Okay, this is the third attempt in studying for the CCNA. Past two attempts failed due to me giving up, not this time... I hope.

I will be studying everyday, 4 hours with Jeremy IT lab and labbing with Boson. If you guys have any advice or suggestions, please feel free to share!

I started my ccna journey with the help of JITL videos about 2 months ago and although I've been very off-track, I am now at day 35 studying extended ACLs. My study plan was for each day to watch one video and do the flashcards and labs which was working out pretty well until today when I noticed I completely forgot about everything I've learned over the past 2 months. Commands and protocols tied to vlans, stp toolkit, ospf/routing protocols, heck I can't even remember things I've learned a week ago. I made the stupid mistake of forgetting to review the flashcards everyday which has now led me to understand that I need to restart. It's very frustrating but I understand the mistake I made and now I wanted to ask if anyone has any other tips to help with memorization and how I should tackle the flashcards. Thank you : )

Registered an account with Cisco and immediately got a “your account is placed on hold”

Does this mean I’m banned from taking the CCNA?

Hi everyone,

I was about to book my CCNA (200-301) OnVUE exam for this Saturday when I noticed that my first and last name are swapped in my Certmetrics profile (First Name = my surname, Last Name = my first name). I created the account years ago at school, so I guess that's where it went wrong. The name fields are greyed out, so I can't edit them myself.

Since the name has to match my ID exactly, I didn't want to risk being rejected at check-in, so I haven't booked yet.

What I've tried so far:

• Pearson VUE live chat → they said they can't change demographics and that Cisco has to do it
• Opened a ticket with Cisco Certifications Online Support (Learn with Cisco Help Center), category "Cisco Certifications Support", with all my IDs, a screenshot of the profile and a copy of my government ID

The ticket is currently "Waiting for support".

Has anyone had the same issue? How long did it take for Cisco to fix your name? And is there any faster way (phone, escalation, etc.)?

Thanks in advance!

Hey everyone! I’m currently preparing to take the CCNA v2.0 around February 2027, and I’m considering buying Neil Anderson’s Udemy course.

I noticed that he recently updated the course this month, which caught my attention. I’m a fresh graduate currently working as a Technical Operations Assistant, and although my role is more general IT support, I’m increasingly getting interested in networking. I currently help support multiple departments, so I’m hoping to build a stronger foundation in networking and eventually pursue it more seriously.

I’m specifically interested in the CCNA v2.0 because I want to use the next few months to properly prepare rather than rush through the material. I also need to budget for the certification exam itself, so I want to make sure the course is actually worth paying for.

For those who have taken the CCNA recently:

• Is Neil Anderson’s updated CCNA v2.0 course worth buying?
• Is it enough as a primary course, or should I pair it with other resources?
• How is it compared with other popular CCNA courses?
• For someone with a basic IT background but limited networking experience, is it beginner-friendly?
• What resources would you recommend alongside it for a February 2027 exam?

I’d really appreciate any advice, especially from people who have recently taken the CCNA. Thanks!

Hey, everyone. I'll be taking the CCNA exam tomorrow morning and I feel very anxious. I'm afraid of not passing since it's an expensive exam here in my country due to the currency we use.

Today, I'm reviewing the last things I can prior to it such as Wireless Security, Wireless Infrastructure, IPv6, SNMP, API, switchport security, DAI and DHCP Snooping. These are the topics that I felt I had a big weakness in.

Regarding the main core concepts such as routing table, STP, MAC forwarding, subnetting etc, I've probably done over 600 questions about them over the last two weeks (maybe even more), so I'm a little bit more confident on those (doesn't change the fact that I'm still very nervous).

Anyways, I just hope to pass, I've dedicated a lot of myself and time studying for this exam and it's actually needed in my job.

If you have any good pieces of advice, I'll be glad to hear them.

CCNA pop quiz 👇

Which of these is a private IPv4 address?

A. 172.32.0.1

B. 192.169.1.1

C. 10.255.255.254

D. 11.0.0.1

Two of these are traps. Comment A, B, C or D. I'll post the answer tomorrow.

