Three steps: your organisation joins the Claude Partner Network (free), you get an email on that recognised company domain, then you book the exam through Pearson.
Step two is where nearly everyone gets stuck, so let me be direct about it before the walkthrough: there is no individual registration route. A personal email address will not get you past login.
Step 1 — Your organisation joins the Partner Network
Anthropic launched the Claude Partner Network on 12 March 2026, and exam access runs through it. Its own announcement states:
"Exams are available to members of the Claude Partner Network."
Membership is free, and organisations register at claude.com/partners.
The important word is organisations. This is company-level, not personal. You cannot join as an individual practitioner, and there is no paid tier that unlocks it for one person.
If you work at an agency, consultancy, systems integrator or software company that brings Claude to customers, this is worth raising internally — it costs nothing and carries real exam discounts.
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Step 2 — Get an email on the recognised company domain
Once the organisation is registered, your work email on that domain becomes your route in. Anthropic's Partner Academy is explicit:
"Registration requires a partner email address on a recognised company domain — personal email addresses will not work."
If your registration is being rejected, it is almost always one of two things:
- You are using a personal address — Gmail, Outlook, iCloud. These fail.
- Your organisation has registered but the domain is not yet recognised, or registration is incomplete. This is an internal fix, not something you can work around from your side.
There is no third option. No appeal process, no individual exception, no workaround worth your time looking for.
Step 3 — Book through Pearson
With a valid partner email, booking runs through Pearson Professional Assessments. All four exams are proctored and identity-verified, and you choose between:
- Online-proctored — sit it from home or the office, with the usual environment requirements
- Test centre — a physical Pearson location
Practical details to plan around:
| Exam length | 120 minutes |
| Total seat time | ~135 minutes with check-in and survey |
| Question format | Multiple choice and scenario-based multiple response |
| Passing score | 720 on a 100–1000 scale |
| Result | Pass/fail with a scaled score |
| Credential | Digital badge via Credly by Pearson |
The exams are strictly closed-book: no Claude, no external tools, no documentation while you are sitting them.
Check your partner tier before you pay
Discounts apply automatically at checkout, and the difference is large enough to be worth a five-minute internal check:
- Select, Preferred and Global Premier partners — 50% off
- Global Premier partners — 100% off through 31 August 2026, then 50%
If your organisation is Global Premier, exams are free until the end of August. Do not pay full price without confirming your tier first.
Before you book: the retake policy
Worth knowing in advance, because it is stricter than most vendor programmes:
- Four attempts maximum per rolling 12-month period
- 14 days wait after the first attempt, 30 days after the second, 90 days after the third
- Each retake costs the full fee — no discounted second attempt
That combination means booking underprepared is genuinely costly. Three failed attempts at Architect: Professional is roughly four and a half months of waiting and $525.
What if you cannot get a partner email?
Then you cannot sit these exams right now. That is the honest position, and Anthropic has made no public commitment to opening the programme to individuals — its official announcement contains no statement about future non-partner availability.
The realistic options are covered in full in can you take the Claude exams without a company email, but briefly: learn the material regardless, and if you want a proctored AI credential you can actually book, AWS Certified AI Practitioner is $100 and open to anyone.
Checklist
- Confirm your organisation is registered at claude.com/partners
- Confirm your partner tier — you may be eligible for 50% or 100% off
- Register with your company-domain email, not a personal one
- Pick the exam that matches your role — Architect vs Developer vs Associate
- Choose online-proctored or test centre
- Prepare properly — the retake ladder makes guessing expensive
Verified 30 July 2026 against Anthropic's Partner Academy FAQ, its official certification announcement, and Pearson VUE. Full pricing and format detail in the Claude certification guide.