As with much in the computer technology industry in the last 4 years, there has been much changes and upheaval. I took my Cisco certified network associate exam in Jan 2023. Here are some hints:

If you’re from BCIT, schedule the exam after the last networking class at bcit cisa 2 year program. Most of the questions are from the first 3 terms but not all. Even though eigrp is not on the exam, policy based routing on route maps is (which is ridiculously advanced to be on that exam). As well as testing whether you know what a recursive route is. Last term at BCIT teaches policy routing with route maps, and dynamic multipoint vpn/ nhrp. The smattering of OSPF you learned in year 1 might get you past the CCNA but you go over OSPF trouble shooting for 2 classes in year 2, and that is going to help with problems where CCNA asks “Here is 2 configuration, they don’t connect, what is wrong?”. Year 2 , term 2 is also where they go over MPLS, though I can’t remember if that was on CCNA (I still don’t know how MPLS works). Year 2 term 1 is also where they go over VTP, vlan transfer protocol and you can count on 2 questions from that that obscure, but potentially time saving technology. BGP is 2 classes in 2nd year 2nd term and you might get one or 2 question on that like private AS-range and what criteria does BGP use to determine route over another, like local reference or weight. Don’t think it gets complicated as comprehending the idea of split horizon. Pay attention the the Cisco portion of the security classes b/c CCNA does ask how IPSEC credentials are stored. But not Cisco’s firewall products like ASA. I do not recall a question about how zone based security is configured on IOS CLI.

The test prep you buy only preps you for 80% of the exam, bc the test prep only contains short question and answers. There are at least 2 maybe 3 lab type questions which you are given console access to a network device in a topology shown to you and you are expected to implement the configuration.

You only have avg of 1.5min per question, so read carefully but don’t waste time at on questions you know you don’t know. You are not given extra time to the lab questions. So you’ll need to save time from short answers to apply the the lab questions which will take a few more minutes.

Buy the lab prep, those questions aren’t on the web yet. My guess bc the lab prep turns the questions and answers to pictures , making it difficult to pirate the questions and answers. I tried to pirate them for myself. Nothing a ocr can’t solve but more time consuming. So I didn’t bother.

There are at least 5 question where they show you output from show … commands and you are expected to explain what is broken or at fault or what mode of a specification the device is working in.

There will be 2 or 3 etherchannel question.

There will be at least one question testing your comprehension on Dora.

You may need to know ipv6 compatibility technologies.

It is actually the hardest networking test you will take, leaving bcit. So I hope you paid attention in all the networking classes.

What neither the BCIT courses prepare you for, nor does the CCNA ask you about, is the potentially elaborate SDN networking you may encounter for it’s maintenance needs (if anyone has implemented this), as I saw a presentation on Cisco DNA.