Chapter PCA professional tier
Professional Cloud Architect
Editor's note — A study companion for the Professional Cloud Architect exam — every domain rebuilt from scratch, with worked practice questions and an exam-grade timed simulation.
50 questions 120 minutes threshold 700/1000 6 domains official guide
Table of Contents
I. Design Plan Cloud Solution Architecture 25% weight
Case Study: EHR Healthcare Case Study: Altostrat Media Case Study: Cymbal Retail Case Study: KnightMotives Automotive Google Cloud Well-Architected Framework (WAF) Analyzing Business Requirements Designing for HA and DR Compute Selection and Design Storage and Database Selection Designing Network Resources AI/ML and Generative AI Design Migration Strategy and Planning II. Manage Provision Cloud Solution Infrastructure 17% weight
Configuring VPC Network Topologies Configuring Hybrid and Multi-Cloud Connectivity Managing Cloud Storage Lifecycle Configuring Disk and File Systems Provisioning Compute Engine Resources Managing Google Kubernetes Engine (GKE) Configuring Serverless Environments Provisioning Vertex AI Workflows Generative AI and Model Garden Configuration Infrastructure as Code (IaC) with Terraform III. Design Security Compliance 18% weight
Identity and Access Management (IAM) Resource Hierarchy and Org Policies Encryption and Key Management VPC Service Controls Cloud Armor and Network Security Software Supply Chain Security AI Security and Model Armor Compliance and Regulatory Governance Audit Logging and Transparency Comprehensive Network Security Design IV. Analyze Optimize Technical Business Processes 15% weight
Modernizing the SDLC CI/CD Pipeline Optimization Troubleshooting and Debugging DR Planning and Business Continuity Optimizing Business Processes Stakeholder Management Cost Optimization and FinOps Change Management and Governance Data Migration and Integrity Site Reliability Engineering (SRE) Processes V. Manage Implementation 12% weight
API Management with Apigee Advising Development Teams Automation with gcloud CLI Using Cloud SDK and Client Libraries Advanced Terraform for GCP Implementation with Gemini Cloud Assist Environment Management and Testing Resource Tagging and Labeling Deployment and Automation Scripts Managing Service Accounts for Teams VI. Ensure Solution Operations Reliability 13% weight
Cloud Monitoring and Observability Cloud Logging and Error Reporting Application Performance Management (APM) Alerting and Notification Strategies Implementing SLIs, SLOs, and SLAs Incident Response and Management Chaos Engineering and Resilience Testing Release Management Strategies Load Testing and Capacity Planning Quality Control and Security Testing