AZ-303 Study Guide
Interested in the Microsoft Azure Solutions Architect Certification? To get it, you have to pass two exams: AZ-303 and AZ-304. In this post, I’m going to show you exactly how I prepared for and passed the AZ-303 exam.
1. Microsoft Learn
Microsoft Learn is a free learning resource which provides learning modules on many different Microsoft technologies including Azure. Completing Microsoft Learn modules and learning paths was the most important part of my preparation for the exam. In many of the modules, a free Azure sandbox subscription is provided so you can complete engaging practical exercises for free.
The official exam page already suggests many Microsoft Learn learning paths. However, these are nowhere close to sufficient for passing the exam comfortably. I’ve listed a more comprehensive set of learning paths which will leave you much more prepared for the exam:
- Architect Network Infrastructure
- Architect Storage Infrastructure
- Architect Compute Infrastructure
- Architect Infrastructure Operations
- Architect Data Platforms
- Architect Message Brokering and Serverless Applications
- Architect Modern Applications
- Architect Migration, Business Continuity and Disaster Recovery
- Azure Network Security Services
- Azure SQL Fundamentals
- Azure Kubernetes Service
- Manage Identity and Access in Azure Active Directory
I’d also recommend completing the following individual modules which deal with topics not covered in the above learning paths:
- Configure BitLocker Encryption for Windows Virtual Machines
- Secure Virtual Machine Disks
- Keep Your Virtual Machines Updated (Azure Update Management)
- Azure Automation State Configuration
- Azure Bastion
2. Official Study Guide
While Microsoft Learn modules will give you most of the content you need to pass the exam, they don’t cover everything. For example, Microsoft Learn doesn’t have much material on Azure AD Connect, which is very likely to be on the exam. Reading the official study guide goes a long way towards filling those gaps in your knowledge and is also a great way to review what you learned from Microsoft Learn in a different format.
The official study guide includes helpful exam tips which let you focus on content which is likely to be tested. It also has some useful practice questions to test your knowledge, although it would have been better if the authors included more of them. The study guide is also organized so that it matches the official exam skills outline very closely. This will help you gain confidence that you know all the required material.
3. Supplemental Material
After completing the Microsoft Learn modules and reading the study guide, you may still feel that there are still some subjects you don’t understand. I’d recommend going through the official exam skills outline and making a note of which skills you think you need more practice with. In my case, I felt that I still needed to understand Azure Migrate and various load-balancing services better. These Pluralsight courses helped me to round out my knowledge:
You don’t have to use Pluralsight, of course. You can use any other resource that’s out there to supplement your knowledge including YouTube videos and Microsoft documentation.
4. Official Practice Exam
So now that you’ve learned all the material, you’re ready to take the exam, right? Not quite—at least, I wasn’t ready yet. Making good use of the official practice exam will drastically increase your chances of passing AZ-303. When I took the actual AZ-303 exam, there were at least 5 questions which were almost identical to ones I saw in the practice exam. That’s almost 10% of the exam! Questions which repeat from the practice exam are essentially freebies and getting them right can be the difference between passing and failing.
After you complete a run of the practice exam, you will be shown the questions which you got wrong. The practice exam will give you a solid explanation of why the right answers were correct and why the wrong ones were incorrect. It will provide links to Microsoft documentation and other sources which will give you more information on the subject. I’d strongly recommend reading the linked documentation whenever you get an answer wrong. It’s even worth looking at the explanations for the questions you got right, as you may learn something you didn’t know. Used this way, the practice exam becomes another method of learning.
5. Take the Exam!
If you’ve done everything I mentioned above, you are totally ready to take this exam. When I took the AZ-303 exam, there were 56 questions to answer in 2 hours and 10 minutes. It’s a good idea to finish the exam quicker so you have time to double-check your answers, especially the ones you weren’t sure about. I wanted about 20 minutes to review my answers, so I knew I had to complete each question in less than 2 minutes. I suggest doing a similar quick calculation when you take the exam.
Don’t waste too much time on questions you are not sure about. It’s most important to complete the exam. The exam gives you a button on each question to mark it for review later. If you’re particularly uncertain about a question, you should take your best guess, mark the question for review and move on. If you have time left over, you can always come back to it.
I hope this study guide helped with your preparation for the AZ-303 exam. Good luck!
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