Studying for the VMware Cloud Foundation 9.0 Architect exam right now and honestly feeling a bit unsure how to approach it. I’ve worked with vSphere for a few years and I’m comfortable with vCenter, ESXi, and day-to-day admin work, but this exam is tied to VMware Cloud Foundation 9.0 Architect, and I get the sense it goes beyond just knowing how the individual components work.

I went through a handful of practice questions to get a feel for things, and a few caught me off guard. One had you choose between backup jobs, async replication, or a vSAN stretched cluster based on specific RPO and RTO requirements. Another asked about the default networking setup for VMware Kubernetes Service workload clusters, which isn’t something I’ve worked with much in my day-to-day role. There was also one about mitigating a support staff skills gap as part of an architecture design, which felt more like an architecture decision than a straightforward technical question.

That mix is throwing me off a bit. I don’t know if I should be treating this like a standard vSphere exam and just brushing up on the fundamentals, or if I need to get more hands-on with VCF specifically, including things like vSAN clusters and multi-zone network design, before I’ll be ready.

I came across the VMware Cloud Foundation 9.0 Architect exam questions page on CertBoosters while looking for more practice material, and the sample questions there matched the mix I was trying to understand: some fundamentals, along with deeper architecture and design decisions. It helped me get a better sense of the range.

For those who have done this before, what really helped you: the lab work itself, going through the design manuals, or working through practice questions?