Cisco Revs CCNA R&S Cert (V3.0)

Cisco Revs CCNA R&S Cert (V3.0); Leans Forward

Yep, it’s official. Cisco just announced (May 17, 2016) big changes to the #CCENT and #CCNA, that is, the Cisco Certified Entry Network Technician (CCENT) and Cisco Certified Network Associate (CCNA) Routing and Switching certifications. As with any big change, there are new exams, exam numbers, and changes to the exam topics. This post gives the overview, some links, and a promise of more posts in the next few days.

Exam Structure Unchanged, But Exam Numbers and Cert Names Change

First off, when Cisco makes a big announcement about one of their certifications, many aspects of the certification can change. Cisco always changes the exam numbers, and they always change the exam blueprint (the document that lists all the exam topics). They could also change details like the number of exams you must take, or even remove an old certification or replace it with a new certification.

For these May 2016 announcements for the CCENT certification and the CCNA Routing and Switching certifications, Cisco changed only the exam numbers and the exam blueprint details for those exams. No program details were changed. Simple enough.

To briefly review you have two options: pass both the ICND1 and ICND2 exams, or pass the CCNA Routing and Switching exam. With the new exam transition, you can pass a combination of old and new. (For CCENT certification, you just have to pass the ICND1 exam.) Figures 1 and 2 list those paths, along with the new exam numbers introduced in 2016.

Figure 1: Exam Path to CCENT (New Exam, May 2016)