ICA hands-on labs
Labs: PreviewIstio Certified Associate: exam-style tasks on a real kubeadm cluster on your own Mac, built and graded by the GoldenKube CLI. Each card shows the domain, the cluster topology it needs, the recommended time and its points; the scenario page has the full task text. Scenarios run Istio 1.29, the version the ICA exam environment runs, on Kubernetes 1.35.
What the ICA bank covers
The Linux Foundation product page calls ICA "an online, proctored, performance-based and multiple-choice exam", but the ICA candidate instructions say "The exam consists of 15-20 performance-based tasks", completed on a designated host, and mention no multiple-choice section; they also state that "The ICA environment is currently running Istio v1.29". GoldenKube therefore practises ICA with hands-on labs only: each scenario is an Istio task on a local Kubernetes cluster, graded on the state you leave behind.
The scenarios are written against the four official domains: installing Istio with istioctl or Helm, in sidecar or ambient mode, customizing the installation and upgrading it with a canary or in place (installation, upgrade and configuration); ingress and egress traffic, routing, destination rules, traffic shifting, connecting to external services, resilience features such as timeouts, retries, circuit breaking and outlier detection, and fault injection (traffic management); authorization, authentication with mTLS and JWT, and TLS at the edge (securing workloads); and configuration, control plane and data plane problems (troubleshooting).
The ICA exam, from the official pages
| Questions | 15-20 performance-based tasks source |
|---|---|
| Duration (minutes) | 120 source |
| Passing score | 68% source |
| Price (USD) | 250 source |
| Validity (years) | 2 source |
| Delivery | Online, proctored, performance-based and multiple-choice source |
| Prerequisites | None source |
| Retake policy | One retake per exam purchase if a passing score is not achieved source |
| Curriculum version | Exam environment runs Istio v1.29 source |
Domain coverage
Published scenarios per official ICA domain, next to the domain's exam weight (checked 2026-10-28 on the official page). 20 published scenarios today.
| Domain | Exam weight | Published scenarios |
|---|---|---|
| Installation, Upgrade & Configuration | 20% | 4 |
| Traffic Management | 35% | 7 |
| Securing Workloads | 25% | 5 |
| Troubleshooting | 20% | 4 |
Mock exam mode
goldenkube exam ica draws a curriculum-weighted set: 15 tasks in 120 minutes, pass at 68%. Solutions and hints are hidden in exam mode.
Scenarios
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How a run works
- Install the CLI and Multipass, then run
goldenkube doctor. - Sign in with
goldenkube login(free account). - Start a scenario with its id; the CLI provisions a fresh cluster and prints the task.
- Solve it on the cluster, run
goldenkube submit; the result appears on your dashboard.
Grading happens on your machine and is practice feedback, not an official score. Tasks are public; hints, reference solutions and grader internals are not.
Frequently asked questions
Can I run these ICA labs today?
Not yet. The ICA scenarios are published and readable here, but the first signed build of the CLI is not on the Homebrew tap, so the catalog is a preview. Running a scenario needs that release and a free account.
Is ICA a multiple-choice or a hands-on exam?
The Linux Foundation product page describes it as "performance-based and multiple-choice", while the ICA candidate instructions list 15 to 20 performance-based tasks and no multiple-choice section. GoldenKube treats ICA as a hands-on exam and practises it with labs, not quiz questions.
Which Istio version do the ICA labs use?
The ICA candidate instructions state that the exam environment "is currently running Istio v1.29", and the GoldenKube ICA scenarios target that version. Istio 1.29 reached its upstream end of life on 15 October 2026, so the Linux Foundation may move the exam to a newer release; check the official instructions before you book.