This ACE practice question tests your understanding of deploying and implementing a cloud solution. Read the scenario carefully and evaluate each option against the stated constraints before committing to an answer. After answering, compare your reasoning against the explanation and wrong-answer breakdown below. Once you have made your selection, read the full explanation to reinforce the concept and understand why each distractor is designed to mislead on exam day.
A developer wants to deploy a containerized web application that can scale to zero when not in use, and only pay for request processing time. Which compute service should they choose?
App Engine Flexible Environment
Why wrong: App Engine Flex has at least one instance always running.
Cloud Functions
Why wrong: Cloud Functions is for event-driven functions, not containerized web apps.
Cloud Run
Cloud Run runs containers and scales to zero when idle.
Google Kubernetes Engine (GKE)
Why wrong: GKE requires at least one node, so it doesn't scale to zero.
Answer choices
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 the correct choice because it is a managed compute platform that runs containerized applications in a serverless environment, automatically scaling to zero when there are no requests and charging only for the resources used during request processing (billed in 100-millisecond increments). This matches the requirement for a containerized web app that scales to zero and has pay-per-use pricing.
Key principle: Answer the scenario, not the keyword: identify the specific constraint before choosing the most familiar-sounding option.
Answer analysis
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
App Engine Flexible Environment
Why it's wrong here
App Engine Flex has at least one instance always running.
Cloud Functions
Why it's wrong here
Cloud Functions is for event-driven functions, not containerized web apps.
Cloud Run
Why this is correct
Cloud Run runs containers and scales to zero when idle.
Related concept
Read the scenario before looking for a memorised answer.
Google Kubernetes Engine (GKE)
Why it's wrong here
GKE requires at least one node, so it doesn't scale to zero.
Common exam traps
Google Cloud often tests the distinction between serverless compute options: candidates confuse Cloud Functions (for event-driven code) with Cloud Run (for containerized apps), or assume App Engine Flexible can scale to zero when it cannot.
Detailed technical explanation
Cloud Run uses Knative serving under the hood, which manages request-based autoscaling with a concurrency setting (default 80 requests per container) and can scale down to zero replicas when no requests are received. The billing model charges for CPU and memory only during request processing, plus a small monthly fee for the container image storage; idle containers incur no compute cost. This makes Cloud Run ideal for workloads with unpredictable or infrequent traffic, such as APIs or webhooks.
Key takeaway
Answer the scenario, not the keyword: identify the specific constraint before choosing the most familiar-sounding option.
Real-world example
A startup's cloud architect reviews their monthly bill and notices costs are higher than expected for a long-running batch job. Switching from on-demand instances to Reserved Instances — or using Spot/Preemptible VMs — can reduce compute costs by up to 72 %. Questions like this test whether you understand the tradeoffs between commitment, flexibility, and cost across cloud pricing models.
What to study next
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FAQ
Deploying and implementing a cloud solution — This question tests Deploying and implementing a cloud solution — Read the scenario before looking for a memorised answer..
The correct answer is: Cloud Run — Cloud Run is the correct choice because it is a managed compute platform that runs containerized applications in a serverless environment, automatically scaling to zero when there are no requests and charging only for the resources used during request processing (billed in 100-millisecond increments). This matches the requirement for a containerized web app that scales to zero and has pay-per-use pricing.
Identify which exam domain this question belongs to, review the core concept, then practise similar questions from the same domain.
Read the scenario before looking for a memorised answer.
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Last reviewed: Jun 30, 2026
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.
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