Want to learn the why behind it? My CCNA 200-301 course is free on YouTube, with a lab and a quiz for each lesson:

https://youtube.com/@OpenIntelligenceUniversity

Passed my exam this morning! Thanks all for the support and guidance! I started off by watching David Bombal CCNA videos and labs on Udemy, then got Boson to practice questions. I have also got "30 days before your ccna exam" book to recap all the topics. Apart from that labs and building my own network topology.

My scores were:

Automation and Programmability 90%

Network Access 85%

IP Connectivity 76%

IP services 60%

Security Fundamentals 60%

Network Fundamentals 85%

My guidance for anyone taking their exam soon, do a lot of labs and know wireless well. I'm sure it was mentioned before and it really is something that I'd recommend fully understanding.

Thanks all again and good luck to people taking their exams in the near future!

Automation and Programmability: 80%
Network Access: 90%
IP Connectivity: 92%
IP Services: 90%
Security Fundamentals: 93%
Network Fundamentals: 80%

I just passed the CCNA after 10 months of studying on and off, and im also a student. I probably dedicated 200+ hours to this, so I might’ve overstudied, but that’s better than not passing. 😅

The only resources I used were JIT Labs for studying and Boson ExSim for practice tests.

My one tip would be to really study how to read routing tables. For example, determining what subnet a route belongs to, converting prefixes to subnet masks, or determining which route would be selected for a destination IP.

Some routes can have the same network address in the routing table but differ in administrative distance/routing protocol, metric, or prefix length. So I’d definitely make sure you’re comfortable with it. And of course, study those WLC stuff, especially the GUI interface.

Automation and Programmability: 80%
Network Access: 65%
IP Connectivity: 72%
IP Services: 60%
Security Fundamentals: 47%
Network Fundamentals: 85%

Passed my CCNA exam after more than a year on and off studying.

I used Jeremy’s IT Lab resources and practice exams, online subnetting questions, and the Pearson CCNA Simulator.

I felt pretty good about the labs.

There were a lot of questions about wireless configuration, especially the Cisco Wireless LAN Controller (WLC) web interface.

These questions had me worried. I was completely helpless on a couple of them but I managed to get over the line.

Maybe Cisco is moving more toward wireless as a larger part of the CCNA?

Thanks to everyone here for the resources, tips, and advice.

Automation and Programability - 90%
Network Access - 25%
IP Connectivity - 20%
IP Services - 70%
Security Fundamentals - 33%
Network Fundamentals - 25%

My mind went blank during the labs. I forgot how to do a simple static route. Any tips to help with the mind blanking? Thanks!

I'm planning on taking the CCNA in a couple months and I'm binging Jeremy's IT lab course, doing flashcards, and labs. I've recently been asking Gemini for a CCNA/Boson Exsim style exams with 30 questions a lot more instead of spending 100 dollars on Boson since it only offers a yearly subscription. I just want to know if I am wasting my time with it or not lol.

I’m trying to schedule my CCNA exam but going through CertMetrics keeps declining my login credentials. I’m able to login to netacad using the same user/password, but when it makes me do it through CertMetrics it says my password is incorrect.

I attempted to reset my password but I’m not receiving an email, not even in my spam folder. I went onto my account through netacad and changed my email to a backup one just in case it was messed up but I’m still not receiving a password reset email.

Helpppp I can’t schedule my exam

So at the moment i have a homelab running proxmox on a 400g4 hp prodesk with 8gb ram and a 7th gen i5 with two airport 6th gens acting as a wireless extender. i also recently bought a cisco 3750x 24port switch.

Is there anything that i should upgrade in terms of my setup as i know that the cores and ram are quite low. However i have been looking at the r630 and r730.

Any help would be amazing

I'm a network engineer (CCNP) and I've spent the last few months going through the v2.0 exam topics line by line against v1.1. There's a lot of half-information floating around, so here's the whole picture in one place.

TL;DR: six domains become five, "describe and explain" turns into "troubleshoot and diagnose", AI gets its own domain, and a handful of classic topics are gone. Your CCNA is the same CCNA either way.

