AWS

Introduction to the 100-Day AWS Cloud Practitioner Challenge

Welcome to your first step into the world of cloud computing with Amazon Web Services (AWS)! This article introduces the 100-Day AWS Cloud Practitioner Challenge, a structured plan to help beginners learn AWS from scratch and prepare for the AWS Certified Cloud Practitioner exam. We’ll cover why learning AWS is valuable, what the Cloud Practitioner certification entails, how the 100-day challenge works, a detailed study roadmap, and even a hands-on exercise using the AWS Free Tier. By the end, you’ll have a clear blueprint to kickstart your cloud journey. Let’s dive in!

Why Learn AWS Cloud? (AWS for Beginners)

If you’re new to cloud computing, AWS is a great place to start. Amazon Web Services (AWS) is the world’s leading cloud platform, providing hundreds of services used by companies large and small. Learning AWS can open doors in your career because cloud skills are in high demand. Even if you’re not aiming to be a developer, understanding AWS is valuable – it helps you communicate with technical teams, architect solutions, or leverage cloud services in business projects.

For beginners, AWS offers an accessible entry point into IT infrastructure. You can experiment with real servers, databases, and more without needing expensive hardware – everything runs in the cloud. AWS’s pay-as-you-go model and Free Tier (more on that soon) mean you can learn and build practical skills at minimal cost. Whether you want to become a cloud engineer or simply boost your resume, AWS knowledge is a smart investment.

In short, learning AWS gives you insight into how modern technology solutions are built. You’ll understand concepts like virtual machines, storage buckets, and cloud security – skills that are transferable across the tech industry. And one of the best ways to validate and structure your AWS learning is by pursuing the AWS Certified Cloud Practitioner certification, which brings us to our next section.

What Is the AWS Certified Cloud Practitioner Certification?

The AWS Certified Cloud Practitioner is an entry-level certification that verifies your grasp of fundamental AWS cloud knowledge. It’s designed for beginners and non-technical professionals to demonstrate a broad understanding of AWS, without getting too deep into technical details. Here’s an overview of this certification:

  • Purpose: The Cloud Practitioner credential proves you understand the AWS Cloud at a basic level – including essential AWS services, use cases, benefits, and how AWS is structured. It covers cloud concepts, security, technology (the core services), and billing/pricing. It’s often described as “AWS Cloud 101,” making it ideal for those starting out.
  • Who It’s For: Anyone! This certification has no prerequisites. It’s perfect for newcomers to cloud computing, students, or professionals in non-IT roles (sales, management, finance) who work with cloud teams. It’s also a great first cert for technical folks transitioning into cloud from other fields, as it lays the groundwork for more advanced AWS certifications later (like AWS Solutions Architect Associate).
  • Exam Details: The exam code as of 2025 is CLF-C02 (an updated version of the exam). You’ll face 65 multiple-choice and multiple-response questions to be completed in 90 minutes. The question style tests your understanding of concepts and ability to recognize AWS solutions for common scenarios. The passing score is around 70% (AWS scores out of 1000 points, with ~700 needed to pass). The exam can be taken at a test center or online from home (with a proctor). It’s offered in several languages, including English and Japanese, so you can choose the language you’re most comfortable with.
  • Cost and Validity: The exam costs $100 USD (around ¥15,000 in Japan, plus tax). Once you pass, the certification is valid for 3 years. AWS requires renewal (by taking the latest exam again or a higher-level cert) to ensure you stay up-to-date, but that’s down the road – for now, your focus is on initial certification.
  • Exam Topics: According to the official exam guide, the Cloud Practitioner exam covers four domains:
    1. Cloud Concepts: Basic cloud computing principles, benefits of AWS, cloud architecture design principles.
    2. Security and Compliance: AWS’s security model (Shared Responsibility Model), identity and access management (IAM), basic security best practices, and compliance programs.
    3. Technology (AWS Services): Core AWS services in compute, storage, database, networking, plus when to use them. Also basics of deployment and operations in the cloud.
    4. Billing and Pricing: How AWS pricing works, understanding the Free Tier, cost management, and the different support plans AWS offers.
  • You don’t need hands-on coding skills for this exam, and you won’t be tested on implementing complex architectures. It’s about knowing the services and concepts. For example, you should understand what Amazon EC2 is and when you might use it, but you won’t have to write a script to launch an EC2 instance in the exam.
  • Why It’s Worth It: Earning this certification shows employers or clients that you have a solid foundation in AWS. It’s a confidence booster for you as well – you’ll be fluent in the terminology and the basic AWS landscape. Many people use Cloud Practitioner as a stepping stone to harder AWS certs (since it builds your baseline knowledge). Even if you don’t plan to become an AWS Solutions Architect or Developer, Cloud Practitioner can be a standalone achievement that validates your cloud literacy.

In summary, AWS Certified Cloud Practitioner is the recommended starting point for AWS certification. It’s achievable for beginners with some study, and the 100-day challenge is a perfect approach to get you there, as we’ll outline next.

What is the 100-Day AWS Cloud Practitioner Challenge?

Learning a new skill takes time and consistency – and that’s exactly what the 100-day challenge is about. The idea is simple: commit to learning or practicing AWS every day for 100 days. By spreading your Cloud Practitioner preparation across about three months, you avoid cramming and instead build lasting knowledge through daily progress.

Here’s why a 100-day challenge is effective for AWS beginners:

  • Consistent Habit: Dedicating time every day (even 30-60 minutes) keeps you engaged with the material. Cloud computing is a broad field; regular exposure helps reinforce concepts. You’ll be surprised how much you can learn in 100 days of steady effort, versus trying to absorb everything in a few sporadic big study sessions.
  • Manageable Chunks: AWS has a lot of services and concepts. Breaking your learning into 100 small pieces makes it far less overwhelming. Each day, you focus on one topic or task – for example, Day 1 might be “What is cloud computing?”, Day 2 might be “AWS global infrastructure basics,” Day 3 might be “create an AWS account” and so on. Small, incremental steps will lead to comprehensive coverage by Day 100.
  • Accountability: If you publicly announce or at least track your 100-day challenge, you add accountability. There’s a community trend on social media with hashtags like #100DaysOfCloud (inspired by the coding community’s #100DaysOfCode). You can tweet or blog about your daily AWS learning – it doesn’t matter if anyone sees it; the act of recording progress can keep you motivated. And if you do connect with others doing the challenge, you’ll gain support and study buddies.
  • Flexibility with Purpose: The 100-day plan is a guideline – you can adjust it to fit your schedule. The key is to not quit. If you miss a day, don’t beat yourself up, just continue the next day. Ideally, try not to skip too many days in a row, but the challenge is forgiving as long as you reach the 100 days eventually. The structure gives you purpose each day (“Today I learn X… tomorrow I’ll tackle Y”), which helps avoid the procrastination that often comes with self-study.
  • Thorough Preparation: By pacing yourself over ~14 weeks, you have ample time to cover all exam domains, do hands-on practice, and revisit tough topics. You can include rest or catch-up days if needed. This pacing ensures by the end of 100 days, you’re not only ready to pass an exam, but you actually understand the concepts on a deeper level and remember them longer.

