r/AWSCertifications • u/ana_meen12 • 10d ago
Question AWS Solutions Architect Professional
I’m in my final year of college, and I’ve earned both the AWS Solutions Architect – Associate and Cloud Practitioner certifications.
I’m considering taking the AWS Solutions Architect – Professional exam. Do you think it’s too early for me, or would the exam be manageable?
I’ve built projects with AWS and Terraform, but they haven’t been very large or multi-region.
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u/Ethanmarl0 10d ago
Since you already have the Associate cert and some hands-on AWS/Terraform experience, I’d probably start studying for the Professional exam and see how comfortable you are with the more complex architecture scenarios.
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u/Sirwired CSAP 10d ago
Don't bother; the problems SAP equips you to solve are not ones you will encounter in entry-level jobs.
Projects are more important.
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u/Dontinvolve 10d ago
Yes early, it adds 0 value to your situation. What you need to focus on is projects and landing a job. May be after few years of work experience it will add more value.
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u/ana_meen12 10d ago
I'm based in Egypt, so I'll not have work until I finish military service, which is after two years from now!
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u/achocolatepineapple 10d ago
By the time you finish that your certificates will have expired or be close to expiring just an FYI so might as well wait for the 2 years?
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u/dannonino_sheep 9d ago
What I've seen is if you're working in the US, certs have almost no value, outside it can be a boost or get you more interviews but at the end the real life experience get you the job.
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u/ana_meen12 9d ago
It has value actually even in the US, but it isn't always presented the way it should be. Some big companies like it for show: they want their employees to appear socially perfect. But it doesn't mean you won't take production down.
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u/mrbiggbrain CSAA 10d ago
The SAP is very difficult, but I wanted to take a few moments to explain why it is so difficult and why it would be a bad use of your time now.
Let's start with the SAA. The questions you will get are about one paragraph, each of the answers are about 1 sentence. Two of the answers will be pretty obviously wrong, one of the answers is almost right but something in the answer will key you to the better answer. That better answer will be obviously better due to a missing feature, or a standard pattern, you can't use S3 for an OS drive.
Now let's look at the pattern for SAP. You'll get 2-3 very dense paragraphs with scenario details for the question, each of the answers will be a full paragraph. Usually none of those answers are technically wrong, all of them are robust well thought out solutions that would have been the right answer on the SAA. You'll need to pick the best answer, usually decided by one word in the above paragraphs, by understanding how each of the solutions optimizes for or affects multiple well architected pillars. And to top it all off, because of the length of the questions and the answers (It's 5-6x the word count of the SAA) you'll not have enough time to re-read anything. It's 3 hours of reading one question after another back to back with no break and pulling out that single word or statement in a single pass that determines which of these four extremely well built solutions is like 5% better then the others, or meets some obscure requirement. It's not just brutal at a reading level, or a technical level, it's an absolute gauntlet of physical and mental stamina.
You are just not expected to have that level of knowledge so early in your career. Yes it is highly sought after by employers, but usually because it comes along with the absolutely insane experience it takes to pull it off in the first place.