Exam Details
AWS · SCS-C03
Secure AWS workloads with advanced identity, encryption, and threat detection strategies.
Practice with ExamOS for AWS Certified Security - Specialty. Learn daily with scenario-based questions, timed quizzes, detailed explanations, and exam-style difficulty.
Who is this for?
Level: Advanced. This specialty exam rigorously focuses on securing AWS environments. While there are no formal prerequisites, AWS strongly recommends having at least two years of hands-on experience securing cloud workloads. You must have a deep understanding of AWS security services, including IAM, KMS, CloudTrail, GuardDuty, and WAF. Knowledge of complex network security, encryption protocols, incident response, and compliance frameworks is absolutely essential. Holding an Associate-level certification beforehand is heavily advised.
Are you ready?
You are prepared to pass if you can confidently design impenetrable architectures, proactively identify risks, and explain how to protect critical data across all AWS services. Challenge your security expertise with a timed practice test!
Overview
The AWS Certified Security Specialty (SCS-C03) certification is designed for professionals who secure AWS environments at scale. It focuses on identity and access management, data protection, infrastructure security, logging, and incident response. The exam tests your ability to design and implement secure architectures using AWS services such as IAM, KMS, CloudTrail, GuardDuty, and Security Hub. Candidates are expected to understand how to protect data in transit and at rest, manage permissions, and detect and respond to security events. A key aspect of this certification is understanding how different AWS services interact from a security perspective. You will encounter scenario-based questions that require choosing the most secure and operationally efficient solution. As organizations move critical workloads to the cloud, security becomes a primary concern. This certification is particularly relevant for roles such as cloud security engineer, security architect, and compliance specialist. Professionals with AWS security expertise are in high demand, especially in industries handling sensitive data, making this certification a strong addition for those specializing in cloud security.
FAQ
The AWS Certified Security - Specialty exam consists of 65 questions, which include both multiple-choice and multiple-response formats. Candidates are allocated 170 minutes to complete the exam.
The exam is scored on a scale of 100 to 1,000, and a minimum scaled score of 750 is required to pass. Unanswered questions are scored as incorrect, so it is beneficial to provide an answer for every item.
The exam content is distributed across six primary domains:
Effective preparation involves a combination of AWS whitepapers, digital training, and documentation for services like KMS, IAM, and GuardDuty. To ensure you are ready for the complexity of the exam, ExamOS offers scenario-based practice quizzes that build real exam confidence by mimicking the logic and structure of the actual questions.
The registration fee is $300 USD. If you have previously passed an AWS certification, you can typically use a 50% discount voucher found in your AWS Certification Account benefits section to reduce the cost to $150 USD.
If you do not pass the exam, you must wait 14 days before you are eligible to retake it. You must pay the full registration fee for each attempt, and there is no limit on the number of times you can take the exam, provided you observe the waiting period.
The certification is valid for three years. To recertify, you must either retake the current AWS Certified Security - Specialty exam or pass the AWS Certified Solutions Architect - Professional exam, which will automatically renew your specialty-level certification.
There are no formal prerequisites for taking the SCS-C03, though AWS recommends candidates have at least five years of IT security experience and two years of hands-on experience securing AWS workloads. The exam is designed for individuals in security-focused roles such as Cloud Security Engineers and Security Architects. ExamOS provides an excellent platform to test the technical depth required for these specific roles through its practice assessments.
Earning this certification signals to employers that you can manage complex security configurations, but it does not guarantee a high-level role on its own. In the current market, this credential is most effective when paired with a strong background in DevOps or network engineering; without significant hands-on experience, the certification may only qualify you for mid-level security analyst positions rather than senior architectural roles.
Once you have mastered the security specialty, the most logical next steps include: