How I Passed the AWS Certified Cloud Practitioner (CLF-C02)#
Welcome back to my random reader across the world. Today I want to write about what I did to pass my most recent certification, the AWS Certified Cloud Practitioner (CLF-C02). For those unfamiliar, the CCP covers cloud concepts, security and compliance, core AWS services, and billing and pricing. It’s a foundational cert, but a solid starting point for anyone building their AWS credentials.
The Course#
I took a course from Udemy by Stephane Maarek called NEW Ultimate AWS Certified Cloud Practitioner CLF-C02 2026, and after completing it, he offers 6 practice tests that can be found here. My study method was straightforward: I completed about 2 sections per day and took notes as I went. I also set up an AWS Free Tier account at the start of the course so I could follow along with the hands-on portions and actually practice in the console as I learned. I’d recommend doing this early on because seeing the services in action makes the concepts stick a lot better than just watching the lectures alone.
The Focus Struggle#
About halfway through the course, I started struggling with focus. I had a conversation with Claude AI about how to improve my concentration, and the root cause turned out to be simple. I kept getting sidetracked by my phone. The fix was equally simple: I started leaving my phone in a different room whenever I sat down to study. It sounds obvious, but it made a huge difference. If you’re studying for a cert and feel like you can’t focus, honestly, try just putting your phone somewhere out of reach before anything else.
And it wasn’t just the phone working against me. I was also battling Central Texas Mountain Cedar season at the same time. If you’ve never experienced it, the tree pollen out here is brutal and it definitely made it harder to stay sharp during study sessions. Between the distractions and the allergies, there were days where I had to really force myself to sit down and get through the material. But you push through.
Staying Accountable#
To keep track of my progress, I documented everything in Jira tickets. I’d add comments on my progress throughout the week, and when my weekly sprint was over, I’d close it out and start a new one, just like I was on the job. I know I don’t have a paying job right now, but I still treat this effort like one. That mindset has been key to staying disciplined during my career transition.
Practice Exams#
After completing the course, I took the practice exams back to back just a few days before my scheduled exam date. I’ll be honest, I scored around 63% on the first practice exam and it was discouraging. But I kept pushing through, reviewing what I got wrong, and by the third practice exam I was scoring 80%+. Seeing that improvement was a real confidence boost. By that point I was feeling more prepared, so the day before the exam I rewatched the summary lecture for each section that had one and made sure to revise the AWS Well-Architected Framework Pillars as a final review.
Exam Day#
The exam itself was actually more straightforward than the practice exams. I was able to complete it in about 30 minutes, even though you get 100 minutes. My final score was 776 out of 1,000, a comfortable pass with 76 points above the 700 minimum. That said, if you’re scoring well on the practice exams, you should feel confident going into the real thing. The practice exams are genuinely harder.
What’s Next#
My next step is the AWS Certified AI Practitioner. I’ve already taken a peek at the course and it looks like I’ll be learning about AWS Bedrock services, which I’m genuinely excited about. I plan to follow the same study approach: 1 to 2 sections per day until I finish the course, and then practice exams again. And just like before, I’ll continue using Jira to track my progress and giving my Randstad coach weekly status updates. Having that combination of self-tracking and another human to keep me accountable has been valuable throughout this whole process.
Well, that’s all. See you in the next one.
P.S. I used ChatGPT and Claude as sounding boards while reviewing this post. Their feedback helped tighten things up, but the ideas and final edits are mine.