🏆 Which Atlassian Associate Exam Was the Hardest? My Personal Ranking 👀

[Mark Sayo]

Hi Atlassian Community! 👋

After completing all 6 Atlassian Associate certifications in March 2026, I thought it would be helpful to share my personal ranking of the exams from easiest to hardest based on my own experience.

This post is a follow-up to my previous discussion where I shared how I completed all 6 certifications in 3 weeks:

👉 🚀 6 Atlassian Associate Certifications in 3 Weeks (All in March 2026) 🔥

Just to be clear, this is not an official difficulty ranking from Atlassian. This is purely based on how I experienced each exam, considering:

• Topics covered
• Question style
• My familiarity with each product
• How much hands-on experience helped

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📌 Certifications I completed

All certifications were completed within March 2026 (around 3 weeks):

• ACA-915 Atlassian Cloud Foundations — March 11, 2026
• ACA-900 Jira Essentials — March 13, 2026
• ACA-925 Jira Service Management Agent Essentials — March 18, 2026
• ACA-910 ITSM with Jira Service Management Foundations — March 19, 2026
• ACA-920 Confluence Essentials — March 26, 2026
• ACA-905 Jira Software Board Configuration — March 26, 2026

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🔢 My ranking (easiest → hardest)

6. ACA-915 Atlassian Cloud Foundations

For me, this was the easiest exam.

The topics are more foundational and focus on understanding the Atlassian Cloud ecosystem, users, and general concepts.

👉 If you already work with Atlassian Cloud tools, this is a great starting point.

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5. ACA-920 Confluence Essentials

This exam was straightforward if you are already using Confluence.

It focuses on pages, spaces, permissions, and collaboration features.

👉 If you use Confluence regularly, many concepts will feel familiar.

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4. ACA-925 Jira Service Management Agent Essentials

This one felt practical and user-focused.

Topics include queues, requests, SLAs, and agent workflows.

👉 Easier to understand if you have experience in support or as a JSM agent.

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3. ACA-910 ITSM with Jira Service Management Foundations

This exam is not just about Jira.

You also need to understand ITSM concepts, such as:

• Incident, problem, and change management
• How JSM supports service management practices

👉 Much easier if you already have ITSM or support experience.

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2. ACA-900 Jira Essentials

Still a foundational exam, but broader compared to the others.

You need to understand:

• Work items
• Projects
• Boards and workflows
• Navigation and filters

👉 Not extremely difficult, but it can feel overwhelming if you’re new to Jira.

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1. ACA-905 Jira Software Board Configuration

For me, this was the hardest Associate exam.

It focuses heavily on configuration and behavior, including:

• Board filters
• Columns and statuses
• Swimlanes and quick filters
• Scrum vs Kanban behavior

👉 Hands-on experience with Jira boards makes a big difference here.

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📊 Suggested order if you're starting

If I were to recommend an order, I would suggest:

1. ACA-915 Atlassian Cloud Foundations
2. ACA-920 Confluence Essentials
3. ACA-900 Jira Essentials
4. ACA-925 Jira Service Management Agent Essentials
5. ACA-910 ITSM with Jira Service Management Foundations
6. ACA-905 Jira Software Board Configuration

This progression builds from foundation → product usage → configuration-heavy topics.

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💡 Final thoughts

This ranking is based on my personal experience, so your experience may be different depending on your background.

For example:

• If you are new to Jira, Jira Essentials (ACA-900) may feel more challenging due to the broad range of topics.
• Even if you use Jira Software every day, Jira Software Board Configuration (ACA-905) can still be tricky because of how board configuration behaves behind the scenes.
• If you are in ITSM, ITSM with Jira Service Management Foundations (ACA-910) or Jira Service Management Agent Essentials (ACA-925) may feel more natural

👉 For me, the biggest factor was hands-on experience.
The more I used a feature in real work, the easier the exam felt.

Since my previous post focused on completing the certifications, I wanted this follow-up to focus more on the actual exam experience and how each one felt from a difficulty perspective.

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👀 Curious to hear from you

If you’ve taken any Atlassian Associate exams:
👉 Which one felt the easiest for you?
👉 Which one was the most challenging?