Which of the following is an advantage of AWS cloud computing over traditional on-premises infrastructure?

Correct answer: You benefit from massive economies of scale

Option D is correct because AWS aggregates usage across millions of customers, which drives down the per-unit cost of computing, storage, and networking, allowing customers to benefit from economies of scale they could never achieve independently. Option A is incorrect because a core AWS advantage is the ability to provision capacity on demand in minutes, eliminating the need to predict and purchase capacity years in advance. Option B is incorrect because AWS inverts this relationship: customers trade large upfront capital expenses for smaller variable operating expenses, not the other way around. Option C is incorrect because with cloud computing AWS manages and owns the physical hardware; customers lose direct hardware control, which is an intentional trade-off for agility and cost savings.