I passed the exam in April this year, and I’d like to share my personal experience and some tips for beginners. My background is not in data science, and I had only used some basic AWS services before starting my preparation. If you are new to AWS or don’t have a technical background, don’t worry — with the right approach, you can still pass the exam.
1. Give Yourself Enough Preparation Time
I recommend setting aside at least one month to prepare. Start by visiting the official AWS exam guide https://aws.amazon.com/certification/certified-machine-learning-specialty to understand which services and topics are covered. This helps you focus your study on the areas that are most important for the exam.
2. Take an Online Course
Choose one structured online course from any learning platform (Udemy, Coursera, A Cloud Guru, etc.). Most of the courses are quite dry, so don’t expect them to be very exciting, but they will give you the necessary foundation.
While following the course, take notes. If possible, create one your own AWS account and explore the services. Familiarising yourself with the AWS Management Console UI helps you remember what each service looks like.
For the confused part, watch YouTube, there are a lot of hands-on demos for you.
3. Practice with Questions
After finishing the course, start doing practice exams. These will show you your weak points. Whenever you found that a service or concept you don’t understand, search for a short, clear video on YouTube. Visual explanations can often make things much easier to grasp than just reading documentation.
4. Study Routine
My personal schedule was about one hour or two hours of study per day. This consistent pace worked well without overwhelming me. If you stay disciplined, one month of focused study is enough for many beginners.
5. Additional Tips
Don’t try to memorize everything — focus on understanding the use cases of each AWS service.
Learn how different services integrate (e.g., S3 with Lambda, Glue with Athena, etc.).
Use free-tier resources in your AWS account to test things hands-on. Doing is always better than just reading.
Right before the exam, review the services that come up most often in practice questions.
Final Thoughts
You don’t need to be a data scientist or an AWS expert to pass this exam. With a clear study plan, the right resources, and steady practice, you can achieve it too.
My biggest advice is: stay consistent, use practice questions, and don’t hesitate to look for simpler explanations when something feels confusing.
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