The AWS Developer Associate exam used to feel like a hidden boss fight—devs often underestimated it after breezing through Cloud Practitioner, only to find themselves knee‑deep in tricky Lambda nuances and DynamoDB edge cases. With AWS services multiplying faster than Netflix recommendations, you need focus, not FOMO. This AWS Certified Developer – Associate Cheat Sheet 2025: Pass DVA‑C02 on Your First Try condenses the avalanche of docs, whitepapers, and re:Invent sessions into a single roadmap. Read it, spin up the hands‑on labs, and you’ll stride into the testing center—or proctored living‑room exam—ready to smash that 720/1000 score line.
We’ll casually drop AWS Certified Developer – Associate Cheat Sheet 2025: Pass DVA‑C02 on Your First Try once more further down, so both search engines and skimming humans remember what you’re studying. Let’s dive.
Exam Blueprint Snapshot
| Item | Details |
|---|---|
| Code | DVA‑C02 |
| Duration | 130 minutes |
| Questions | 65 (50 scored, 15 unscored) |
| Passing Score | 720 / 1000 |
| Price | $150 (practice test $20) |
| Domains | Deployment (22 %), Security (26 %), Development with AWS Services (30 %), Refactoring & Monitoring (22 %) |
Pro tip: DVA‑C02 loves hands‑on nuance—expect CLI flags, IAM policy snippets, and CloudWatch metric thresholds. Breadth still beats depth, but you’ll need to know why a Lambda hits InitDuration spikes or how to fix SQS visibility timeouts without breaking exactly‑once processing.
The Developer‑First AWS Mindset
You’re being tested as a builder, not an architect. That means:
- Code‑Level API knowledge—SDK retries, exponential backoff, paginators.
- Event‑Driven Wiring—Lambda + EventBridge + SQS fan‑out.
- Security in Code—Parameter Store, Secrets Manager, KMS encryption calls.
- Automation—CloudFormation / SAM / CDK flush.
- Monitoring & CI/CD—CloudWatch, X‑Ray, CodePipeline.
Keep that lens on every scenario.
Deployment & CI/CD Essentials (22 %)
SAM vs CDK vs CloudFormation
Mnemonic: “Infra, Constructs, Crates.”
- CloudFormation – Infra as YAML/JSON.
- SAM – Adds
Transform: AWS::Serverless-2016-10-31; simplifies Lambda/APIGW; still YAML. - CDK – Code Constructs in TypeScript, Python, Java, Go; compiles to CloudFormation (the “crates”).
Typical exam cue: “Developer wants to define infra in their preferred programming language and deploy immutable stacks.” → CDK.
CodePipeline Cheat Lines
| Stage | Tool | Default Artifact Handling |
|---|---|---|
| Source | CodeCommit/S3/GitHub | Generates ZIP or .tar.gz |
| Build | CodeBuild | buildspec.yml drives phases |
| Deploy | CodeDeploy / CloudFormation / SAM | Rolling, Blue/Green |
Remember: CodeBuild has no subnet by default—VPC config is extra.
Blue/Green Deploy Flags
- Lambda – Use aliases; CodeDeploy shifts traffic by weight or “linear/canary.”
- ECS – Blue/Green via CodeDeploy + Route 53.
- Elastic Beanstalk – Swap CNAME.
Cold‑start latency? Use provisioned concurrency before traffic shift.
Security Section (26 %)
IAM Least Privilege Quick Rules
- Prefer roles over users inside AWS (no secret keys).
- Use condition elements:
aws:SourceArnfor Lambda → S3 triggers. - Set resource‑level permissions for S3, DynamoDB; no wildcards unless read‑only lists.
Remember sts:AssumeRole is always in the trust policy, not the permission policy. Common exam trap.
Secrets Management Decision Tree
| Need | Service | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Rotating RDS creds | Secrets Manager | Built‑in rotation w/Lambda |
| Non‑rotating API keys | SSM Parameter Store (SecureString) | Cheaper, 4 KB limit |
| Envelope encryption, custom keys | KMS | Customer Managed Key (CMK) |
Secrets Manager costs $0.40 per secret monthly + $0.05 per 10 000 API calls.
Encryption Cheat
- S3 default – AES‑256 SSE‑S3 (AWS managed).
- Client wants own keys – SSE‑KMS with CMK or CSE.
- DynamoDB – Transparent server‑side AES 256.
- EBS – Encryption at rest enabled by snapshot or during creation.
- Kinesis – Uses KMS key for each stream when enabled.
Development with AWS Services (30 %)
Lambda Nuggets
- Memory scaling = CPU scaling.
- Ephemeral
/tmpstorage: 512 MB default; 10 GB option. - Elastic Network Interface (ENI) created at cold start for VPC access—use Lambda Function URLs when public and skip APIGW overhead.
- Reserved concurrency throttles invocation bursts; provisioned concurrency warms environment.
Cold Start Math: Execution billed at Duration + InitDuration.
