CCAO-F · exam guide v1.0 · effective 2026-07

Claude Certified Associate – Foundations

Exam blueprint and preparation reference

The certification is intended for professionals who use Claude as a productivity tool and build Claude Projects in their day-to-day roles.

Gnar policy · not from the exam guide

Do not sit CCAO-F, and do not prepare for it

CCAO-F earns no Claude Partner Network Services Track credit. Passing it does not add an active certified individual, so it moves Gnar's tier position by exactly zero. It is the one Anthropic credential of the four that does not count.

Everything below is the real, complete exam blueprint, published for comparison — so that the decision not to sit it can be made against the facts rather than in the dark. There is deliberately no practice bank and no study guide for CCAO-F: preparation time belongs on the three credentials that count.

If someone wants this certification for their own reasons, that is theirs to choose and this page is here for them. Just do not fund it as a route to the Select tier, and do not count it in the headcount — see docs/partner-status.md.

About this certification

The Claude Certified Associate – Foundations certification validates that an individual can apply Claude to complete business and productivity tasks with minimal guidance. This includes using built-in platform features, capabilities, and tools to streamline workflows; identifying opportunities to improve processes with Claude; selecting approaches that balance quality, efficiency, and cost; and recognizing limitations and escalating more complex or technical work to Claude Architects and Developers. It is intended for professionals who use Claude as a productivity tool in roles such as operations, marketing, project management, education, and communications.

Anthropic's words, from section 1 of the CCAO-F exam guide, v1.0. This guide is subject to change without notice.

No practice items for this credential, by choice.

Its blueprint is fully transcribed, so everything on this page is current. No item bank will be written against it: CCAO-F earns no tier credit, and authoring practice for it would spend the effort that the three credentials which do count have a claim on. Practice is live for CCAR-F, CCDV-F, CCAR-P.

Exam content outline

Domain names and weights are the guide's. “Expected items” is weight × 60 — what a real sitting draws, not a prediction about anyone's score.

Domain	Weight	Expected items
D1 Prompting and Task Execution	14%	8
D2 Output Evaluation and Validation	21%	13
D3 Product and Model Selection	12%	7
D4 Workflow Integration and Solution Design	16%	10
D5 Configuration and Knowledge Management	12%	7
D6 Governance, Risk, and Responsible Use	15%	9
D7 Troubleshooting and Optimization	10%	6

Objectives, by domain

This guide publishes a flat list of objectives per domain rather than numbered task statements. Exam items are written against these.

D1 Prompting and Task Execution 14%

Create effective prompts for business and technical tasks
Apply task decomposition techniques to structure complex requests
Iterate prompts to improve output quality
Adapt prompting strategies based on task type (analysis, research, drafting, brainstorming)

D2 Output Evaluation and Validation 21%

Evaluate Claude-generated outputs for accuracy and completeness
Identify hallucinations, inconsistencies, and biases in responses
Apply fact-checking and validation techniques
Determine when human review or additional verification is required
Edit, adapt, refine, and compare outputs for the intended audience
Organize and curate information and select appropriate output formats (artifacts, inline, structured data)

D3 Product and Model Selection 12%

Select appropriate Claude product features (Projects, research mode, chat, artifacts)
Differentiate between Claude model types (Haiku, Sonnet, Opus)
Align model selection with task requirements (cost, speed, quality)
Understand and manage context limitations and memory considerations (when to restart, summarize, or persist)

D4 Workflow Integration and Solution Design 16%

Apply Claude to analyze requirements and use cases
Leverage Claude for research, planning, and process optimization
Use Claude to support solution design, development, and iteration
Integrate Claude into existing workflows to augment or redesign them
Communicate Claude's value and limitations to stakeholders

D5 Configuration and Knowledge Management 12%

Configure Claude Projects with instructions and knowledge sources
Manage uploaded knowledge and connectors (e.g., Google Drive, Gmail)
Create effective system-level instructions
Inform, maintain, and update Claude configurations, knowledge sources, and instructions

D6 Governance, Risk, and Responsible Use 15%

Identify appropriate and inappropriate use cases
Apply data sensitivity, regulatory, and privacy considerations
Follow organizational AI policies and governance standards
Understand the ethical implications of AI usage

D7 Troubleshooting and Optimization 10%

Identify, diagnose, and resolve issues with underperforming prompts or poor outputs
Adjust approach based on feedback and results
Optimize workflows for efficiency and effectiveness

Domain names, weights and the objective text above are Anthropic's words, transcribed from section 6 of the CCAO-F exam guide.

Exam details and policies

Form: 60 items · 120 minutes multiple-choice, multiple-response
Fee: $99
Cut score: 720 of 1000 Scaled from a standard-setting study, so it is not 72%. No practice percentage converts into it.
Valid for: 12 months
Delivery: Proctored: online proctored and/or test center, per program policy
Result reporting: Pass/fail with scaled score (100–1,000), plus percent-correct by domain on the score report

Prerequisites

There are no mandatory prerequisites or required courses, and no software-development or API experience is needed. The experience above is recommended, not required. The credential is awarded based on exam performance alone.

Link the company email domain before you book.

Linking takes 7–10 days, and a certification earned on an unlinked domain does not credit toward the Claude Partner Network Services Track count. This is our program note, not Anthropic exam-guide content — see docs/partner-status.md.