In short, the 100-Day AWS Cloud Practitioner Challenge is a self-driven, disciplined study plan. It’s about creating a learning habit. Each day’s effort builds on the previous days. Imagine how confident you’ll feel at day 100, having invested consistent time into learning AWS – you’ll have covered everything from the basics of EC2 and S3, to how AWS secures its cloud, to how the billing works. And most importantly, you’ll have practical experience from doing hands-on labs regularly in those 100 days.

Next, let’s talk about setting up your environment and gather the resources you’ll use throughout this challenge.

Setting Up for Success: AWS Free Tier and Study Tools

Before you embark on learning AWS, you should set up two things: access to AWS itself (for hands-on practice) and a collection of learning resources to guide your study. Let’s go through these preparations.

Create Your AWS Free Tier Account

Since AWS is a hands-on platform, it’s crucial to practice what you learn. The good news is AWS provides a Free Tier for new accounts, which gives you a generous amount of free usage for many popular services during your first 12 months. This allows you to try things out without incurring costs, as long as you stay within the limits.

Steps to get started with AWS Free Tier:

  • Sign Up: Go to the AWS website (aws.amazon.com) and register a new AWS account. You’ll need an email address and a credit/debit card for verification. Don’t worry – AWS won’t charge you for free-tier usage, but they do require a card on file. During signup, AWS might do a small temporary charge (like $1) to verify the card, which gets refunded.
  • Basic Info: You’ll provide some basic information (name, address) and choose an account type (select “Personal” if it’s just for you learning). Also, you’ll set up an account password and security questions.
  • Phone Verification: AWS will do a quick phone verification step (either text or call with a code).
  • Select a Support Plan: Choose the Basic Support (Free) plan when prompted (the others cost money; you don’t need them for learning purposes).

Once your account is created, you can log in to the AWS Management Console, which is the web interface to access all AWS services.

What’s included in Free Tier? A lot! Here are a few highlights you get per month for 12 months:

  • Compute: 750 hours of Amazon EC2 (virtual server) running Linux or Windows on a t2.micro or t3.micro instance. (750 hours is enough to run one instance 24/7 for the whole month.)
  • Storage: 5 GB of Amazon S3 storage standard tier, plus additional free usage for AWS Glacier (archive storage) and EFS (file storage).
  • Databases: 750 hours of Amazon RDS (managed relational database) on a small instance, 5 GB of database storage.
  • Serverless: 1 million free requests per month on AWS Lambda functions, and 1 million notifications with Amazon SNS.
  • Other: Amazon DynamoDB (NoSQL database) offers 25 GB storage and enough read/write capacity for free. Amazon CloudWatch (monitoring) provides certain free metrics. AWS data transfer out has a free allotment of 1 GB from Amazon S3, etc.

These are just a few examples – the free tier covers dozens of services. This means you can experiment with a virtual machine, create a website, store files, try a database, all for free. It’s perfect for practicing the things you’ll learn during the challenge.

Important tips for free tier usage:

  • Always stop or delete resources you’re not actively using. For instance, if you launch an EC2 instance to test something, terminate it when done so it doesn’t keep running into the next month beyond the free 750 hours. If you use S3 to store some test files, delete them if you no longer need them. This way you stay safely within free limits.
  • Set up a budget alarm: In the AWS Console, you can go to Billing > Budgets and create a cost budget (e.g., $5 or $10). Set it to alert you via email if you exceed, say, $1 of charges. This way, if you accidentally leave something running that isn’t covered by free tier, you’ll know before the bill gets high. It’s a nice safety net for peace of mind.
  • The free tier is for 12 months from account creation for many services. (Some AWS services are “Always Free” in certain usage amounts, like AWS Lambda’s 1 million calls per month is always free even after a year.) But for your purposes, as a beginner focusing on the Cloud Practitioner, you will likely upgrade to more advanced things or get credits by the time 12 months passes. Still, mark your signup anniversary so you’re aware when full charges would kick in.

Now that your AWS account is ready to go, you’ll use it frequently throughout the 100-day challenge for hands-on exercises. Next, let’s gather the learning materials and resources to help you study the theory and practice questions for the exam.

Best Resources to Learn AWS (Courses, Books, and More)

Learning AWS is easier today than ever, thanks to a wealth of educational resources. Here are some highly recommended tools and study materials, especially tailored for the Cloud Practitioner level:

  • AWS Official Training – Cloud Practitioner Essentials: AWS offers a free on-demand course called AWS Cloud Practitioner Essentials. It’s available on the AWS Skill Builder platform (and sometimes on third-party sites like Coursera). This course includes video modules covering all exam domains. It’s a fantastic starting point because it’s from AWS itself, ensuring you learn the topics that AWS deems important. Plan to go through this course in the early phase of your 100-day journey. It covers cloud fundamentals, introductions to many services, security basics, and AWS’s billing model. (Tip: If English isn’t your strong point, AWS provides this course in multiple languages, or with subtitles – check if a Japanese version is available if you prefer.)
  • Video Courses on Udemy (or Similar): Many students benefit from structured video courses taught by experienced instructors on platforms like Udemy. These courses condense everything you need for the Cloud Practitioner exam into a series of lectures, often with demos and slides. Two popular instructors for AWS certs are Stephane Maarek and Neal Davis, who both offer highly-rated Cloud Practitioner courses. Such courses can make learning engaging, as the teachers often explain complex concepts in simple terms and provide real-world analogies. They can be a great complement to the official AWS training. (If you prefer learning in Japanese, search Udemy for “AWSクラウドプラクティショナー” – there are Japanese-language courses and practice exams available as well.)
  • Study Guides and Books: If you like reading, consider getting a dedicated study guide. A top pick is the AWS Certified Cloud Practitioner Study Guide (Foundational Exam) – this kind of book covers each exam topic in detail and usually includes review questions or even full practice tests. Books are good for structured learning and as a reference; you can highlight important facts or revisit chapters on tough topics. Some official or third-party guides have hundreds of practice questions included, which is a bonus. For Japanese readers, there are books like 「AWS認定クラウドプラクティショナー 教科書」 or 「AWS認定資格試験テキスト（CLF-C02対応）」 that cover the exam in Japanese. These often have diagrams and summary points helpful for beginners.
  • Practice Exam Services: One of the best ways to prepare for the exam is to use practice tests. They train you for the exam format and help identify areas you need to study more. AWS itself offers an official practice exam for a small fee, but you can get better value from third-party providers:
    • Tutorials Dojo / Tech Skillset (TD): Well-known for realistic AWS exam questions. They have Cloud Practitioner practice sets (in English and even Japanese translations) that closely mimic the real exam’s difficulty. Each question comes with detailed explanations and reference links.
    • Whizlabs: A popular platform offering many AWS practice questions and exams. Their Cloud Practitioner exam pack gives you several full-length tests. Questions may vary in quality, but it’s good extra practice and covers a wide range of topics.
    • Udemy Practice Exams: On Udemy, you’ll also find practice exam sets (for example, Stephane Maarek offers a set of 6 practice exams, and so do others like Jon Bonso/Tutorials Dojo under Udemy platform). These often go on sale cheaply and can be a convenient way to get lots of questions.
  • Plan to start taking practice exams once you’ve covered most of the coursework – perhaps around Day 60 or later in your challenge. When you do, simulate exam conditions: set a timer for 90 minutes, no notes, and see how you score. Review every question afterward, especially the ones you got wrong, and read the explanations carefully. This will greatly improve your understanding and retention.
  • AWS Documentation and Whitepapers: AWS’s official documentation is thorough and free. For each service, there’s a developer guide and FAQs – you obviously don’t need to read all of them for an entry-level exam, but if something intrigues you or if you want clarity on a topic, the docs are a reliable source. Additionally, AWS whitepapers can provide insight into best practices. For Cloud Practitioner, recommended reads include Overview of AWS (high-level intro to all services), AWS Well-Architected Framework summary (for cloud best practices), and AWS Security Overview. These can be dense, so use them as reference to clarify concepts rather than mandatory reading front-to-back.
  • Interactive Learning (Hands-on Labs & Games): Beyond static content, leverage interactive tools:
    • AWS Workshops and Labs: AWS regularly publishes guided lab exercises and tutorials (check out AWS Workshops site or events like AWS Skill Builder labs). There are hands-on challenges that give step-by-step instructions to accomplish tasks in AWS – great for practice. Some third-party sites like Qwiklabs (now part of Skill Builder) and A Cloud Guru also offer hands-on labs in a sandbox environment.
    • AWS Cloud Quest: This is a unique, gamified learning experience. AWS Cloud Quest: Cloud Practitioner is essentially a game where you roam a virtual city solving cloud-related challenges. It’s targeted at beginners and covers Cloud Practitioner topics in a fun way. If you enjoy interactive learning, this can be a refreshing addition to your study plan.
    • Cloud Sandbox: Some providers (e.g., Whizlabs, Skill Builder) have sandbox environments where you can try AWS services without worrying about costs, as they provide temporary AWS instances. Not necessary given the free tier, but it’s good to know.
  • Community and Support: Don’t underestimate the power of community. Join forums or groups where you can ask questions or read others’ experiences:
    • Stack Overflow and AWS re:Post: Great for specific technical questions. If you wonder “What’s the difference between service X and Y?” someone likely asked it on these forums.
    • Reddit (r/AWSCertifications): A community of learners sharing tips and encouragement for AWS exams. You can find advice, success stories, and clarification on confusing topics.
    • Local/User Groups: Depending on where you live, AWS User Groups are active in many cities. They might host meetups or online webinars (often free) where you can learn from AWS experts or just network with fellow learners. For example, there’s a large “JAWS-UG” (Japan AWS User Group) community in Japan.
    • Social Media: Follow AWS Training and Certification’s official channels, and instructors or AWS heroes on LinkedIn/Twitter. They often share study tips, free webinar announcements, or discount codes for courses/exams.

As you can see, there’s no shortage of resources. The key is to choose a few that suit your learning style and use them consistently. A balanced approach could be: Watch the AWS Essentials videos to build your foundation, read a chapter of a study guide to solidify it, and do a hands-on lab to apply it. Then rinse and repeat for each topic. Sprinkle in practice questions as you go to test yourself.

Next, we’ll outline how to organize these topics and resources into a coherent 100-day study plan.

100-Day Study Roadmap for AWS Cloud Practitioner

Let’s break down an example 100-day plan covering all the content you need to learn, while incorporating reviews and practice. You don’t have to follow this exact schedule, but it’s a useful template. We’ll divide the 100 days into phases, each with a focus area:

Days 1–20: Cloud Fundamentals and AWS Overview

Focus: Grasp general cloud computing concepts and get an overview of AWS services.

  • Cloud Basics: Start with understanding what cloud computing is. Learn the key benefits (like scalability, elasticity, pay-as-you-go pricing), and the different cloud service models: Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS), Platform as a Service (PaaS), Software as a Service (SaaS). Know examples of each (AWS primarily provides IaaS/PaaS; an example of SaaS is something like Gmail or Dropbox which are consumer services).
  • Deployment Models: Learn the difference between public cloud (e.g., AWS), private cloud, hybrid cloud. Cloud Practitioner exam may ask about basic concepts like “What is a hybrid cloud?” (mix of on-premises and cloud).
  • AWS Global Infrastructure: Familiarize yourself with how AWS is structured globally. Learn what an AWS Region is and what an Availability Zone (AZ) is. For example, AWS has regions like “US-East-1 (N. Virginia)” or “ap-northeast-1 (Tokyo)” – each region is a separate geographic area with multiple AZs (data centers). Also note AWS has Edge Locations for content delivery (used by Amazon CloudFront). You should understand that choosing a region is important for latency, compliance, and redundancy.
  • AWS Management Console: Spend a day navigating the AWS Console. Get comfortable finding services (use the search bar) and viewing service dashboards. Maybe customize your console home by pinning frequently used services. Also, learn about the AWS Command Line Interface (CLI) and AWS mobile app just at a high level (you don’t need to use them yet, just know they exist as alternate ways to access AWS).
  • Core Service Categories: AWS has many services, but they group into categories. Get a high-level overview of major categories:
    • Compute (e.g., EC2, Lambda)
    • Storage (e.g., S3, EBS, Glacier)
    • Database (e.g., RDS, DynamoDB)
    • Networking (e.g., VPC, CloudFront, Route 53 DNS)
    • Security (e.g., IAM, KMS)
    • Analytics, Machine Learning, etc. (you can note that they exist, but detailed learning will come later if needed).
  • In this phase, just aim to recognize the names and purposes of the most commonly referenced services. A good approach: skim through the AWS overview whitepaper or the AWS product webpage and read the one-paragraph description of services that sound familiar from your video course or AWS Essentials training.
  • Hands-On Foundation: Early on, do simple tasks like: create your AWS account (if not already done), set up MFA (multi-factor authentication) on your root user for security, and explore AWS pricing calculator website just to see how one might estimate costs. These small hands-on activities reinforce theoretical concepts (e.g., you’ll understand AWS account security and how pricing can be calculated).

