Unofficial study guide · last refresh 14 October 2026
Claude Certified Architect— Foundations
A free, open-source guide to Anthropic's technical certification for solution architects (exam code CCAR-F). All five exam domains, with code examples, anti-patterns, decision frameworks, and practice questions.
Plate I · The exam
Sixty questions. Two hours.
- 60scenario-based questions
- 720/1000to pass
- 4/6scenarios per exam
- 5knowledge domains
Aimed at solution architects with 6+ months building on Claude APIs, the Agent SDK, Claude Code, and MCP. One of four Claude certifications (Associate, Architect Foundations, Architect Professional, Developer). Proctored via Pearson VUE, registered through the Anthropic Partner Academy; $125 per attempt, certification valid 12 months (Exam Guide v1.0, July 2026). Access via the Claude Partner Network.
Plate II · Domains
Five domains, weighted.
Each ring shows the domain's share of the exam.
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Agentic Architecture & Orchestration
Agentic loops,
stop_reason, hub-and-spoke multi-agent systems, hooks, task decomposition, session management. -
Tool Design & MCP Integration
Tool interface design, structured errors, the 4–5 tool maximum,
tool_choice, MCP servers and transports. -
Claude Code Configuration & Workflows
CLAUDE.md hierarchy, skills & slash commands, path-specific rules, plan mode, CI/CD integration.
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Prompt Engineering & Structured Output
Explicit criteria, few-shot prompting,
tool_use& JSON schemas, validation-retry loops, multi-pass review. -
Context Management & Reliability
Context windows, escalation patterns, error propagation, large-codebase strategies, human review, provenance.
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The overview
Exam scenarios, the critical anti-patterns, decision frameworks, a 4-week study plan, and official resources.
Plate III · The family
Studying another one?
Overview guides for the other three Claude certifications, from the official v1.0 exam guides.
Plate IV · What's inside
What's in it.
10 critical anti-patterns
The wrong answers that show up on the exam, and why they're wrong.
Decision frameworks
Programmatic vs. prompt-based enforcement, plan vs. direct, batch vs. sync, and more.
Practice questions
Scenario-based questions with explained answers across every domain.
4-week study plan
A daily schedule from core architecture through exam-prep drills.