How to Reschedule a Certification Exam

Most certification exams can be moved to a new date free of charge, provided you act more than 24 hours before your appointment. Log in to the account you booked through — usually Pearson VUE, reached via your certification provider's portal — open your upcoming appointment, and choose a new date and time. Miss that 24-hour deadline, though, and most providers treat the change as a no-show: the full fee or voucher is forfeited.

That single deadline is the reason to deal with a clashing exam date today rather than tomorrow. This guide covers only moving an existing booking — the deadlines, the fees where they exist, and the exact steps. If you want to withdraw entirely and recover your money, see how to cancel a certification exam instead; if the appointment has already passed, the rules in what happens if you miss your certification exam apply.

The 24-hour rule, and who deviates from it

The industry default is simple: reschedule at least 24 hours before your appointment and it costs nothing; inside 24 hours, you cannot change the booking and a no-show forfeits everything you paid. CompTIA (for in-person appointments), Microsoft and AWS all follow this pattern.

Two major providers structure things differently:

• PMI (PMP) works on a 30-day scale. More than 30 days out, rescheduling is free. Within 30 days of the appointment, PMI charges a US$70 fee. Within 48 hours of the appointment you cannot reschedule at all — at that point a missed exam forfeits the full fee. (Policy summarised from PMI's Pearson VUE scheduling guidance; confirm current terms at pmi.org.)
• ISC2 (CISSP, CCSP, SSCP, CC) charges an administrative fee for every change: US$50 to reschedule, regardless of how far out you are, per ISC2's published exam pricing.

A useful exception in the other direction: CompTIA states that online OnVUE exams can be rescheduled or cancelled any time before the exam actually starts — a more generous window than its 24-hour rule for test-centre appointments. One caveat if you booked with approved test accommodations: CompTIA requires three days' notice to cancel those appointments, so treat accommodated bookings as needing extra lead time.

Reschedule deadlines at a glance (as of 2026)

Provider	Free reschedule window	Fee or restriction inside the window
CompTIA (test centre)	More than 24 hours before	Inside 24h: fee/voucher forfeited
CompTIA (OnVUE online)	Any time before the exam starts	Accommodated bookings: 3 days' notice
Microsoft	More than 24 hours before	Inside 24h: fee forfeited; some free/promotional exam offers need 6+ business days' notice to avoid a fee
AWS	More than 24 hours before	Maximum two reschedules per appointment; a third change means cancelling and rebooking
PMI (PMP)	More than 30 days before	US$70 fee within 30 days; locked within 48 hours
ISC2	US$50 admin fee applies to any reschedule	—

Policies change; always confirm the current wording on your provider's policy page before relying on a deadline.

How to reschedule step by step

The mechanics are broadly the same across every programme delivered by Pearson VUE — which includes CompTIA, Microsoft, Cisco, AWS, ISC2 and PMI exams.

1. Sign in through your certification provider's portal, not by searching for Pearson VUE directly. Microsoft candidates go through their Microsoft Learn profile, AWS candidates through their AWS Certification account, CompTIA candidates through their CompTIA sign-on, and so on. This routes you to the Pearson VUE dashboard tied to the correct programme.
2. Open your upcoming appointments. Your booked exam appears with its date, time and delivery method (test centre or online).
3. Select the appointment and choose "Reschedule". If the option is greyed out or missing, you are probably inside the locked window — contact the provider's candidate support immediately rather than assuming nothing can be done.
4. Pick a new date, time and (if applicable) test centre. Seat availability varies by location, so have two or three acceptable slots in mind. Online-proctored slots typically offer more flexibility around the clock.
5. Pay any reschedule fee and confirm. ISC2 and in-window PMI changes will ask for payment at this step; most others will not.
6. Check the confirmation email. Verify the new date, the time zone, and the delivery method. A surprising number of missed exams trace back to a time-zone mix-up on a rescheduled online appointment.

If your exam is delivered by PSI rather than Pearson VUE — ISACA's CISA is the main example in this cluster — the same logic applies through PSI's booking interface, but ISACA's own deadlines govern; check isaca.org for the current terms, as they are not standardised with the Pearson VUE programmes above.

What rescheduling does to your voucher and eligibility

Rescheduling in good time changes nothing except the date: your payment or voucher simply follows the appointment. Two boundaries are worth knowing, though.

Voucher expiry does not move. A CompTIA voucher is typically valid for 12 months from purchase, and rescheduling an exam does not extend it. If you keep pushing the date back, make sure the new appointment still falls inside the voucher's validity window — an expired voucher is forfeited money.

Eligibility windows do not move either. PMP candidates have a one-year eligibility window from application approval, with up to three attempts inside it. Rescheduling repeatedly is allowed within PMI's fee structure, but the new date must still sit within that year.

AWS adds a count limit: each appointment can be rescheduled at most twice. A third change requires cancelling and rebooking from scratch, which brings AWS's cancellation terms into play.