Network+ after A+: what CompTIA actually recommends

There is usually an argument about what to take after A+. CompTIA removes most of it by writing the answer into its own exam details — the recommended experience for Network+ is "CompTIA A+ certification, with 9 to 12 months of hands-on experience in a junior network administrator or network support technician role".

That sentence names A+ and a year of work. It is a recommendation rather than a gate, but it is the clearest statement CompTIA makes anywhere about the order of its own certifications.

What Network+ is

Version 9, exam series code N10-009, launched on 20 June 2024. A maximum of 90 questions in 90 minutes, passing at 720 on a scale CompTIA writes as 100-900. Retirement is given as "usually three years after launch", estimated 2027. Available in five languages — English, German, Japanese, Portuguese and Spanish — which is two more than A+ V15 offers.

CompTIA lists it against three NICE and DoD 8140 work roles: technical support specialist, network operations specialist, and system administrator. Read 24 September 2026.

What it covers

CompTIA's own description has it assessing network connectivity, documentation, service configuration, data centres, cloud, virtual networking, monitoring, troubleshooting and security hardening. Its published skills list expands that into six areas: deploying wired and wireless devices including IP addressing, ports, protocols and network architecture; documentation, life-cycle, change and configuration management; virtualization, cloud service models, elasticity and scalability; monitoring for high availability and resolving connectivity issues; establishing secure networks and mitigating vulnerabilities; and diagnosing network issues with appropriate tools.

If that reads familiar, it should. A+ Core 1 is 23% networking and Core 2 is 28% security, and Network+ takes both of those and makes them the whole exam rather than a slice of one. The step up is depth, not a change of subject.

The three differences that matter

1. One exam, not two

A+ is Core 1 and Core 2. Network+ is a single sitting. One preparation, one booking, one voucher — and one pass mark rather than two different ones to remember. After A+, this feels straightforward.

2. A higher pass mark, on a scale written differently

Network+ passes at 720 against A+'s 675 and 700. CompTIA writes Network+'s scale as 100-900 and A+'s as "on a scale of 900". Do not read the higher number as a difficulty rating: each exam is calibrated against its own question pool, and comparing thresholds across exams tells you nothing. Why scaled scores do not compare.

3. Renewal costs twice as much

This is the practical one. CompTIA's continuing-education fee table puts A+ at $75 for the three-year period and Network+ at $150, alongside Security+, Linux+, Cloud+, Server+ and the rest of that tier.

When you are ready for it

CompTIA's recommendation is A+ plus nine to twelve months in a junior network administrator or network support technician role. Most people do not have exactly that, so read it as a description of the assumed starting knowledge rather than as a checklist.

Three honest readiness signals, in the absence of the job title:

• You are comfortable with IP addressing and subnetting without looking them up. Network+ assumes this; A+ introduced it.
• You have configured something real — a router, a switch, a wireless network, a VLAN — rather than read about configuring one.
• The words in CompTIA's skills list above are mostly familiar. Where several are not, that is your study plan rather than a reason to wait.

One exam, two sets of rules to re-read

The candidate agreement you accepted for A+ is the same agreement, so most of it will be familiar: the retake policy with no wait before a second attempt and fourteen days before a third, the prohibition on brain-dump material, the requirement to test in the country you registered from.

Two clauses are worth re-reading anyway. The first is that you cannot re-sit an exam code you have already passed without CompTIA's consent — relevant if you were considering re-taking Network+ as a renewal activity. The second is that CompTIA uses statistical analysis of results as a basis for enforcement and may invalidate scores where anomalies arise, which is the same reason to keep away from dump material on the second exam as on the first.

Studying for it

The structure that worked for A+ works again. Start with CompTIA's objectives document, which is free and is the specification the exam is written against. Professor Messer, whose free A+ courses this site recommends, publishes a free N10-009 Network+ course too: 87 videos running 12 hours and 55 minutes, with the same line on the page — all of the training videos are completely free to watch. His 70-page course notes are a separate paid product. Read 24 September 2026, and none of it earns this site anything.

Where Network+ differs is that labs matter more. Subnetting is practice; routing and switching behaviour is something you need to watch happen. Paid subscription libraries are one way to get at that: a search of Pluralsight's own catalogue for "CompTIA A+" on 24 September 2026 returned Network+ and Tech+ paths and no A+ path at all — so it is a resource for this rung of the ladder rather than the previous one.

The overlap with what you already studied

Coming from A+, more of Network+ is familiar than the name change suggests. Core 1's networking domain — 23% of that exam — already covered protocols, ports, wireless technologies, small-office network setup, IP addressing and the diagnostic tools that go with them. Network+ does not reintroduce those; it assumes them and builds.

The genuinely new territory is the enterprise scale of it: data centres, virtual networking, service configuration, monitoring for high availability, and the life-cycle and change-management processes around all of it. That last area is where A+'s operational procedures domain turns out to have been preparation rather than padding, which is a good argument for having taken it seriously the first time.

And after Network+

CompTIA's recommended experience for Security+ is Network+ plus two years of experience in a security or systems administrator job role. That is the next rung and this site stops there on purpose: a security certification deserves a security specialist's attention rather than a paragraph at the end of a page about entry-level IT support.

What this site can tell you is the shape of the path. A+ first, as the credential that CompTIA writes into Network+'s own recommendation. Network+ second, which renews A+ as a side effect. Then a decision about specialising. The full A+ page is where that path starts.