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How I Passed the AWS Cloud Practitioner (CLF-C02) Exam – Study Tips & Review
How I Passed the AWS Cloud Practitioner (CLF-C02) Exam
Back in September, I passed the AWS Cloud Practitioner (CLF-C02) certification exam after studying for about a month. Let me share how I prepared for it – the good, the bad, and everything in between :)
📚 My Background Before Studying
I had some prior hands-on experience with AWS. I was already familiar with the following services:
- CloudWatch, SQS, CloudFront, S3, EC2, Transfer Family
- Route 53, DynamoDB, RDS, CloudFormation
Because of that, I only needed one day to review the core concepts.
If you’re starting from scratch, I recommend spending at least a week just learning the basics.
🧠 My Study Plan (Summarized)
-
General Concept Review (Day 1)
I found tons of summaries online, but honestly, they were too overwhelming.
I ended up doing just one day of review and moved on.
(This worked for me since I already knew about 50% of the content.) -
Practice Questions Using Dumps
I used free dumps from sites likeExamtopics. They offer both questions and answer explanations.
👉 Some answers can be debated, so I highly recommend using ChatGPT to double-check and understand why an answer is correct or incorrect. -
Write Things Down to Remember Better
Instead of just memorizing answers, I focused on understanding why certain options were wrong.
I used scrap paper lying around the house and wrote things down repeatedly—at least five times for each key point.
Writing helps me retain information better. -
Optional: Create an Error Note
I skipped this part because I’m lazy 😅, but if you’re the type who gets nervous, making an error notebook might help.
You can’t bring it into the test room, of course, but it’s useful for reviewing on the way to the exam.
✍️ Test Day Checklist & Tips
- What to Bring: Two forms of ID (e.g., passport + national ID) or one ID + a credit card
- Must verify both Korean and English names.
- Language Options: English is the default. If you choose Korean or another language, you get 20 extra minutes.
- (I’ve seen some say you get 30 minutes, but I was given 20.)
- Arrive Early: You can start the test as soon as you’re ready.
- My test was scheduled for 11 AM, but I arrived at 10:20 and started right away.
- Test Environment: Very strict security
- It felt like airport screening. They checked socks, pants, and even lightly patted down arms/legs.
- You’ll receive a laminated sheet + marker to take notes. Raise your hand if you need to erase and reuse it.
- Others may already be taking different certification exams (AWS, GCP, Azure, etc.), so just quietly focus and leave quietly when done.
📝 My Test Experience
- Number of Questions: 65
- Time Taken: Finished in about 50 minutes (with one quick review pass)
- Difficulty: Mostly memorization. Many questions were similar to ones I saw in dumps.
- Score: 840/1000 (Passing is 700)
The AWS Cloud Practitioner exam is basically a memorization test. It reminded me of Korea high school—just memorize well…
💡 Extra Tips
- Join an AWS Online Study Session if available. Sometimes, they offer 50% discount vouchers for the exam.
- If you pass, you’ll also receive a 50% discount voucher for your next AWS certification.
- You might even get a chance to become an AWS Subject Matter Expert (SME) in the future!
Final Thoughts
The AWS Cloud Practitioner is a great entry-level certification.
If you’ve used AWS even a little bit in real projects, you can pass this in a short time.
Even if you’re completely new, this exam is 100% doable with focused memorization.
You don’t need months of study—just stay consistent and strategic. You got this! 💪