AWS Certified Solutions Architect – Associate (SAA-C03) ToC

✅ AWS Certified Solutions Architect – Associate (SAA-C03) - Table of Contents

1. Introduction

About the SAA-C03 exam
Target audience and prerequisites
Exam overview (format, duration, passing score)
Study resources and preparation tips

2. Domain 1: Design Secure Architectures (30%)

IAM (Users, Roles, Groups, Policies)
IAM Permissions boundaries and session policies
Resource-based vs Identity-based policies
AWS Organizations, SCPs, and account structure
Encryption and Data Protection
- AWS KMS, S3 encryption, EBS encryption
- Secrets Manager & Systems Manager Parameter Store
Secure Network Architecture
- VPC, Security Groups, NACLs
- PrivateLink, VPC Peering, VPN, Direct Connect

3. Domain 2: Design Resilient Architectures (26%)

High Availability and Fault Tolerance
- Multi-AZ, Multi-Region design patterns
Load Balancing
- ALB, NLB, CLB use cases
Auto Scaling and Elasticity
DNS-based Failover (Route 53)
Backup & Disaster Recovery
- Backup policies, AWS Backup
- DR strategies: Pilot light, Warm standby, Active-active

4. Domain 3: Design High-Performing Architectures (24%)

Storage Optimization
- S3 Storage Classes (Standard, IA, Glacier)
- EBS, EFS, FSx
Compute Optimization
- EC2 instance types and performance tuning
- Lambda, Fargate, ECS, EKS
- Placement groups
Database Selection and Performance
- RDS, Aurora, DynamoDB, Redshift
- Read Replicas, Global Tables, ElastiCache
Content Delivery and Caching
- CloudFront, API Gateway caching

5. Domain 4: Design Cost-Optimized Architectures (20%)

Resource Right-Sizing
Pricing Models
- On-Demand, Reserved, Spot Instances, Savings Plans
Cost Management Tools
- AWS Budgets, Cost Explorer, Trusted Advisor
Cost-Effective Storage and Data Transfer

6. AWS Well-Architected Framework

Pillars of the Well-Architected Framework
- Operational Excellence
- Security
- Reliability
- Performance Efficiency
- Cost Optimization
- Sustainability

7. Practice and Exam Preparation

Sample questions and explanations
Practice exams and mock tests
Hands-on labs (AWS Free Tier, Qwiklabs, AWS SkillBuilder)
Final review tips

8. Appendix

Summary of Key AWS Services
AWS CLI and SDK basics
Architectural Design Patterns (Well-Architected Diagrams)
Certification Exam FAQs
Cheat Sheets and Flashcards

AWS Certified Solutions Architect – Professional (SAP-C02) – Table of Contents

Domain 1: Design Solutions for Organizational Complexity (26%)

Requirements gathering and analysis
Designing multi-account and multi-VPC architectures
Hybrid connectivity strategies (on-premises ↔ AWS)
Centralized services (security, logging, networking)
Governance, compliance, and multi-team environment considerations

Domain 2: Design for New Solutions (29%)

Translating business requirements into technical design
Selecting appropriate compute, storage, database, and networking services
Designing highly available and fault-tolerant architectures
Designing secure applications with IAM, KMS, and encryption
Choosing appropriate deployment strategies (containers, serverless, microservices)
Cost-optimized design patterns

Domain 3: Continuous Improvement for Existing Solutions (25%)

Assessing and improving existing architectures
Performance optimization (compute, storage, databases, networking)
Cost optimization and rightsizing
Migrating workloads to modern architectures (monolith → microservices, lift & shift → re-architect)
Resiliency and disaster recovery improvements (RTO/RPO strategies)
Security enhancements and remediation

Domain 4: Accelerate Workload Migration and Modernization (20%)

Migration strategies (6 R’s: Rehost, Replatform, Repurchase, Refactor, Retire, Retain)
Designing and implementing migration workflows (AWS Migration Hub, Application Migration Service, Database Migration Service)
Selecting modernization approaches (containers, serverless, managed services)
Data migration strategies (online/offline, Snowball, Direct Connect, DataSync)
Validating migration success and post-migration optimization

Additional Key Topics Across Domains

AWS Well-Architected Framework (all pillars)
Designing with sustainability in mind
Multi-region architectures
Edge services (CloudFront, Global Accelerator, Route 53)
Observability (CloudWatch, X-Ray, OpenTelemetry, third-party integration)
Security best practices (least privilege, SCPs, encryption, monitoring)

Projects

AWS Solution Architect Professional – Project Ideas

1. Highly Available Multi-Tier Application

Deploy a 3-tier architecture (web, app, DB) using ALB, Auto Scaling Groups, and RDS.
Add multi-AZ failover and caching with ElastiCache.
Apply IAM roles for least privilege and KMS encryption.

2. Hybrid Cloud Connectivity

Connect on-premises to AWS with VPN and Direct Connect.
Use Transit Gateway to connect multiple VPCs and accounts.
Demonstrate failover from VPN → Direct Connect.

3. Disaster Recovery Architecture

Build pilot-light and warm-standby strategies.
Use Route 53 health checks + failover routing.
Replicate RDS/EC2 across regions with RDS cross-region read replicas and S3 replication.

4. Microservices on EKS with Service Mesh

Deploy microservices on Amazon EKS.
Use AWS App Mesh or Istio for service-to-service communication.
Integrate with CloudWatch Container Insights and X-Ray tracing.

5. Secure API Gateway with WAF

Build a REST API with API Gateway + Lambda backend.
Apply AWS WAF rules and Cognito for authentication.
Add CloudFront for global content delivery.

6. Multi-Region Active-Active Architecture

Deploy applications across two AWS regions.
Use Route 53 latency-based routing with health checks.
Implement DynamoDB Global Tables and S3 Cross-Region Replication.

7. Centralized Logging and Monitoring

Aggregate logs from multiple accounts using CloudWatch Logs and S3.
Use OpenSearch (Elasticsearch) for log analytics.
Add GuardDuty, Security Hub, and AWS Config for compliance monitoring.

8. Compliance-Driven Architecture

Design workloads following AWS Well-Architected Framework (security & compliance focus).
Enforce IAM least privilege with Service Control Policies.
Use AWS Config rules, Security Hub, and Audit Manager for governance reporting.

9. Event-Driven Architecture with Decoupling

Build a decoupled system using SQS, SNS, and Lambda.
Implement retries, dead-letter queues (DLQ), and message filtering.
Demonstrate scalability and fault isolation through event-driven design.

10. Edge-Optimized Architecture

Use CloudFront for global content delivery.
Add AWS Global Accelerator for latency reduction.
Deploy WAF and Shield for DDoS protection at the edge.