I passed the CKA exam in June 2026. This post shares what helped me prepare, plus a few exam-day habits that made the test easier.

I am now officially recognised as a Certified Kubernetes Administrator!

About the CKA Exam

This Is a Practical Exam

The CKA is a practical exam. You work on real Kubernetes clusters and solve real tasks.

The advantage is that you can test your answers as you go. The questions are written clearly, and most of the time I knew whether my solution was working.

The disadvantage is time. It is easy to spend too long on one question, get pulled into a rabbit hole, and lose track of the time.

This Is an Open Book Exam

You can access some documentation during the exam. It’s impossible to remember every manifest, field, and command option, so documentation is part of the workflow. You need to learn how to find the relevant information quickly.

Before your exam, check the official list of allowed resources.

Materials

I learnt a lot from Anthony Nocentino’s CKA course. It was a deep dive into Kubernetes, its internals, and the Linux tooling around it. The course is being retired, but I still found it valuable because the core of the CKA has not changed much.

Eventually, I spent most of my time in the official Kubernetes documentation. The better you can use the documentation, the better your chances in the exam.

Build Your Own Little Cluster

Because it’s a practical exam, you need to understand how Kubernetes works in practice.

One way to do that is to spin up at least two Linux VMs and install one control-plane node and one worker node. Building a cluster this way is one of the exam objectives, and it helps you understand what is happening under the hood.

You can also use KIND, which lets you create a multi-node cluster locally.

Or you can watch my video and find the commands here:

Practical Mock Tests

Killercoda

Start by practising all the scenarios available on Killercoda. Each question gives you a working, preconfigured cluster. I spent 30-60 minutes a day practising them. There are a lot of scenarios, and they touch on every exam objective.

Killer.sh

When you buy an exam voucher, it includes the exam attempt, one retake if needed, and two Killer.sh simulator attempts.

The Killer.sh simulator is close to the real exam experience. Each simulator attempt gives you 36 hours of access from the moment you activate it. During that time, you get the exam environment, questions, answers, and grading.

Here is the approach I recommend:

  • Find two spare days in a row.
  • Take the first mock exam on Day One.
  • Review the questions you failed.
  • Fix the failed questions while the environment is still active.
  • A few hours later, or the following day, reset the environment and attempt the mock exam again.

Your goal is to score at least 90%.

Then go for the real exam.

Applications

Kubectl

This is the main tool you’ll use. If you follow the Killercoda scenarios, you will get very familiar with kubectl.

The exam has kubectl aliased as k, with autocompletion enabled.

Some of my favourite commands:

  • k get <resource>: lists objects of a given type
  • k get <resource> -A: lists objects across all namespaces
  • k get <resource> -o yaml: prints the object as YAML
  • k describe <resource>: prints readable information about an object, including events
  • k explain <resource> --recursive: shows how the object is structured and which fields are available
  • k create <resource> -o yaml --dry-run=client: prints the YAML manifest for a resource. You can add > file.yaml to save it to a file.
  • kubectl config set-context --current --namespace <namespace>: sets the default namespace, so you do not need to provide it with every command

Kubeadm

kubeadm is used for initialising clusters, joining nodes, and managing cluster certificates.

VS Codium

I have spent a lot of my life in VS Code, so I tend to use it more than terminal editors. I completed the entire exam without leaving VS Codium.

Some tricks:

  • In the exam environment, the VS Codium file explorer only showed the local filesystem for me. I created a folder called work, and inside it I created a folder for each question that needed manifest files. I find editing YAML manifests much faster in VS Codium than in Vim.
  • VS Codium can open multiple terminals when needed. Just remember to SSH each terminal into the correct cluster. When a question is done, exit the SSH session.
  • When I needed to apply a manifest on a remote cluster, I copied it from VS Codium and pasted it into Vim in the shell.

Vim

Vim has a unique way of working with text files. If you have never used it, spend some time learning the basics before the exam.

  • Vim is the editor you will use while connected to a cluster. You might use it for quick YAML edits, generated manifests, or deployments.
  • You can run vimtutor in your terminal for self-study.

Useful Vim Motions

  • vim <fileName>: opens a file
  • :q: exits Vim
  • :w: saves the file
  • :wq: saves and exits
  • :q!: exits without saving
  • Esc: returns to normal mode
  • i: enters insert mode, where you can type
  • v: enters visual mode, which is helpful for selecting and indenting YAML
  • dd: deletes the current line
  • dw: deletes the current word
  • d$: deletes from the cursor to the end of the line
  • u: undo
  • gg: goes to the top of the file
  • G: goes to the end of the file
  • >: indents the selected line or block
  • /: searches. Use n to go to the next result.

There is more to learn, but at the bare minimum I would complete vimtutor up to lesson 1.2.

Some Other Tools You Will Likely Need for the Exam

  • helm: package manager for Kubernetes
  • grep: filters lines of text
  • journalctl: reads system logs. This is helpful when, for example, kubectl does not work because of API server problems.
  • crictl: tool for managing containers
  • systemctl: manages services
  • apt, apt-get, and dpkg: manage packages on Debian-based distributions
  • curl: makes web requests

Exam Day

The exam is remote and proctored. You can, and should, show up 30 minutes before the planned start time. You will need to show identification to the proctor. Schedule the exam for a time when your brain works at its best.

You can reschedule your exam up to 24 hours before the start time.

Clear Room Policy

The admission process is thorough. The proctor will take their time making sure there is nothing that could violate the exam policy. I removed everything from my office except my monitor, laptop, keyboard, mouse, desk, chair, webcam, and furniture.

Time Management

Time flies. You have less of it than you might think. This is the strategy I followed:

  • Read the question. Attempt it only if you know exactly what you need to do and can clearly picture the result. You do not want to spend half your time on one difficult question and then rush through the remaining ones.
  • When in doubt, flag the question and move on.
  • When you reach the last question, look at what you flagged. Now you can see how many difficult questions are left and how much time you have. I was able to go through all questions in half the time. That left me the other half for the more complicated questions.
  • Even if you can only complete part of a question, do it. At least on Killer.sh, I could get marks for partially completed questions.
  • Leave troubleshooting questions until the end. The problem with “this is broken, fix it” questions is that they might hide several tasks. These questions are satisfying and interesting, but they are also the biggest time sink.

Never Miss out Any of My Work

Join Newsletter!

Summary

This was certainly one of the most interesting and challenging exams I have ever done. The practical nature of the exam made me better at my job. I finally understand how Kubernetes works and how its object-based model fits together.

Practice. Do the mock exams with confidence. Join the club.