By the end of Day 20, you should be comfortable with basic terminology. You should be able to answer questions like “What advantages does cloud computing offer over on-premise IT?”, “What is the difference between a region and an availability zone in AWS?”, or “Name a few core AWS services and what they do.” This foundational knowledge sets the stage for diving deeper into specific services next.

Days 21–40: Core AWS Services (Compute, Storage, Database, Networking)

Focus: Learn the fundamental AWS services that form the backbone of most cloud applications. This is typically the largest chunk of content.

  • Compute Services: Start with Amazon EC2 (Elastic Compute Cloud). Understand that EC2 is basically a virtual server in the cloud. Learn concepts like instance types (varying CPU/memory), AMIs (pre-configured machine images), and key pairs (for SSH access). You don’t need to know how to configure every setting, but grasp how one would launch an EC2 instance and the fact that you pay per running hour. Also, understand scaling: one benefit of cloud is you can launch multiple instances behind a load balancer or use auto-scaling to adjust capacity on the fly (you’ll revisit that in architecture section, but note it here).
    • Aside from EC2, know the idea of containers (AWS has ECS and EKS services for running Docker containers) and serverless computing. The primary serverless service is AWS Lambda – which lets you run code without managing servers (just know that Lambda executes your functions on demand, with a free tier of 1 million requests).
    • Also, AWS Elastic Beanstalk is a service that helps deploy web applications easily (it handles provisioning EC2, etc.). Be aware of it as a concept of PaaS on AWS.
  • Storage Services: AWS provides different storage options:
    • Amazon S3 (Simple Storage Service): This is a core service to understand deeply. S3 is object storage in the cloud for files and data (images, videos, backups, etc.). Learn about S3 buckets and objects, how you put and get objects, and the fact that S3 can scale virtually unlimited. Key points: S3 is durable (11 9’s durability), stores data across multiple AZs by default, and has configurable access controls. Note S3 pricing is based on storage size, requests, and data transfer.
    • Block Storage: Amazon EBS (Elastic Block Store) are like virtual hard drives for EC2 instances. When you launch an EC2, it likely uses EBS for its disk. Understand EBS persists data even if the EC2 is stopped (unless you delete it). EBS volumes have types (SSD, HDD) and you pay per GB per month.
    • File Storage: Amazon EFS (Elastic File System) provides a managed network file system that can be shared across instances (Linux only). It’s elastic and grows/shrinks automatically.
    • Also note Amazon S3 Glacier is used for archival storage (infrequently accessed, very cheap but slow retrieval).
  • Database Services: AWS has both relational and NoSQL databases:
    • Amazon RDS (Relational Database Service): RDS manages traditional databases like MySQL, PostgreSQL, Oracle, SQL Server, etc., for you. Know that RDS can run in a multi-AZ mode for high availability and that it automates tasks like backups, software patching. You should know RDS is for structured data that needs SQL and strong consistency.
    • Amazon DynamoDB: A fully managed NoSQL database (key-value store). It’s serverless in a sense you don’t manage the servers, and it can scale to huge throughput. Good for scenarios where you need flexible schemas or very high performance lookups.
    • Amazon Redshift: Mentioned as AWS’s data warehousing solution (for big analytics queries on columnar data). Cloud Practitioner might only briefly touch on it as a named service.
    • Amazon Aurora: An AWS-developed relational database engine compatible with MySQL/Postgres but offering performance benefits.
    • At a minimum, know RDS vs DynamoDB differences (relational vs NoSQL) and use cases of each (e.g., RDS for complex queries/transactions, DynamoDB for simple key-value access with massive scale).
  • Networking & Content Delivery:
    • Amazon VPC (Virtual Private Cloud): This is how AWS isolates networks. Understand that when you create an AWS account, a default VPC is there for you, which is a virtual network where your resources (like EC2 instances) reside. Learn terms like subnet (subsections of a VPC’s IP range, typically mapped to an AZ), internet gateway (allows VPC resources to communicate with internet), and security group (virtual firewall for instances).
    • Elastic Load Balancing (ELB): AWS’s service to distribute traffic across multiple instances. Just know it exists and is used to achieve high availability.
    • Amazon CloudFront: AWS’s Content Delivery Network (CDN). It caches content at edge locations worldwide to reduce latency for users. Commonly used with S3 or web applications to serve content faster globally.
    • Amazon Route 53: AWS’s DNS service. It resolves domain names to IPs and can do advanced routing like health-check-based routing. Remember the name Route “53” comes from DNS port 53.
    • AWS networking basics: Perhaps learn that in AWS, each instance or service can have a public IP or private IP. Public means accessible from the internet (if security allows), private means internal within the VPC. Security groups are stateful firewalls controlling traffic. These details solidify conceptual understanding even if not deeply tested.
  • Security Fundamentals (Intro): During this phase, while focusing on services, also start lightly touching security aspects of those services. For example, learn that EC2 Key Pairs are for SSH authentication, S3 buckets can have policies to grant access, and IAM (Identity and Access Management) is used to control access to all these services (you’ll dive deeper into IAM later, but basic usage might come up as you practice using the console).
  • Hands-On Ideas (Days 21–40): It’s crucial to reinforce learning with practice. Some exercises to do in this period:
    • Launch a simple EC2 instance in the free tier (e.g., an Amazon Linux 2 t2.micro). Practice connecting to it (if you’re comfortable with SSH or use the browser-based AWS CloudShell/EC2 Instance Connect). Try stopping and starting it. This teaches you the EC2 lifecycle.
    • Create an S3 bucket and upload a test file (we have a tutorial later in this article for S3). Maybe experiment with making the object public (if it’s not sensitive) and accessing it via a URL, to understand S3 permissions.
    • Spin up a small RDS database instance (if comfortable) or at least go through the creation steps in the console to see what options are there (you can immediately delete it to avoid usage if you’re just experimenting).
    • Create a DynamoDB table via the console and add some items through the UI. It’s a fully managed experience so it’s easy to do.
    • Experiment with CloudFront by delivering content from your S3 bucket (this might be intermediate, but if adventurous, it’s a good mini-project: host a simple static website).
  • These hands-on tasks not only prepare you for exam scenario questions (“Which service would you use to store files? How do you secure an EC2?” etc.) but also build true competency.

