Ace your Terraform Professional exam: 5 tips from certified pros

It’s no secret. The Terraform Authoring and Operations Professional with AWS exam is intense. Test takers must answer multiple-choice questions and complete hands-on labs that include writing code, troubleshooting, and solving issues pulled from the real world, all within a four-hour window. The complexity of the exam is essential in validating real, deeply technical Terraform expertise, but it can also make preparing for the exam daunting. That’s why we asked three newly certified Terraform pros to sit down with us and share their advice for success.

»Meet the pros

Our pros have different roles, different backgrounds, and different experiences with the Terraform Authoring & Ops Pro exam. Two things they have in common? They passed the exam and are ready to share their tips with you.

• Elif Samedin is an Independent Consultant from Bucharest, Romania engaging with clients spanning various industries.
• Aman Puri specializes in cloud app modernization in the IT industry and is currently based in Mumbai, India.
• Ben Dalton is a Cloud Infrastructure Engineer in the financial services industry in London, England.

»Tip 1: Have the right foundation

The Terraform Authoring & Ops Pro exam is not for everyone. While you might be able to pass the Terraform Associate exam with theoretical knowledge and some practice, the Terraform Pro exam requires real-world experience. Elif puts it like this, “You can’t just memorize Terraform documentation and expect to pass [Terraform Pro]—you need hands-on experience working with infrastructure in a cloud environment.”

Before scheduling your exam appointment, take some time to evaluate whether the exam is the right fit for you. We’ve compiled some resources to help you:

• HashiCorp Developer describes who this exam is for and lists important prerequisites.
• Our Exam Orientation page gets deeper into the skills and knowledge you should have before taking the exam.
• The Learning Path walks you through the content you can expect on the exam.

»Tip 2: Practice, practice, practice

You might think it goes without saying, but it’s so important we’re saying it three times: practice, practice, practice.

All three of our pros agree.

Aman created his own Terraform projects to practice:

“[I started by comparing] what I actually know from my personal experience with what I needed to know, based on the exam description. There were quite a few concepts that I knew about, but only conceptually, so there were things that I still had to learn from a practical perspective… To do so, I created my own scenarios and then tried to experiment with those [topics]. That helped me a lot, because I could anticipate what I would see on the exam more.”

Ben also found comparing his standing knowledge with the exam prep materials helpful:

“For areas I wasn’t as confident in, I made a point to read through the material and then test things out in my own environment. I set up my own Terraform configuration, created local states, built modules, and experimented with moving things around. Practicing in a hands-on environment made a huge difference because it helped me reinforce my understanding and problem-solving skills.”

Elif leaned on practice projects as well, and had this suggestion for those who are preparing:

“I would kick things off by having them build a Terraform module. Then we would build from there, covering different topics. This practical approach helps candidates touch on various topics organically and reinforces concepts they’ll encounter in the exam.”

The consensus is: compare your skills with the Exam Content List and then practice in your own Terraform environment.

»Tip 3: Be open to learning something new

We were delightfully surprised to hear that our Terraform pros also treated their exam prep like a learning path. Each learned about a new topic, function, or tool in Terraform during their study.

In Aman’s words, “[One] cool thing is that this certification encourages a culture of continuous learning. Cloud tech moves fast, and staying up to date is super important.”

For Ben, the exam helped him dive deeper into using Terraform in different ways,

“I've used Terraform in the most common ways to provision and manage infrastructure in the cloud, but there are some topics I haven’t explored as much, such as migrating resources between state files. So for me, that was an opportunity for me to learn some more, and sort of put into practice some scenarios that I could come across in the future.”

And Elif “discovered the Terraform remote state data source through certification prep”, saying, “Turns out it's useful for things like sharing Terraform state, but sharing the whole file with sensitive data inside? Not the best idea.”

So, while you need production experience with Terraform before attempting the exam, it doesn’t mean you have to be an expert on everything. If you approach your study activities with a growth mindset, you might just learn something new on the way to achieving your certification goals.

»Tip 4: Get familiar with HashiCorp docs

In our conversation with Ben, he shared one tip that is commonly overlooked: familiarize yourself with HashiCorp documentation.

During the Terraform Professional exam, you will have access to the official Terraform documentation. The documentation will likely be critical to your exam success, but relying on the docs without being familiar with their structure can hurt your time management, “In real life, we tend to rely on Google or Stack Overflow to find answers quickly. But in the exam, you can’t do that. You need to know how to find what you need directly within HashiCorp’s docs. That would have saved me some time during the test.”

Not only will reviewing the Terraform docs help you prepare for the exam content, but if you pay close attention to how they’re structured, you’ll be well prepared to use the docs to your advantage on exam day too.

»Tip 5: Avoid these common mistakes

In addition to what to do during your exam prep and appointment, our pros shared a few things not to do.

»Don’t: Mis-manage your time

We touched on it before, but it’s worth noting again: managing your time well is important in your success on the exam.

In a four-hour exam, it may seem like you have plenty of time, but most exam takers end up using most if not all of their allotted time. Ben mentions that this was one of the toughest parts of the exam, “One of the biggest challenges was balancing accuracy with speed. Some tasks required deep thinking and debugging skills, and in a high-pressure environment, it’s easy to get stuck on a problem for too long.”

To ensure you manage your time well on exam day, “focus on practicing complex Terraform scenarios with a time constraint to get used to thinking fast and making decisions under pressure,” suggests Ben.

»Don’t: Forget the basics

In a high-pressure testing environment, it’s easy to get overwhelmed. But, as an experienced engineer, don’t forget to remember your fundamentals during the exam.

“A major trap is overlooking the basics,” Elif says, “before diving into advanced topics, it’s crucial to understand why Terraform exists, how it compares to other tools, and how it fits into the broader infrastructure landscape.”

Aman shares an example that helped him, saying “I made sure to always run terraform_plan before applying anything! That’s a lifesaver in both real-world work and the exam.”

In other words, trust your instincts, lean on your knowledge and practice, and you’ll be well set up for success.

»Don’t: Get discouraged (especially on your first attempt)

Elif put it so well at the end of our interview, “Certifications are milestones, not endpoints — keep learning! Also, don’t be discouraged if you don’t pass on the first try. The experience you gain in preparation will still be invaluable to your growth as an engineer.”

Plus, your Terraform Professional exam fee includes one free retake if you don’t pass on your first try — even more reason to look on the bright side if you struggle the first time around.

»Conclusions

We hope these tips will demystify the Terraform Authoring & Operations Professional exam and set you up for success in your preparation.

Remember what our exam pros said:

• Have the right foundation: Know if this exam is for you by reviewing the materials on HashiCorp Developer.
• Practice, practice, practice: Build your own practice environments and experiment with the tools, functions, and tasks you may be less familiar with.
• Be open to learning something new: You don’t have to be an expert on all things Terraform; be willing to fill in any knowledge or skill gaps during your prep.
• Get familiar with HashiCorp docs: Ensure you can make the most out of the tools given to you on exam day by knowing how to navigate the docs.
• Avoid common mistakes: Manage your time well, utilize your hard-earned skills, and stay committed to growth. It’s what makes the certification journey worth it.

Thank you to Elif, Aman, and Ben for sharing their experience with us! We hope their advice has you feeling ready to start (or continue) your Terraform Professional certification journey.