning you pay nothing when there is no traffic, and it scales up instantly to handle incoming requests. Because it directly supports container images and abstracts all infrastructure, it is the simplest and most cost-efficient choice for deploying a containerized web application.
- ✗
App Engine Standard Environment
Why it's wrong here
App Engine Standard Environment can scale to zero automatically, but it does not run arbitrary containers. Instead, it executes code in language-specific sandboxes using supported runtimes such as Python, Java, Go, or Node.js, and requires you to follow a particular runtime API and structure. If your application is containerized, you would need to refactor or adapt it to the sandbox constraints, making Cloud Run a better fit.
Quick reference
Cloud Service Model Comparison
| Model | You Manage | Provider Manages | Examples |
|---|---|---|---|
| IaaS | OS, runtime, apps, data | Hardware, hypervisor, networking | EC2, Azure VMs, GCP Compute Engine |
| PaaS | Apps and data | OS, runtime, middleware, hardware | Elastic Beanstalk, Azure App Service |
| SaaS | Data and settings only | Everything else | Microsoft 365, Salesforce, Workday |
| FaaS / Serverless | Function code only | Infra, scaling, runtime | Lambda, Azure Functions, Cloud Run |
| CaaS | Containers and apps | Kubernetes, OS, hardware | EKS, AKS, GKE |
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Cloud Digital Transformation
Key term
Cloud Run
Cloud Run is a fully managed compute platform from Google Cloud that lets you run containerized applications in a serverless environment, automatically scaling from zero to thousands of requests.
Key term
Serverless
Serverless is a cloud computing model where the cloud provider manages the servers, and you only pay for the actual compute time your code uses, without having to worry about provisioning or maintaining infrastructure.
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Written by Johnson Ajibi, MSc IT Security
Senior Network & Security Engineer · founder of Courseiva
This GCDL 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 GCDL exam.