After Day 40, you will have covered the meat of AWS services. You should now know what EC2, S3, RDS, DynamoDB, VPC, etc., are and when to use them. Many exam questions boil down to recognizing the right service for a job (e.g., “Which AWS service is best for content delivery?” answer: CloudFront). With the core services under your belt, we move on to the equally important topics of security and best practices.

Days 41–60: Security, IAM, and Compliance

Focus: Understand AWS security and compliance fundamentals, and learn how to monitor your AWS environment.

Security is job zero at AWS, and it’s a significant part of the Cloud Practitioner exam. This phase will cover:

  • AWS Shared Responsibility Model: This is critical to know. AWS is responsible for the security of the cloud (protecting infrastructure: hardware, servers, networking, etc.), while the customer is responsible for security in the cloud (your configuration of services, your data, user access, etc.). Be clear on examples of what AWS manages vs what you manage. For instance, AWS secures the physical data centers and hypervisor; you are responsible for managing users in your account and securing data you store on S3 (like setting the right permissions or encryption).
  • Identity and Access Management (IAM): IAM is the service that controls authentication and authorization in AWS. Spend ample time on IAM:
    • Understand IAM Users (representing individuals or applications that need access), Groups (to group users and attach policies for many users at once), Roles (to give permissions to AWS services or for cross-account access), and Policies (JSON documents that define permissions).
    • Know that IAM allows you to enforce Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA) for extra security on user logins.
    • Learn the principle of least privilege: always give the minimal permissions needed for a user to do their job.
    • Familiarize with how AWS credentials work (access keys for API access vs passwords for console).
    • Hands-on: Create an IAM user for yourself separate from the root account (the root account should ideally not be used for daily work). Assign it admin permissions, then practice logging in with that user. This is a common best practice AWS might ask conceptually. Also try making a role and see how you can assign it to an EC2 instance (just conceptual; full demo might be advanced but understand roles are used for giving EC2 or Lambda permissions to other AWS resources without storing keys).
  • AWS Security Services: Know the purpose of key security-related services:
    • AWS KMS (Key Management Service): for creating and managing encryption keys. Many services integrate with KMS for encrypting data at rest.
    • AWS Shield: a service that protects against DDoS attacks (Standard is on by default, Advanced is a paid option).
    • AWS WAF (Web Application Firewall): helps protect web applications from common exploits (works with CloudFront or ALB).
    • Amazon GuardDuty: an intelligent threat detection service that monitors for malicious activity or anomalies in your AWS accounts and workloads.
    • AWS Config: a service that tracks configuration changes and can evaluate compliance rules.
    • AWS CloudTrail: extremely important – this logs all API calls made in your account (who did what and when). It’s key for auditing.
    • You don’t need deep details on each, but know their names and roles. For example, an exam question might ask “Which service can automatically notify you of suspicious activity, like an EC2 instance making unusual API calls?” (Answer: Amazon GuardDuty).
  • Compliance and Shared Controls: Understand that AWS offers compliance programs (like HIPAA, SOC, ISO certifications) – as a customer, you can inherit AWS’s compliance for your infrastructure. Also know that while AWS manages security of the cloud, you have responsibilities like patching your EC2 OS, configuring security groups, etc. Just be familiar with that divide.
  • Monitoring and Logging:
    • Amazon CloudWatch: service for monitoring AWS resources and applications. It collects metrics (CPU usage of an EC2, etc.) and logs (like your application logs if configured). Know that CloudWatch has Alarms you can set (e.g., alarm if CPU > 80% for 5 minutes) to trigger notifications or auto-scaling actions.
    • AWS CloudTrail: as mentioned, it logs API activity. Know that enabling CloudTrail (which is now usually enabled by default for account activity) is key for auditing and incident response.
    • AWS Trusted Advisor: a tool that gives you best practice recommendations in areas of cost optimization, security, fault tolerance, etc. For Cloud Practitioner, remember that Trusted Advisor can highlight security holes (like “S3 bucket publicly accessible”) as well as cost-saving tips. However, full Trusted Advisor checks require Business support plan or higher (Basic gives some checks).
  • Disaster Recovery & Backup Basics: AWS enables strategies like backups, multi-AZ deployments, cross-region replication for S3, etc. Understand terms like Recovery Time Objective (RTO) and Recovery Point Objective (RPO) conceptually, though depth may not be huge on this exam, it’s good context when thinking about security and availability.
  • Hands-On Ideas (Days 41–60):
    • Practice IAM: Create a couple of test users and groups with limited permissions (for example, a user that only has permission to read from a specific S3 bucket). Test the access to ensure the policy works as intended.
    • Enable MFA on your accounts if not done.
    • Enable CloudTrail in your account (it might already be capturing basic events). Generate some activity (like list S3 buckets) and then check the CloudTrail logs to see the entry. This helps you see what kind of information is recorded.
    • Use CloudWatch: If you have an EC2 running from earlier, check its CPU metric in CloudWatch. Optionally set an alarm on it (just for learning; you can delete the alarm later).
    • Visit Trusted Advisor in the console (it provides core security checks like “do you have MFA on root account?” for free). See what recommendations it gives for your account.
    • If you created any resources, try tagging them (AWS allows tagging resources with key-value pairs). Tagging isn’t a huge exam topic but it’s mentioned as a best practice for organizing resources (e.g., tagging by project, owner, or environment).

By Day 60, security concepts should be second nature. You should understand how AWS secures the cloud and how you, as a user, secure what you build on AWS. Key takeaways: IAM is crucial, CloudTrail is your audit log, AWS has many built-in protections and services to help you secure your environment. Also, at this point in the challenge, you likely have covered all the new theoretical content needed for the exam. The next 40 days will be about cementing that knowledge, learning architecture principles, and doing thorough reviews and practice.

Days 61–80: Architecture Best Practices and Additional AWS Services

Focus: Learn how to put the pieces together and explore any remaining services or concepts not yet covered.

Now that you know individual services, it’s time to understand how they work in concert to create reliable, efficient systems. AWS Cloud Practitioner expects you to know basic design principles and be aware of some higher-level services.

