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Google PCA Practice Question: A media company runs a stateless web application…
A media company runs a stateless web application on Compute Engine behind an HTTP(S) load balancer. They want to automatically replace unhealthy VMs and maintain a fixed number of running instances across two zones. What should they use?
⚠ Common exam trap
PCA often tests the difference between zonal and regional MIGs, and candidates may overlook the need for multi-zone distribution when the requirement specifies 'across two zones'.
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
✓
A regional managed instance group with a fixed target size and autohealing
A regional managed instance group with a fixed target size and autohealing automatically replaces unhealthy VMs and maintains the specified number of instances across multiple zones. This meets the requirements of automatic replacement and fixed instance count across two zones. Autohealing uses health checks to detect and recreate unhealthy instances, ensuring high availability.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✗
An unmanaged instance group with health checks
Why it's wrong here
An unmanaged instance group performs no autohealing or automatic recreation, so unhealthy VMs are never replaced and the fixed count is not maintained. It is tempting because unmanaged groups can attach health checks for load-balancer targeting, and would suit manually managed, heterogeneous VMs.
- ✗
A zonal managed instance group with autoscaling
Why it's wrong here
A zonal managed instance group confines instances to one zone, so it cannot maintain the fixed number of running instances across two zones as required. Zonal MIGs are tempting because they do provide autohealing and autoscaling, and would be correct if the workload needed resilience within a single zone only.
- ✗
Compute Engine with instance templates and no group
Why it's wrong here
Instance templates without a group create no managed group, so nothing detects unhealthy VMs or restores the fixed instance count across zones. Templates are tempting because they define the VM configuration, and they would be correct as the building block inside a regional managed instance group, not standalone.
- ✓
A regional managed instance group with a fixed target size and autohealing
Why this is correct
A regional managed instance group spreads instances across two zones, satisfying the multi-zone requirement, while its fixed target size maintains the exact instance count. Autohealing health checks detect and recreate unhealthy VMs automatically, meeting the self-healing constraint without manual intervention or external orchestration.
Go deeper
Related to this question
Learn chapter
Virtual Machine Instances in Compute Engine
Key term
Managed instance group
A managed instance group is a collection of identical virtual machine instances that are automatically managed as a single unit to ensure high availability and scalability.
Key term
High availability
High availability is a system design approach that aims to keep applications and services operational and accessible with minimal downtime, even when some components fail.
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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 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.