SDK Retry Defaults
- AWS SDK v3 for JavaScript & v2 for Python use standard mode: 2 try + 3 retry (total 5 attempts) with Exponential Backoff Jitter.
API Gateway Quick Table
| Flavor | Best When | Limits |
|---|---|---|
| REST API | Legacy, feature‑rich (authorizers, request validation) | $3.50/million + data |
| HTTP API | Cheaper, lower latency | $1/million; IAM/OIDC auth only |
| WebSocket API | Real‑time duplex | Up to 10 000 RPS/connection |
API GW + Lambda concurrency synergy: use Lambda integration for dynamic compute; for high fan‑out >500 RPS, consider ALB.
DynamoDB Speed Round
- Capacity modes: On‑Demand (predictable $ per request) or Provisioned (RCU/WCU).
- DAX – In‑memory cache, sub‑millisecond, TTL.
- Streams – 24‑hour change log; Lambda trigger in “exactly‑once” streaming mode.
- Transactional APIs –
TransactWriteItems,TransactGetItemsguarantee ACID across tables. - Partition key design: 10 GB hotspot is the soft throttle.
SQS vs SNS vs EventBridge
- SNS – Fan‑out pub/sub; push to HTTP, Lambda, SQS. No persistence.
- SQS Standard – Unlimited throughput, at‑least‑once, 12‑hour retention (max 14 days).
- SQS FIFO – Exactly‑once, 3000 msg/s with batching.
- EventBridge – Near real‑time event bus, schema registry, cross‑account routing.
Exam scenario: Need to buffer jobs for downstream processing with ordering → SQS FIFO.
Refactoring & Monitoring (22 %)
X‑Ray Map Anatomy
- Segments – Each service (Lambda, EC2).
- Subsegments – Downstream calls (DynamoDB, HTTP).
- Annotations – Key/Value indexed for filter.
- Bottlenecks color code: red = error, yellow = throttling.
Inject tracing SDK at code if not using Lambda Service Integration.
CloudWatch Logs & Metrics
- Log retention default: indefinite (0).
- Metric Filters convert log patterns → custom metrics.
- Embedded Metric Format (EMF) inserts JSON metric in log line; no separate PutMetric.
- Alarm types: Static, Anomaly, Predictive (machine learning).
CodeGuru Profiler & Reviewer
- Profiler – Continuous CPU & heap; saves 50 % CPU spend claims.
- Reviewer – Pull‑request code analysis, finds hard‑coded secrets, concurrency bugs.
—Expect at most one question each; know they integrate with CodeCommit and GitHub, and reviewer supports Java, Python, TypeScript.
Memory Numbers to Tattoo (2025 Version)
- Lambda payload max: 6 MB synchronous, 256 KB for async invocation, 10 MB for Function URLs.
- SQS message size: 256 KB (up to 2 GB via S3 extended).
- Kinesis shard: 1 MB/s in, 2 MB/s out, 1000 records/s.
- API Gateway timeout: 29 seconds (REST) / 30 seconds (HTTP).
- DynamoDB TTL scan: deletes within 48 hours.
- CloudFront default TTL: 24 hours (min 0, max 1 year).
Use these to smash “what’s the limit?” questions.
7‑Day Accelerated Study Plan
- Day 1 – Watch AWS official Developer Associate course (3 h) + create flashcards.
- Day 2 – Build Lambda + HTTP API sample; add X‑Ray tracing (2 h).
- Day 3 – DynamoDB hands‑on: Streams + Lambda, DAX cache (2 h).
- Day 4 – CI/CD: SAM pipeline, CodeBuild tests, CodeDeploy blue/green (2 h).
- Day 5 – Security labs: IAM roles, KMS encryption, Secrets Manager rotation (2 h).
- Day 6 – Full practice exam; review wrong answers.
- Day 7 – Re‑read this cheat sheet, rest, schedule the real exam.
AWS Certified Developer – Associate Cheat Sheet 2025: Pass DVA‑C02 on Your First Try—Final Tips
- Know the why behind service choices, not just what they do.
- Build something— muscle memory trumps rote memorization.
- Map questions to domains— if scenario screams “cost,” likely Billing answer isn’t correct here.
- Stay calm— mark tough ones, circle back; 130 minutes is plenty.
- Celebrate— 900+ scores exist, but a 720 pass looks identical on LinkedIn.
FAQ
Is Developer Associate harder than Solutions Architect Associate?
They’re similar in breadth, but Developer digs deeper into Lambda, SDKs, and CI/CD pipelines; architects face more design trade‑offs.
Do I need to memorize CLI syntax?
Know basic patterns (aws s3 cp, sam deploy --guided) but the exam focuses more on concepts than exact flags.
How much coding appears in the test?
Short snippets or JSON IAM policies—no full algorithms. Recognize what a policy allows or what SDK call retries.
Can I pass with theory only?
Possible, but hands‑on labs raise confidence and retention dramatically.
How long is the cert valid?
Three years. Renew via an updated exam or AWS continuing‑education credits.
