Anthropic runs four Claude certifications. Associate: Foundations is $99, Developer: Foundations and Architect: Foundations are $125 each, and Architect: Professional is $175. All four are 120-minute proctored exams delivered through Pearson, and all four pass at 720 on a 100–1000 scaled range.
For the one-page overview of all four exams, cost and eligibility, see Claude certification.
One thing to settle before the detail: all four are restricted to members of the Claude Partner Network. You need an email on a recognised company domain — personal addresses are rejected. If that is your situation, read can you take the Claude exams without a company email first, because nothing below helps until that is resolved.
The four exams
| Certification | Price | Length | Pass | Counts toward partner standing |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Claude Certified Associate: Foundations | $99 | 120 min | 720/1000 | No |
| Claude Certified Developer: Foundations | $125 | 120 min | 720/1000 | Yes |
| Claude Certified Architect: Foundations | $125 | 120 min | 720/1000 | Yes |
| Claude Certified Architect: Professional | $175 | 120 min | 720/1000 | Yes |
Anthropic's own framing of who each is for:
- Associate: Foundations — consultants, project leads, and business or technical roles working on Claude projects. Tests practical, everyday Claude use.
- Developer: Foundations — engineers building Claude applications. Tests the Claude API, tool use and agent development.
- Architect: Foundations — solution architects designing agent systems with Claude.
- Architect: Professional — the advanced credential, aimed at large-scale enterprise deployments. Tests integration architecture, governance and evaluation.
Note that Architect: Professional is a separate exam, not a second stage of Foundations.
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All four are proctored and identity-verified, delivered through Pearson Professional Assessments — either online-proctored or at a test centre. Questions are multiple choice and scenario-based multiple response.
The exams are closed-book in the strictest sense: no Claude, no external tools, no documentation while you are sitting them. Which is worth pausing on, given the subject matter. You are being tested on your ability to reason about Claude architectures without Claude.
Pass or fail comes back with a scaled score, and a passing result issues a digital badge through Credly by Pearson.
Total seat time runs around 135 minutes once check-in and the post-exam survey are counted, so budget more than the 120-minute exam window.
Retake policy
This is stricter than most vendor programmes and worth knowing before you book:
| Attempt | Wait before the next one |
|---|---|
| After attempt 1 | 14 days |
| After attempt 2 | 30 days |
| After attempt 3 | 90 days |
Four attempts maximum per rolling 12-month period, and each retake costs the full fee. There is no discounted second attempt.
So a candidate who fails three times is looking at roughly four and a half months of enforced waiting and $375–$525 spent depending on the exam. Going in underprepared is expensive here in a way it is not on, say, an AWS Associate exam.
What the discounts actually look like
Partner tier discounts apply automatically at checkout:
- Select, Preferred and Global Premier partners — 50% off
- Global Premier partners — 100% off, through 31 December 2026
That second one is a real deadline. If your organisation is Global Premier, exams are free until the end of December 2026 and half price after. Worth checking your tier before you pay for anything.
Note also that Claude Certified Architect: Foundations rose in price on 30 June 2026 — the $125 above is the current figure. If you find a $99 price for it quoted elsewhere, that is out of date.
How the programme got here
Useful context, because it explains why guides written a few months ago are wrong.
Anthropic launched the Claude Partner Network on 12 March 2026, and Claude Certified Architect: Foundations was the only exam at launch. In July 2026 three more opened for registration — Associate: Foundations, Developer: Foundations and Architect: Professional — with Anthropic's announcement dated 23 July 2026.
So the programme went from one exam to four in roughly four months. Anything published before July describes a smaller programme, which is why you will see confident articles claiming Anthropic has "one certification." It had one. It has four.
Which one should you take?
Short version, if you are eligible:
- Building with the API day to day → Developer: Foundations
- Designing agent systems for clients → Architect: Foundations
- Running large enterprise deployments → Architect: Professional
- Advising or leading rather than building → Associate: Foundations
One caveat on the Associate: it is the cheapest at $99, but it is the only one that does not count toward Partner Network standing. If your organisation's motivation for certifying you is partner eligibility, the Associate does not move that needle.
I go deeper on the choice in Architect vs Developer vs Associate: which should you take.
Is it worth the money?
That depends entirely on whether you are inside a partner organisation, and I have written that up separately in is the Claude Certified Architect worth it in 2026.
The short honest version: if your employer is a Claude partner, three of these count toward the firm's standing and the exam may cost you nothing — the calculation is easy. If you are outside that world, this is not the AI certification to be chasing, and there are better places to spend $100–$175.
Preparing for a Claude exam with StudyTech AI
Whichever of the four exams you book, the retake ladder makes walking in underprepared expensive.
StudyTech AI is a personalised AWS and AI certification prep platform with prep paths for all four Claude exams: Claude Certified Associate, Developer – Foundations, Architect – Foundations and Architect – Professional. It builds your practice around your skills and knowledge gaps, and tells you when you are ready to take your exam. It finds your knowledge gaps, gives adaptive practice, creates flashcards from your mistakes, tracks readiness by exam domain, and tells you when you are ready to book.
StudyTech AI does not register you for the exam. You still need a Claude Partner Network email to book through Pearson VUE.
Start a free Claude assessment on StudyTech AI
All figures verified 7 November 2026 against Anthropic's official announcement, its Partner Academy FAQ, and Pearson VUE. This programme has changed materially twice in four months — confirm current details before booking.