Google PCA Design and plan a cloud solution architecture Practice Question
A financial services company runs a regulated trading platform in a single Google Cloud region. Regulators require that the platform survive the loss of an entire region with a recovery point objective of zero and a recovery time objective of under one minute. The database is Cloud Spanner, and the application tier runs on Google Kubernetes Engine. Which design should the architect choose?
⚠ Common exam trap
The trap here is treating backups, change streams, or zone redundancy as substitutes for synchronous cross-region replication and pre-provisioned compute in a second region.
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
✓
Deploy Cloud Spanner as a multi-region instance and run GKE regional clusters in two regions behind a global external Application Load Balancer
Zero recovery point objective demands synchronous cross-region replication, which only a multi-region Cloud Spanner instance provides. Sub-minute recovery demands application compute already running in a second region with automated traffic failover. Combining a multi-region Spanner instance with regional GKE clusters in two regions behind a global external Application Load Balancer satisfies both constraints simultaneously.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✗
Deploy Cloud Spanner as a regional instance and take scheduled backups exported to a Cloud Storage bucket in another region
Why it's wrong here
A regional Spanner instance keeps all replicas inside one region, so a region outage takes the database offline. Backups exported to another region can restore data, but restoration takes far longer than one minute and loses everything written since the last backup, violating the zero recovery point objective. This design cannot meet either stated target.
- ✓
Deploy Cloud Spanner as a multi-region instance and run GKE regional clusters in two regions behind a global external Application Load Balancer
Why this is correct
A multi-region Cloud Spanner instance synchronously replicates data across regions with strong consistency, giving a recovery point objective of zero. Regional GKE clusters in two regions behind a global external Application Load Balancer provide health-checked failover with sub-minute recovery. Together they meet both the zero data loss and under-one-minute recovery targets for a region loss.
- ✗
Deploy Cloud Spanner as a multi-region instance and run a single GKE zonal cluster with node pools spread across three zones in the primary region
Why it's wrong here
Multi-region Spanner protects the data layer, but a single GKE cluster confined to one region has no compute capacity if that region is lost. Spreading node pools across zones only protects against a zone failure, not the region failure the regulators require. The application tier would be unavailable, so the recovery time objective would not be met.
- ✗
Deploy Cloud Spanner as a regional instance with read replicas in a second region and use change streams to replay writes into the second region after failover
Why it's wrong here
Spanner regional instances do not offer cross-region read replicas; replica placement is determined by the instance configuration. Change streams are a data capture mechanism, not a replication or failover mechanism, and replaying writes introduces lag and complexity. This design misuses the feature and cannot deliver zero data loss or sub-minute recovery.
Go deeper
Related to this question
Learn chapter
Introduction to Google Cloud Platform
Key term
Google Kubernetes Engine
Google Kubernetes Engine (GKE) is a managed Kubernetes service on Google Cloud that lets you deploy, scale, and manage containerized applications without having to operate the underlying cluster control plane.
Key term
GKE
GKE is Google's managed Kubernetes service that automates deploying, scaling, and managing containerized applications in the cloud.
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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 Google Cloud exam blueprint
This PCA 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 PCA exam.