Google PCA Design and plan a cloud solution architecture Practice Question
A retail company is planning to migrate its on-premises data warehouse to Google Cloud. They want a fully managed, petabyte-scale, and highly scalable analytics data warehouse that supports ANSI SQL and integrates with their existing BI tools. Which Google Cloud service should they choose?
⚠ Common exam trap
The trap here is assuming that any managed database service can serve as a data warehouse, but only BigQuery is purpose-built for petabyte-scale analytics with ANSI SQL support.
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
✓
BigQuery
BigQuery is Google Cloud's fully managed, petabyte-scale analytics data warehouse that supports ANSI SQL and integrates with BI tools. It is serverless, highly scalable, and designed for analytical workloads. Cloud SQL is for transactional databases, Cloud Spanner is for global transactional consistency, and Cloud Bigtable is a NoSQL database for high-throughput applications, none of which are optimized for petabyte-scale SQL analytics.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✗
Cloud Spanner
Why it's wrong here
Cloud Spanner is a globally distributed, horizontally scalable relational database designed for transactional workloads with strong consistency. While it supports ANSI SQL, it is not optimized for petabyte-scale analytics and is more expensive for such use cases. It is better suited for high-throughput transactional applications, not as a data warehouse replacement.
- ✓
BigQuery
Why this is correct
BigQuery is a fully managed, petabyte-scale analytics data warehouse that supports ANSI SQL and integrates with many BI tools. It is designed for high-performance analytics and can scale seamlessly. It is serverless and allows you to run fast SQL queries on large datasets. This makes it the ideal choice for migrating an on-premises data warehouse and supporting BI workloads.
- ✗
Cloud SQL
Why it's wrong here
Cloud SQL is a fully managed relational database service for MySQL, PostgreSQL, and SQL Server. It is designed for transactional workloads and does not scale to petabyte-scale analytics. While it supports ANSI SQL, it is not suitable for a data warehouse requiring massive analytical processing. Therefore, it does not meet the requirements for a petabyte-scale analytics data warehouse.
- ✗
Cloud Bigtable
Why it's wrong here
Cloud Bigtable is a fully managed, scalable NoSQL database for large analytical and operational workloads. It is ideal for high-throughput, low-latency applications but does not support ANSI SQL and is not a data warehouse. It requires application-level integration and is not designed for SQL-based BI tools. Thus, it does not meet the requirement for a SQL-compatible analytics data warehouse.
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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Key term
Data
Data is raw, unprocessed information, like numbers, words, or measurements, that can be stored, processed, and analyzed by computers.
Key term
Cloud Spanner
Cloud Spanner is a fully managed, globally distributed relational database service from Google Cloud that combines the benefits of relational database structure with horizontal scalability and strong consistency.
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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.