How Hard Is the CompTIA A+ Exam?

Why candidates actually fail A+

Talk to people who narrowly missed a core and the same handful of causes come up. These are the genuine difficulty drivers:

1. Underestimating the breadth. No single A+ topic is deep, but the objective list is enormous. Candidates who study their favourite areas thoroughly and skim the rest get caught by the exam's even spread. The objectives document from CompTIA's site is the only reliable map of what can appear.
2. Rote-memorising ports and acronyms without context. Knowing that a port number exists is not the same as recognising it inside a troubleshooting scenario. A+ questions increasingly wrap facts in situations — "a user cannot reach…" — and context-free flashcard knowledge collapses under that framing.
3. Freezing on performance-based questions. PBQs reward hands-on familiarity. If you have never actually navigated the settings being simulated, the interface itself becomes the obstacle. This is the most common complaint from book-only studiers.
4. Ignoring CompTIA's troubleshooting methodology. Both cores test the official troubleshooting steps, and questions about "what should the technician do NEXT" expect CompTIA's ordering — identify the problem before establishing a theory, verify functionality before documenting. Answering from personal habit rather than the methodology costs easy marks.
5. Treating Core 2 as a formality. After passing Core 1, momentum tempts candidates to book Core 2 quickly and cram. Its higher passing score (700 vs 675) and its less "study-able" operational content make that a poor gamble.

Every one of these is avoidable, which is precisely why A+ deserves its reputation as demanding-but-fair.

Is A+ hard for complete beginners?

Yes — but not prohibitively. CompTIA recommends around 12 months of hands-on experience in an IT support role before attempting A+, yet there is no enforced prerequisite, and beginners pass it regularly.

Consider a realistic case: a retail supervisor moving into IT with no professional experience but a habit of fixing family laptops. Core 1 will feel half-familiar — they have handled RAM, storage drives and Wi-Fi settings — but the networking theory and enterprise hardware content will be new. Core 2 will be the bigger stretch: they have used Windows for years but never administered it, and concepts like security policies or ticketing procedures are workplace knowledge they simply haven't acquired. For this person, A+ is genuinely challenging; the gap is closed with deliberate hands-on practice (spare machines, virtual machines, guided labs), not extra reading.

Contrast that with a helpdesk analyst eighteen months into their first job. Most of both cores describes their daily work; their risk is complacency on the memorisation-heavy corners (display standards, cable specifications) that never come up on shift.

Two practical safety nets soften the difficulty for everyone. First, CompTIA's retake policy allows an immediate second attempt with no waiting period (a 14-day wait applies from the third attempt onwards) — though each attempt needs a new full-price voucher, and at a US retail price of $274 per exam as listed by CompTIA's authorized resellers in June 2026 (prices vary by country), failing is an expensive habit. Second, you can benchmark yourself before spending anything: working through CompTIA practice questions and scoring your results by domain shows you exactly how far from ready you are, while the questions themselves train the scenario-style reading the real exam uses. How many weeks that gap takes to close depends on your starting point — we cover realistic timelines separately in how long to study for CompTIA A+.

How A+ difficulty compares with other CompTIA exams

Within CompTIA's lineup, A+ is the gentlest of the core technical certifications but not the easiest exam CompTIA sells — Tech+ sits below it as a true pre-career option. Network+ demands deeper theory in one domain rather than shallow knowledge across many, and many candidates who found A+ manageable rate Network+ the harder sit; the sequencing question between the two is settled in our A+ vs Network+ comparison. Security+ is a further step up in abstraction. If you are still choosing your first CompTIA exam altogether, the decision logic lives in which CompTIA certification to start with.

Frequently asked questions

What score do I need to pass each A+ exam?

Core 1 (220-1201) requires 675 and Core 2 (220-1202) requires 700, both on a scale of 100–900. They are scaled scores, not percentages, so there is no fixed "number of questions right" that guarantees a pass.

If I fail one core, do I lose my pass on the other?

No. Each core stands alone once passed, and you can retake only the exam you failed. Both passes must, however, come from the same exam version, so avoid long gaps that risk a version retirement between your two sits.

Is there an official A+ pass rate?

No. CompTIA does not publish pass rates for any of its exams. Any percentage you see online is an estimate or an invention, and no reliable failure statistics exist.

Are the performance-based questions scored more heavily?

CompTIA does not disclose per-question weighting. Treat PBQs as worth real marks but never worth unlimited time — flagging a difficult PBQ and returning later is a legitimate and widely used tactic.

A fair verdict on A+ difficulty

CompTIA A+ is a wide, shallow, two-part test that rewards hands-on habit and even coverage, and punishes cramming and favouritism. For candidates with a year of IT support behind them it is a firm but reasonable checkpoint; for complete beginners it is a genuine challenge that demands practical lab time, not just reading. What it is not is a lottery — the failure causes are known, specific and avoidable. When you can work scenario-based practice questions across every domain without leaning on a lucky specialism, you are ready to book; the step-by-step route to that point is mapped in our guide to preparing for CompTIA A+.