Thanks to this Sub I Passed! - AT/AT/AT
I passed the exam this morning. Score: AT/AT/AT
A big thank you to everyone in this Sub.
Note that I haven't got my official score. I used the following link https://auth-certification.pmi.org/authorize/pearsonvue?registrationid=XXXXX&action=individualScoreReport and replaced XXXXX with my registration ID provided by PearsonVue via email to look at my score.
My Preparation: (Applies to Exams Prior to 9th July, 2026)
I didn't have to go through AR's 35-hour course as I have a master's in construction management and 4 years of experience as Assistant PM. Luckily, I cleared the registration process with that.
I started preparing in earnest 2-1/2 weeks prior to the exam. First, I went through AR's PMP Cram Course to understand what the test consists of, the terms I need to learn and get an idea about all the different processes and documents. I highly recommend going through this course or any other introductory course, if all the terms and processes from PMBOK are new to you.
Then I watched the PMP mindset video by AR (Complete PMP Mindset 50 Principles and Questions) and the 200 ultra hard PMP questions by AR (200 Ultra Hard PMP Questions 1-200) which in reality are Easy to Moderate in terms of SH exams and the actual exam as well. The video is extremely helpful, nonetheless.
After this, I subscribed to study hall plus. I took all the practice questions and practice exams. My average was around 70% (including all difficulties). After going through all the practice questions and the 15-question-long practice exams, I reviewed as many incorrectly answered questions that I could (around 30) before attempting the first full length practice exam. On my first practice exam I got 74% (including all difficulties).
After this, I copied each incorrectly answered question and pasted it into NotebookLM and asked it why the PMI provided choice was correct and why I was wrong. In some cases, I would further question the response from NotebookLM to get a better explanation. I skipped over all Extreme level questions for this process as many have said that they are typically not seen on the actual exam (Which I found to be correct) and doesn't seem to follow the PMP mindset from AR. Note that I fed some resources into NotebookLM prior to asking it any questions.
I did this for the rest of the exams as well. After Full length exam 1, I gave exam 5 and 4 (in that order) as based on this sub they were more difficult and indeed they were. I got 66% and 69% respectively. Then again, I reviewed all my incorrect answers. Then gave exam 3 and got 72%. Then I reviewed everything again - all my wrong answers (Just read through my chat in NotebookLM). I also asked it to make 10-15 bullet points explaining what I kept getting wrong and how I need to apply the mindset in such scenarios. I went through all that and gave exam 2, two days prior to the actual exam and got 78%. Note that all my scores include all difficulty levels.
Exam: (Applies to Exams Prior to 9th July, 2026)
One day prior to the exam I added my mistakes from the last practice exam (19 wrong answers excluding extreme level) to NotebookLM and reviewed everything. I must have spent 3 hours in the morning doing this and then completely stopped looking at anything related to the exam.
I slept early and woke up an hour before the test. Drank coffee and had a light breakfast. My exam was online and I would recommend it to anyone that has a desk, a chair and a place where you won't be disturbed for 4 hours. Also, you would need to make sure you don't have spotty internet and areas that have frequent power outages.
Now back to my exam. I had set up my room the night prior. Removed anything and everything that could be a problem. The proctor never talked to me before, during, or after the exam. I strictly followed each prompt and didn't look away from my screen. I used both 10-minute breaks. Anybody giving the online exam, please make sure that the 10-minute break timer has started before you get up from your seat. As the program asks you twice if you want to start your break. If you don't start your break and get up, the proctor will revoke your exam.
The actual exam content was mostly similar to Easy and Moderate from SH. With around 20%-30% similar to Difficult questions from SH. I didn't get any drag and drop questions. I didn't even get any calculations. The wording of the questions is similar if not slightly better than SH. Based on my experience, I would highly recommend going through all practice questions and exams in SH to everyone and make sure you learn the mindset and how to apply it. Also, something that helped me a lot was to carefully read and understand the question and ask myself- What is the problem? What are we trying to fix here? What do we need to find out? What is missing?
ALSO USE THE STRIKE FUNCTION (ALT+X) AND HIGHLIGHTER (ALT+J) provided - highlight important/key words in questions and strike answers that are definitely wrong. This helps preventing you from reading and going through the question and the choices a hundred times.
Again, thank you everyone! I couldn't have done it without this group and everybody in it.