AWS Certified Developer - Associate Study Guide (2026)

AWS Certified Developer - Associate Study Guide 2026 – Pass on Your First Attempt

This AWS Certified Developer - Associate study guide covers all exam domains, key concepts, and real exam-style scenarios to help you pass on your first attempt. Learn what topics matter most, avoid common mistakes, and follow a structured plan based on the official exam blueprint.

Edureify AI helps you identify your strengths and weak areas using real exam-style questions, detailed explanations, and domain-level analysis. Get a personalized study plan, track your progress, and focus only on what will improve your AWS Certified Developer - Associate exam score.

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What should you study for the AWS Certified Developer - Associate exam?

To pass the AWS Certified Developer - Associate certification exam, you should focus on:

  • Development with AWS Services: Covers developing and architecting applications using core AWS services including Lambda, API Gateway, DynamoDB, S3, SQS, SNS, and Kinesis.
  • Security: Covers implementing security controls for AWS applications including authentication, authorization, encryption, and secrets management.
  • Deployment: Covers deploying applications to AWS using CI/CD pipelines, infrastructure as code, and container services.
  • Troubleshooting and Optimization: Covers monitoring, tracing, debugging, and optimizing AWS applications using CloudWatch, X-Ray, and performance best practices.

The exam tests your ability to apply concepts in real scenarios, not just memorize definitions.

AWS Certified Developer - Associate Exam Syllabus and Topics

The AWS Certified Developer - Associate exam is divided into 4 domains. Each domain tests specific skills and contributes to your overall score.

Development with AWS Services

Covers developing and architecting applications using core AWS services including Lambda, API Gateway, DynamoDB, S3, SQS, SNS, and Kinesis.

32%
Weight
16
Questions
160
Marks

AWS Lambda

  • Function configuration and runtime environments
  • Event sources and triggers
  • Lambda layers and extensions
  • Concurrency, throttling, and cold starts
  • Lambda@Edge and SnapStart

Amazon API Gateway

  • REST API vs HTTP API vs WebSocket API
  • API Gateway integrations and proxy resources
  • Authorization with Cognito and Lambda authorizers
  • Throttling, caching, and CORS

Amazon DynamoDB

  • Partition keys, sort keys, and indexes (GSI, LSI)
  • Capacity modes: On-Demand vs Provisioned
  • DynamoDB Streams and TTL
  • Conditional expressions and transactions
  • DAX for caching

Amazon S3

  • S3 bucket policies, ACLs, and presigned URLs
  • S3 versioning, lifecycle rules, and replication
  • S3 event notifications
  • Multipart upload and transfer acceleration

Amazon SQS and SNS

  • Standard vs FIFO queues
  • Visibility timeout and dead-letter queues
  • SNS topics and fan-out patterns
  • SQS polling: short vs long polling

Amazon Kinesis

  • Kinesis Data Streams vs Firehose vs Analytics
  • Shards, partition keys, and sequence numbers
  • Consumer types: enhanced fan-out

Security

Covers implementing security controls for AWS applications including authentication, authorization, encryption, and secrets management.

26%
Weight
13
Questions
130
Marks

IAM Policies and Roles

  • IAM policy evaluation logic
  • Cross-account access and resource-based policies
  • IAM roles for EC2, Lambda, and ECS
  • AWS STS and temporary credentials

Amazon Cognito

  • User Pools vs Identity Pools
  • Cognito Sync and federated identities
  • JWT token validation
  • OAuth 2.0 and OIDC flows

AWS KMS and Encryption

  • Customer managed keys (CMK) vs AWS managed keys
  • Envelope encryption
  • S3, DynamoDB, and Lambda encryption at rest
  • KMS key policies

AWS Secrets Manager and Parameter Store

  • Storing and rotating secrets
  • SSM Parameter Store SecureString
  • Referencing secrets in Lambda and ECS

Deployment

Covers deploying applications to AWS using CI/CD pipelines, infrastructure as code, and container services.

24%
Weight
12
Questions
120
Marks

AWS CodePipeline, CodeBuild, and CodeDeploy

  • Pipeline stages and actions
  • CodeBuild buildspec.yml configuration
  • In-place vs blue/green deployments
  • Deployment strategies: all-at-once, rolling, canary

AWS CodeCommit and CodeArtifact

  • Git repository management on AWS
  • Artifact storage and package management

AWS CloudFormation

  • Templates, stacks, and nested stacks
  • CloudFormation parameters, mappings, and outputs
  • Change sets and rollback triggers
  • Custom resources and CloudFormation macros

AWS Elastic Beanstalk

  • Environment types: Web Server vs Worker
  • Deployment policies and .ebextensions
  • Elastic Beanstalk with Docker

AWS SAM

  • SAM template structure
  • SAM CLI for local testing
  • SAM transforms and deployment

Troubleshooting and Optimization

Covers monitoring, tracing, debugging, and optimizing AWS applications using CloudWatch, X-Ray, and performance best practices.

18%
Weight
9
Questions
90
Marks

Amazon CloudWatch

  • CloudWatch Metrics, Logs, and Alarms
  • CloudWatch Logs Insights queries
  • Metric filters and custom metrics
  • CloudWatch EventBridge rules

AWS X-Ray

  • Distributed tracing and service maps
  • X-Ray segments, subsegments, and annotations
  • Enabling X-Ray for Lambda and API Gateway
  • X-Ray sampling rules

Optimization Patterns

  • Lambda provisioned concurrency and memory tuning
  • DynamoDB capacity planning and adaptive capacity
  • Caching strategies: ElastiCache, DAX, API Gateway cache
  • API Gateway throttling and quotas
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Learning Progress

Development with AWS Services 85%
Security 92%

Practice Test Scores

95%
Latest Score
Above passing threshold

Frequently Asked Questions