C100DBA Application Administration Practice Question
Which read concern provides the strongest consistency guarantee by ensuring the data returned has been acknowledged by a majority of the replica set?
⚠ Common exam trap
Test-takers often confuse read concern 'majority' with write concern 'majority', or assume it guarantees absolute real-time synchronization across all globally distributed nodes.
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
✓
majority
The 'majority' read concern guarantees that the data read has been committed to a majority of the replica set members, ensuring that the read will not be rolled back after a failover. This is essential for applications requiring strong consistency, such as financial systems. DBAs must guide developers on when to trade off performance for this level of consistency to ensure the application behaves correctly under all possible cluster failure scenarios.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✗
local
Why it's wrong here
The 'local' read concern returns data from the node's local view without checking if the data has been acknowledged by a majority of the replica set. While it is the most performant option, it is susceptible to reading data that could be rolled back after a primary failure.
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available
Why it's wrong here
The 'available' read concern returns data with no consistency guarantees, even potentially returning orphaned data in sharded clusters. It is designed for maximum performance in read-heavy applications where consistency is not a priority, and it is entirely unsuitable for applications requiring strong data integrity or accurate reporting.
- ✓
majority
Why this is correct
The 'majority' read concern ensures that the returned data is committed to a majority of the replica set, preventing reads of data that could be rolled back. It is the best choice for ensuring strong consistency in a distributed system, even if it introduces slightly more latency than lower-consistency levels.
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snapshot
Why it's wrong here
The 'snapshot' read concern provides multi-document transaction consistency. While it is stronger than 'majority', it is only available within the context of a multi-document transaction. For a standalone read request, 'majority' is the highest standard of consistency available to ensure the data is durable and will not be rolled back.
About these practice questions
This C100DBA question is part of Courseiva's 222-question bank — original exam-style content with full explanations and wrong-answer analysis, never real exam questions or exam dumps. Learn why practice questions differ from exam dumps →
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 MongoDB exam blueprint
This C100DBA practice question is part of Courseiva's free MongoDB 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 C100DBA exam.