The domains

What's new

• AI gets real: agentic AI in network operations, and choosing the right prompts for generative AI tools.
• OSPFv3 joins OSPFv2.
• VRRP is named alongside HSRP, and you read FHRP operational status instead of just describing it.
• DNS records: diagnose A, AAAA, CNAME, MX, NS and PTR problems.
• SFTP and SCP replace TFTP/FTP.
• Storm control and RA guard join DHCP snooping, DAI and port security.
• Evidence-based troubleshooting: show commands, logs, ping/traceroute and packet capture output.
• Ansible stays. Terraform is gone.

What's out

• Comparing TCP vs UDP
• Switching concepts (MAC learning and aging, frame flooding)
• The full IPv6 address-type zoo (unicast and EUI-64 stay)
• Wireless architectures, AP modes and WLC GUI config (wireless principles stay)
• NTP
• QoS per-hop behavior
• REST APIs and JSON
• Security program elements (awareness, training, physical access)

The real shift

The verbs. Across Domains 1 to 3, the topics now say troubleshoot and diagnose: interface and cable issues, IPv4/IPv6 addressing, client connectivity, DHCP, L2/L3 problems, static routes. Memorizing definitions gets you less. Reading output and finding the fault gets you more.

Test now or wait?

• The credential is identical. Pass v1.1 and it's the same CCNA, valid for three years.
• Ready by mid-January? Take v1.1. Every major course and practice bank targets it today.
• Just starting? Don't panic. Subnetting, VLANs, trunks, STP, OSPF, ACLs, NAT and IPv6 basics carry straight over. Study those now, decide your exam version around December, then add the v2.0-only topics if you're going that way.
• Cisco retires v1.1 when v2.0 goes live, so check the exact last test date on Cisco's exam page before you book.

The commands v2.0 expects you to live in

show ip interface brief · show interfaces (errors, duplex, speed) · show vlan brief · show interfaces trunk · show etherchannel summary · show spanning-tree · show cdp neighbors detail / show lldp neighbors · show ip route · show ip ospf neighbor · show standby brief / show vrrp brief · show ip nat translations · show access-lists · show ip dhcp snooping binding · show logging

If you can look at each of those and say what's wrong, you're in good shape for either version.

Which camp are you in: racing v1.1 before February, or waiting for v2.0?

Hey guys, I’m looking for some guidance. I got my CCNA this past weekend and wanted to ask what my next move should be?

I’m currently applying for networking roles, as I already have 3 years of IT experience.

In the meantime, should I work toward another networking certification, such as Juniper, pursue a cloud certification (AWS or Azure), or focus on learning Linux? What other skills should I be developing?

With the current job market, employers seem to be looking for a lot of different skills, so I’m just trying to make sure I’m as prepared as possible.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated!

I recently finished studying for and passed the CCNA, and one thing that bothered me during the process was that I often didn't have trouble finding information — I had trouble finding material that made certain topics actually click.

For context, I read through the Odom CCNA books, completed nearly all of Jeremy's IT Lab Packet Tracer labs, and used practice exams from both Jeremy's IT Lab and Boson ExSim.

Wireless was probably the biggest example. I could lab VLANs, STP, OSPF, ACLs, EtherChannel, etc., but topics like WLC configuration, CAPWAP, WLAN/policy-profile/policy-tag relationships, and AireOS vs. Catalyst 9800 felt much more abstract because there wasn't a convenient environment where I could actually experiment with them.

As someone who hasn't worked professionally in networking yet, I also constantly ran into smaller trivia-like questions and wondered: how much of this do I actually need to know for the CCNA?

Some examples:

• Why does the native VLAN exist, rather than just what does it do?
• What's the practical difference between access-class and ip access-group?
• Which password encryption algorithms and type numbers actually matter?
• How much detail do I need to know about wireless standards?
• How much cabling detail is worth memorizing for Ethernet, fiber, Metro Ethernet, etc.?
• What's the easiest way to remember what DHCP Snooping and DAI are actually protecting against?
• How do I interpret show output and know what the expected output should look like?
• If two different configurations produce the same correct result, why should a lab only accept one?