  • AWS Well-Architected Framework: AWS has a set of five pillars for good architecture:
    • Operational Excellence,
    • Security,
    • Reliability,
    • Performance Efficiency,
    • Cost Optimization.
  • You don’t need to memorize exhaustive details, but know these pillar names and what they imply. For example, Reliability means designing for fault tolerance (like using multiple AZs, backups), and Cost Optimization might mean using the right pricing models (like Reserved Instances for steady workloads). The exam might ask something conceptual like “Which pillar of the Well-Architected Framework covers the ability to recover from infrastructure disruptions?” (Reliability pillar).
  • High Availability and Fault Tolerance: Understand strategies AWS offers for high availability:
    • Using multiple AZs (e.g., deploy instances across 2 AZs behind a load balancer, or use RDS Multi-AZ).
    • Auto Scaling to add/remove instances on demand keeps your application resilient under varying load.
    • Avoid single points of failure: e.g., use multiple NAT gateways in different AZs, or ensure if one component fails, there’s a backup (like an S3 static site could serve as backup if your EC2 web server fails, etc.).
    • Disaster Recovery strategies: from least downtime to most downtime: Multi-site active-active, Warm standby, Pilot light, Backup & restore. You might not need all details, but know that AWS enables various DR approaches depending on needs and cost.
  • Scaling and Elasticity: You learned about Auto Scaling groups for EC2. Also note services that scale automatically:
    • Serverless services (Lambda, DynamoDB, S3, etc.) inherently scale without you needing to provision capacity.
    • Content delivery with CloudFront scales to meet demand globally.
    • These concepts map to the Performance and Reliability pillars (ensuring your system can handle load and remain available).
  • Cost Optimization in Practice: Reiterate some AWS cost tips:
    • Use Reserved Instances/Savings Plans for long-running workloads to save money (know the idea, though Cloud Practitioner may not quiz deeply on RIs, just that they exist and provide discounts for commitment).
    • Use Spot Instances for flexible or non-critical workloads (spot instances are spare capacity with big discounts but can be taken back with short notice).
    • Right-size your services (don’t use a huge EC2 if a small one suffices).
    • Turn off resources not in use (like dev/test environments after hours).
    • Utilize free tier and managed services to reduce operational costs for the given scale.
    • Understand that moving to cloud can save costs due to better utilization and not having to manage data centers, but cost management is still important (AWS provides tools for this as discussed earlier).
  • AWS Cloud Adoption Framework (CAF): In context of business, AWS has guidance for cloud adoption in organizations (perspectives like business, people, governance, etc.). For Cloud Practitioner, just be aware that AWS CAF exists as a high-level guideline for companies transitioning to cloud – you likely won’t get detailed questions on it, maybe just a mention.
  • Explore Additional Services: There might be services not yet touched that could appear in an exam question or are just good to know:
    • Messaging Services: Amazon SQS (Simple Queue Service) for decoupling applications with message queues, and Amazon SNS (Simple Notification Service) for pub/sub messaging and sending notifications (SMS, email). Know that SQS ensures messages are delivered and processed asynchronously, SNS broadcasts messages to multiple subscribers. For a scenario: use SQS when you need to buffer requests (like a queue of tasks for a worker to process).
    • Application Integration: Amazon EventBridge (mentioned in newer CLF-C02) – it’s a serverless event bus that can route events between AWS services and your applications. Just know it’s used for building event-driven architectures (e.g., trigger actions when something happens).
    • Analytics: AWS has analytics services like Amazon Kinesis (real-time data streaming), AWS Glue (data catalog and ETL), Amazon Athena (query data in S3 using SQL). For Cloud Practitioner, you mostly need awareness: Athena allows analyzing S3 data with SQL, etc. They likely won’t go deep here, but a question might test if you know that AWS offers analytics solutions beyond just databases.
    • Machine Learning: Be aware AWS has services like Amazon SageMaker (for building ML models), and various AI services (Rekognition for vision, Polly for text-to-speech, etc.). At foundational level, just know they exist as part of AWS’s broad offerings, but they aren’t heavily focused in the Cloud Practitioner exam.
    • DevOps & Deployment: AWS services like AWS CloudFormation (infrastructure as code service to automate resource provisioning using templates) or AWS CodeDeploy/CodePipeline (CI/CD tools). CloudFormation is sometimes mentioned even in Cloud Practitioner context as a way to script and automate deployments, which ties into operational excellence.
    • Management & Governance: AWS Organizations (manage multiple AWS accounts under one master for centralized billing and access control). If you recall, AWS Organizations was added to the new exam domain. Understand that Organizations lets a company group accounts and apply policies to those accounts (like restricting what services can be used, or consolidating billing). Also know Service Catalog (for standardized offerings) and Systems Manager (for managing fleets of instances).
  • It’s a lot, but remember, you don’t need to be an expert on each service. The goal is to familiarize yourself so that if a question mentions one of these, you have a clue what it is. The breadth of AWS is huge; Cloud Practitioner just scratches the surface of each area.
  • Architecture Diagrams: It’s helpful to see visual diagrams of basic architectures. Check AWS’s official architecture center or tutorials – for example, a simple three-tier web app: users -> ELB -> EC2 (app servers) -> RDS (database) with S3 for static files and CloudFront to CDN cache, etc. Visualizing such setups consolidates your knowledge of which service plays which role.
  • Hands-On Ideas (Days 61–80):
    • Draw an architecture diagram for a hypothetical scenario (like a website or a data processing system) using a tool or pencil and paper. Label which AWS services you’d use and why. This exercise connects the dots between services.
    • Try AWS CloudFormation if curious: take a sample template from AWS docs and deploy it to see it create resources automatically. Then delete the stack to clean up. This can demystify what Infrastructure as Code means.
    • Use AWS Cost Explorer in the billing section to review if you incurred any costs (you shouldn’t if within free tier, but it’s good to know how to check your spending and see the cost breakdown).
    • If you have multiple AWS accounts (maybe you and a friend), explore AWS Organizations by inviting an account and see how consolidated billing looks.
    • Enable GuardDuty (it has a 30-day free trial) to see if it flags any findings on your account (likely not much if you haven’t done anything malicious, but just to see the service interface).

Now you’ve touched on almost everything of significance. By Day 80, you have the knowledge needed to answer exam questions and, importantly, an understanding of how to apply AWS in real-world scenarios. The final 20 days will be all about review, practice, and preparation to ensure you’re ready to ace the exam.

Days 81–90: Billing, Pricing, and Support – and Final Review

Focus: Master AWS billing concepts and review all topics; take practice tests to gauge readiness.

