CAPA practice exam: free questions, domains and format

What is the CAPA exam?

CAPA is the Certified Argo Project Associate exam from the Linux Foundation and CNCF. It is a proctored, online, multiple-choice exam covering the four Argo projects: Argo Workflows for running container-native jobs and pipelines, Argo CD for GitOps delivery to Kubernetes, Argo Rollouts for progressive delivery strategies such as canary and blue-green, and Argo Events for event-driven automation. It tests whether you understand what each project does, how its resources are structured and how the four fit together, rather than whether you can operate them live. Officially it is the Certified Argo Project Associate certification, a multiple-choice exam in the Golden tier of the 16-certification Golden Kubestronaut program. The sections below cover its official domains, the verified format and cost, and its place in the path.

Expect to read manifests: a Workflow template with steps or a DAG, an Application with a sync policy, a Rollout with an analysis step, an EventSource wired to a Sensor. Knowing the custom resources and their key fields is worth more than memorising command flags.

CAPA exam domains and weights

CAPA has four domains, one per project. Argo Workflows is the largest at 36%, closely followed by Argo CD at 34%, then Argo Rollouts at 18% and Argo Events at 12%. Workflows and CD are the two largest domains, so those two projects should get most of your time: templates, DAGs and steps, artifacts and parameters on the Workflows side, and applications, sync policies, health and app-of-apps patterns on the CD side. Rollouts and Events are smaller but still examined on their core resources and strategies, so skipping them costs points you can win cheaply. The official list has 4 domains: the largest is Argo Workflows at 36% and the smallest is Argo Events at 12%, so a sensible plan splits study time roughly in proportion to these weights.

The projects share ideas, which helps retention: declarative manifests, controllers reconciling state, and Git or events as triggers. Learn Argo CD first, since it is the most widely used, then Workflows, then the two smaller projects as extensions of the same model.

CAPA exam format and cost

The CAPA exam facts below were read from the official Linux Foundation pages on 2026-10-23, and every row of the table links to the page it came from. Format: Online, proctored, multiple-choice. Questions: 60. Duration: 90 minutes. Passing score: 75%. Price: 250 US dollars. Certification validity: 2 years. Prerequisites: None. Retake policy: One retake per exam purchase if a passing score is not achieved. Curriculum version: not published by the Linux Foundation. Prices and policies change, so confirm them on the official CAPA page before you book. If the Linux Foundation changes a value, this page is updated and shows the date it was last verified.

With 60 questions in 90 minutes you have about 90 seconds per question on average, which is enough to read a scenario carefully but not to agonise over one item. If every question counts equally, 75% of 60 is 45 correct answers, so one unknown topic does not decide the result. Flag a hard question, move on, and return to it at the end.

Treat the table as the single source for numbers on this page. If a row says the Linux Foundation does not publish a value, we print that instead of guessing, and the official CAPA page remains the final word on registration and policy.

How GoldenKube practice works for CAPA

GoldenKube turns the CAPA bank into a practice loop. You answer one question at a time, see right away whether you were correct, and read an explanation of why. The next question is chosen for you: reviews that are due come first, then the domain where you are weakest, spread across all 4 exam domains so you do not only practise what you already know. A question you miss comes back on a spaced schedule until you answer it correctly, and a mock exam mode lets you test yourself under exam conditions. You can answer 10 questions as a guest with no sign-up; after that a free account saves your progress, with no credit card.

• Adaptive order: due reviews first, then your weakest domain.
• Spaced repetition: missed questions return until you have mastered them.
• Every question carries an explanation, not just a right-or-wrong verdict.
• Mock exam mode for a timed run once you are close to ready.

5 sample CAPA questions

The five questions below come from the GoldenKube CAPA bank, and each one shows its correct answer and a written explanation. They are practice questions written for learning, not questions from the real exam, and they were picked once so the page stays stable. Use them as a quick check of your level: if you can explain why each wrong option is wrong, you are in good shape for this part of the syllabus, and if not, the explanation shows what to revise. The sample questions page holds a larger set, and the practice app holds the full bank with adaptive ordering and review.

spec:
  ignoreDifferences:
    - group: apps
      kind: Deployment
      jsonPointers:
        - /spec/replicas

Where CAPA sits in the Golden Kubestronaut path

CAPA is a Golden-tier certification, not one of the 5 core Kubestronaut certifications, and Golden Kubestronaut requires all 16 certifications in the program, so CAPA is a required step. Its own prerequisites, per the Linux Foundation: None. The program page lists all 16 certifications side by side and marks which ones GoldenKube can practice today. In the program it forms a delivery cluster with CGOA, which tests GitOps principles in tool-neutral terms, and with CNPE, the hands-on platform engineering exam that expects GitOps and continuous delivery skills. Many candidates take CGOA and CAPA close together, since the principles in one explain the tooling in the other.

Argo CD in particular is the reference implementation of GitOps pull-based delivery, so the effort carries over. The program page shows all sixteen certifications and which ones GoldenKube practices today.

Frequently asked questions