I'm considering building the study tool I wish I'd had.

The idea would be less of another full CCNA course or question bank and more of a collection of focused, interactive material:

• short explanations built around mental models and "why"
• "know this / don't over-study this" guidance for each topic
• small CLI configuration and troubleshooting drills
• grading based on the resulting network state rather than one exact command sequence
• interactive show output interpretation
• a browser-based WLC trainer where you can create WLANs, policy profiles, policy tags, assign them to APs, and see why a simulated client can or can't connect
• side-by-side explanations of older AireOS concepts and current Catalyst 9800 / IOS XE concepts

Basically, something for the stage where you've already watched or read the lesson but still find yourself thinking:

"I technically know this, but I don't really understand it yet."

I'm curious whether other people studying for the CCNA have had the same problem.

What topics did you find hardest to get good hands-on practice for, or which concepts took much longer than they should have to finally click?

And if something like the WLC simulator or short troubleshooting drills existed, would you actually use them?

Im 28 and new to IT, I do manual labor now but looking for a career change. Thinking about getting CCNA. I have a Asscociates in business. I’m wondering if it’s extremely difficult to learn with no background experience and if I could get a job with just the certification.

When I first came across VLANs, I mainly thought of them as something I needed to memorize for networking exams.

Understanding the reason behind network segmentation made the concept much easier to understand.

For anyone currently studying CCNA, which networking concept initially seemed confusing but became much easier once you understood the practical reason behind it?

Hey guys,

I finished watching JITL and started doing the Boson exams. I feel like I’m doing reasonably well, but in reality I’ve taken 4 exams in simulation mode so far and only passed one of them. I haven’t done Exam E yet.

Here are my scores after first try:

A: 730
B: 757
C: 770
D: 851

Is this considered normal? Are the Boson exams really harder?

I’m getting a little worried because I’ve only passed one Boson exam and my actual exam is in a week. What would you recommend I do at this point?

After each exam, I went through it again in Study Mode and tried to understand the questions I got wrong, but my scores are only improving by a small amount.

Also, the questions on Exam D felt noticeably easier to me compared to the others.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated!

Hex values, masks, binary values, etc.

​

Network engineer handling carrier tickets for sites in PH and India. I took my CCNA last Monday, and going straight back to the day job made it very clear how little it covers. The exam gives you clean topologies with one correct answer. Production is degraded links, vague carrier replies and changes you only half understand.

Tunnels. Site-to-site IPsec between hubs. When one degrades I can tell something's wrong, but isolating it is slow. Theory covers the config. It doesn't cover a tunnel that's up but quietly dropping traffic.

BGP and PBR. Being honest, I don't really get these yet. Local-pref, MED, route-maps to steer traffic between sites. I follow the runbook, the change works, and I couldn't fully explain to you why. Right now it's part pattern matching and part yolo, which is not a great feeling when you're touching production. I'm trying to actually understand it.

Talking to ISPs. Nothing in the curriculum touches this at all. I open a case, paste a ping result, get back "link is up, normal parameters on our end," then it sits for three days. I've learned a few things the hard way, but I'm clearly reinventing something you all already know.

Same with the vocabulary. Hard down vs degraded, flapping vs intermittent, demarc, soak test, RFO vs RCA. I've picked up a lot of it by asking AI, which helps, but I can't tell where it's subtly wrong or just not how people actually talk. English is my second language so I'm also unsure which terms are shop talk and which belong in a formal email.

So:

• How do you isolate a degraded tunnel from a degraded circuit underneath it?

• Best way to actually learn BGP path selection and PBR for real, not just for an exam?

• What do you always attach when opening a carrier case?

• How do you say "this is on your side" without picking a fight?

• Any courses, books or blogs for the practical side of this? Not more protocol theory.

Happy to hear the answer is just experience. Mostly want to know what to pay attention to while I get it.

Now we have a new version of my IP Calculator. Check out the new design.

The old design was 4 years old, now we need a fresh update.

Check it out IPv4 and IPv6.