  • AWS Billing & Pricing Deep Dive: While we’ve mentioned cost optimization, here we focus on how AWS charges and what tools it provides:
    • Pricing Models: Understand On-Demand (pay by the hour/second with no commitment), Reserved Instances/Savings Plans (commit to 1 or 3 years for discount), and Spot (bid for unused capacity at big discounts, but can lose it anytime). Know which scenarios each model suits: e.g., Reserved for steady long-term workloads, Spot for flexible or stateless tasks.
    • Free Tier reminders: Know what is free for 12 months vs always free vs not free. You don’t have to memorize all, just remember common ones (like always free: Lambda’s 1M requests, DynamoDB’s free tier). Exam might have a question like “What does the AWS Free Tier provide?” (general understanding: free resource usage up to certain limits for new users, some services always have a free level).
    • Cost Management Tools: We discussed AWS Budgets and Cost Explorer. Reiterate them:
      • AWS Budgets: set custom cost or usage budgets and get alerts.
      • Cost Explorer: visualize and analyze cost and usage data over time (useful for identifying spending trends).
      • AWS Cost and Usage Report (CUR): a detailed spreadsheet of all your costs (for advanced analysis, probably beyond CP exam scope).
    • AWS Marketplace: Just be aware AWS has a marketplace where you can buy/rent software solutions that run on AWS (like pre-configured software on EC2, or SaaS products). You pay for them through your AWS bill.
    • Support Plans: This is often tested. AWS offers 4 support tiers: Basic (free for all accounts), Developer, Business, Enterprise. Know the differences:
      • Basic: no tech support aside from account/billing issues, and access to documentation and community forums. Everyone gets this.
      • Developer ($29/month+): business hours email access to support for 1 person, for dev/testing environments.
      • Business ($100/month+ or 10% of spend): 24x7 phone, email, chat support for unlimited contacts, faster response times, and access to Trusted Advisor’s full set of checks, etc. Aimed at production workloads.
      • Enterprise ($15k/month+): All benefits of Business plus a Technical Account Manager (TAM), concierge support, and shortest response times (15 min for critical issues). For mission-critical use.
      • An exam question might give a scenario: “A startup needs around-the-clock technical support and guidance but with a limited budget – which support plan fits?” The answer would be Business (Enterprise would be overkill and Developer lacks 24/7 support).
    • Service Limits: AWS has certain default limits (quotas) per account (like number of EC2 instances of a certain type, or how many VPCs you can create). You should know that limits exist and you can request increases. This is a minor point but often part of managing costs and expectations.
  • Exam Readiness Review: Use this time to go back over all domains:
    • Revisit notes or flashcards you made for key definitions (What’s an AZ? What does IAM role mean? etc.).
    • If there were any topics that you struggled with earlier, now is the time to fill those gaps. For example, maybe you weren’t clear on how CloudFront works – re-read that section or watch a quick tutorial video on it.
    • Go through the official AWS exam guide checklist (it lists tasks like “Define the billing models in AWS” or “Explain the Shared Responsibility Model”). Ensure you can explain each item in your own words.
    • It might help to teach someone else or pretend to. Explain out loud what you learned; if you can clearly teach a concept, you likely understand it well.
  • Full-Length Practice Exams: Sometime in this window (maybe Day 85 or so), take a full-length practice exam if you haven’t already:
    • Simulate test conditions: quiet environment, set a timer (90 minutes), and answer 65 questions from a reliable practice exam source.
    • After finishing, score it (most platforms do this automatically). Review every question’s explanation. Take note of any questions you got wrong or guessed on. Identify which domain they belong to – do you notice a pattern? (e.g., maybe you got several wrong in the Security domain – time to refresh IAM and KMS concepts, etc.)
    • If your score is above, say, 80-85%, that’s a good sign. If it’s lower, don’t panic – use it as a guide to focus your final studying. Many people take multiple practice exams to build confidence. Each time, you’ll see improvement.
    • Two days later, perhaps take another exam from a different question bank. Repeating this cycle of test -> review -> improve can significantly boost your readiness.
  • Exam Logistics: By around Day 90, schedule your actual AWS exam if you haven’t already. AWS exams are taken through Pearson VUE or PSI. You can book online for an at-home exam (just ensure a quiet room, good internet, and follow the proctoring rules) or schedule at a testing center near you. Slots can fill up, so scheduling a week or two in advance is wise. Having an exam date also gives you a target and sense of urgency for the last stretch of study.
  • Mental Prep and Rest: Don’t neglect rest and mindset. Cramming the night before isn’t as helpful as getting a good night’s sleep. In these days, make sure you’re getting enough rest so you don’t burn out. Daily study can be tiring, and by day ~90 you deserve some light review days. Trust the work you’ve put in.

By Day 90, you should feel confident in your knowledge. You’ve covered all domains, practiced exam questions, and know what to expect. The final step is just to polish your readiness and keep a positive mindset.

Days 91–100: Final Polishing and Exam Day

Focus: Last-minute review, relax, and succeed in the exam.

  • Use Days 91-94 to review any remaining weak spots. It might be useful to re-read summaries or cheat sheets. AWS provides a “exam readiness” webinar for Cloud Practitioner – if available, you could watch that as a recap.
  • Day 95: Do a light practice – maybe re-do some questions you got wrong before, or quiz yourself with flashcards/key points. Don’t overdo new material; just reinforce what you know.
  • Day 96-97: Relaxation and Rest. It may sound odd in a study plan, but ensuring you’re not stressed is important. At this point, avoid heavy studying. Just do a light skim of notes. Trust that you know your stuff.
  • Day 98-99: Exam Checklist. Make sure you have everything ready for exam day:
    • If going to a test center: print your confirmation email, have two forms of ID ready, know the route and parking, etc.
    • If taking online: install the testing software ahead of time, run the system test, ensure your webcam and microphone work. Clean your desk area as they require.
    • Remind family or roommates about your exam time so they don’t interrupt.
    • On the day before, prepare the materials you might need (ID, earplugs for center maybe, a drink for break if allowed).
  • Day 100: Exam Day! Have a healthy breakfast, and arrive on time or set up early. During the exam, manage your time (65 questions in 90 minutes is plenty if you don’t get stuck too long on one question – you can flag and return later). Read questions carefully; watch out for keywords like “most cost-effective” or “best practice” which indicate the nature of the answer they want. Eliminate obviously wrong answers to improve your odds if you need to guess. With the thorough preparation you’ve done, you’ll find many questions are straightforward. For any tricky ones, use logic and the knowledge you’ve built.
  • After finishing, you’ll usually see a preliminary result (pass/fail) on the screen. Congratulations – if you followed the challenge and put in the effort, there’s a very high chance you’ll PASS! Within a few days, you’ll get an official email from AWS with your certification digital badge and certificate.

Completing the exam is a fantastic achievement, but beyond that, think of how far you’ve come in 100 days: from knowing little or nothing about AWS, to now being AWS Certified and comfortable with cloud concepts. This knowledge will be a foundation you can build on for future learning or career opportunities.

Hands-On Tutorial: Your First AWS Project (S3 Bucket Exercise)

Theory is important, but nothing beats actual hands-on experience. Let’s do a simple tutorial to get you familiar with using the AWS Management Console. We’ll create an Amazon S3 bucket (a storage container in AWS) and upload a file to it. This will illustrate how easy it is to use AWS services.

Goal: Create an S3 bucket and upload a file into it using the AWS Console.

Steps:

  1. Log in to AWS Console: Sign in to your AWS Management Console with your account credentials. You’ll see the AWS services dashboard (the home screen).
  2. Open the S3 Service: In the console, find the search bar at the top and type “S3”. Click on “S3 – Scalable Storage in the Cloud” from the results. This will take you to the Amazon S3 dashboard, where you manage storage buckets.
  3. Create a New Bucket: Click the “Create bucket” button. You’ll be prompted to enter a bucket name and select a region.
    • Bucket name: This must be globally unique (no two AWS customers can have the same bucket name) and follow certain rules (all lowercase, no spaces, etc.). Choose something like “my-100day-challenge-bucket-12345” (adding random numbers or your name helps make it unique).
    • AWS Region: Choose a region close to you (for example, if you’re in Japan, you might choose “Asia Pacific (Tokyo)”, which is ap-northeast-1). The region is where your data will reside.
    • Leave other settings at default for now (Object Ownership, Block Public Access, etc., can remain as default which is secure).
    • Scroll down and click “Create bucket”. That’s it – your bucket will be created in a few seconds and appear in your S3 buckets list.
  4. Upload a File to the Bucket: Now that you have a bucket, let’s put a file in it.
    • Click on the name of your new bucket to open it. (It might be empty since you just created it.)
    • Click the “Upload” button. In the upload dialog, you can either drag & drop a file or use the “Add files” button to select a file from your computer.
    • Choose a small test file (for example, a picture or a text file). Remember that any data you upload to S3 (even a few KB) will count, but a small file is negligible in cost especially within free tier (5 GB free).
    • After selecting the file, click “Upload” (you can just accept the defaults for permissions and properties for now). The console will show an progress bar and then a success message once the upload is done.
    • You should now see the file listed in your bucket.
  5. Verify the File and Understand Permissions: Click on the file in the S3 bucket listing. You’ll see its details, including a link to Object URL. By default, S3 buckets are private, meaning if you copy that Object URL and paste it in a browser, you’ll not be able to view the file (unless you make it public). That’s good – AWS secures things by default. For now, don’t change the permissions; just know that the file is safely stored in your bucket and only accessible to you (or whoever you grant access).
    • (Optional Advanced Step: If it’s an innocuous file and you want to test access, you could try making it public. S3 will require you to disable the “Block Public Access” setting at the bucket level and then set the object permission to public. This is a bit involved and AWS will warn you about making data public. If you’re just experimenting, feel free to skip making anything public, as it’s not necessary for this tutorial.)
  6. Cleanup (Optional): The file you uploaded will incur practically no cost (fractions of a cent) and the bucket is empty aside from that, so you can actually leave it as is – it’s within free tier. But if you’re done practicing and want to keep your account tidy:
    • You can delete the file: go back to the bucket, check the box next to the object, click “Delete” and confirm.
    • You can also delete the bucket itself: from the bucket list, select your bucket, then choose “Delete bucket”. You’ll need to type the bucket name to confirm deletion. (Note: a bucket must be empty to delete it, so delete the file first as above).
    • It’s good practice to clean up resources you create for testing, so you don’t accidentally accumulate too many things or confuse yourself later.

Congratulations! You have just performed your first AWS cloud task: storing data in the cloud. In a real scenario, you could use S3 to host a website, backup important documents, or serve data to an application. With this simple exercise, you saw how intuitive the AWS Console is – it’s point-and-click to create resources.

Throughout the 100-day challenge, you’ll do many more hands-on activities like this – launching servers, configuring networks, etc. Each time, it will reinforce the concepts you learn and give you confidence in using AWS.

Conclusion: Ready to Take on the Cloud

Embarking on the 100-Day AWS Cloud Practitioner Challenge is a fantastic way to transform from a cloud novice to a confident AWS user. Over roughly three months, you will have systematically covered everything from “What is the cloud?” to deploying real resources on AWS. You’ve learned the core AWS services, understood best practices, and even gotten your hands dirty with the console. This journey not only prepares you to pass the AWS Certified Cloud Practitioner exam, but also lays a strong foundation for further AWS certifications or cloud projects you want to tackle.

A few final tips and encouragement:

  • Keep the Momentum: After achieving the Cloud Practitioner certification, don’t stop learning! The cloud field is continuously evolving. You can set new goals – perhaps try an AWS Solutions Architect Associate next, or apply your skills to a project (like building a personal website on AWS). The study habits you formed in these 100 days will serve you well in any tech learning endeavor.
  • Stay Curious: If you encounter new AWS services or announcements (AWS is known for releasing lots of new features annually, especially around re:Invent conference), take a moment to read a summary. With your foundational knowledge, you’ll be able to understand new concepts more easily. Cloud Practitioner is just the beginning; AWS has specialty areas (from machine learning to security to advanced networking) that you can explore based on your interests.
  • Leverage Your Certification: Add your AWS Cloud Practitioner certification to your resume, LinkedIn, and professional profiles. It’s a recognized credential that shows your initiative and knowledge. You might be surprised – even an entry-level cert can make you stand out for certain roles or help you in discussions at work about cloud projects. If you’re in a non-technical role, this cert signals that you understand the tech side enough to bridge conversations with IT teams.
  • Community & Networking: You now belong to a growing community of AWS certified individuals. Engage with them – join AWS events or local meetups, participate in online forums, or consider writing a blog post about your 100-day learning experience. Networking can lead to job opportunities, mentorship, or collaboration on projects. Plus, teaching others is a great way to reinforce your own knowledge.
  • Adapt for Japanese Audience (日本の皆様へ): (For those writing a Japanese version, ensure to adjust tone and examples accordingly, acknowledging any local AWS community or resources available in Japanese.)

Finally, give yourself a pat on the back. Committing to a 100-day challenge is no small feat, and completing it is something to be proud of. AWS might have seemed intimidating at first with its alphabet soup of services, but now you’ve got clarity on many of them. Cloud computing is the backbone of modern IT, and you’ve taken a big step in mastering it.Now, go forth and conquer the cloud! Good luck on your exam and enjoy your cloud journey. The skills you gain here will be invaluable as technology continues to shape the world. Happy learning, and see you in the cloud!

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