- The Plain Answer: What ITS-AI Actually Is
- Who Issues It and How the Program Works
- The Six Objective Domains
- The 2026 Revision and the Legacy Outline Problem
- Exam Format, Fee and Scoring Mechanics
- Registration Channels Compared
- Who Should Take It, and Who Hires for It
- Readiness: The 150-Hour Profile
- Validity and Recertification
- Sequencing Your Preparation by Domain
- Frequently Asked Questions
- ITS-AI here means the Pearson-issued IT Specialist - Artificial Intelligence certification, delivered through Certiport and Pearson VUE.
- The current English exam objectives list six domains, from AI Problem Definition to Maintaining and Monitoring AI in Production.
- The pass mark is 700 on a 1-1000 scaled score, not a raw 70 percent.
- Expect roughly 45-50 questions in a 50-minute timed limit; the count varies by form.
The Plain Answer: What ITS-AI Actually Is
ITS-AI is shorthand for the Information Technology Specialist - Artificial Intelligence Certification, published publicly as IT Specialist - Artificial Intelligence. It is a knowledge-based, computer-delivered credential that tests whether a candidate understands the full lifecycle of an applied AI project: defining the problem, preparing data, engineering features, choosing and evaluating models, integrating and securing the resulting application, and keeping it healthy after release.
The words "a ITS-AI" in the title of this article are a common way people phrase the question, and it is worth answering literally: an ITS-AI is the credential itself, and a person who passes it holds the IT Specialist - Artificial Intelligence certification. Related explainers on this site cover the naming in more detail, including what ITS-AI stands for and the meaning of the ITS-AI label. If you want the certification overview from a different angle, see What Is ITS-AI Certification?
This credential is a proctored multiple-choice style knowledge assessment, not a hands-on lab and not a research-level machine learning exam. Its emphasis is breadth across the project lifecycle, and that breadth is the thing candidates most often underestimate.
Who Issues It and How the Program Works
The certification is issued by Pearson and administered by Certiport, a Pearson VUE business. Pearson's catalogue identifier for the exam is INF-307. The exam sits inside the broader IT Specialist family, a set of entry-to-early-career technology certifications aimed at students, career changers and early-stage professionals who need a verifiable credential rather than a graduate-level one.
There is no degree requirement. Eligibility is effectively about whether you know the material in the published objective domains. For the formal side of this question, the companion piece ITS-AI Requirements: Eligibility, Prerequisites & How to Qualify walks through what is and is not demanded of you before you sit the exam.
The Six Objective Domains
The current English exam objectives document, published by Pearson/Certiport under the title IT Specialist Exam Objectives - Artificial Intelligence (copyright 2026), organizes the exam into six domains. These are official exam objectives, meaning they describe what is assessed rather than prescribing a course of study. Pearson does not publish percentage weights for them, so any site claiming exact domain percentages is guessing; treat the domains as six areas to cover, not a weighted blueprint.
Domain 1: AI Problem Definition
Before any model exists, a candidate must show they can frame a problem correctly and judge whether AI is even the right tool.
- Translating a business need into an AI task
- Feasibility assessment: is there enough usable data, is the expected value worth the cost
- Understanding where human interaction fits into an AI-assisted process
Domain 2: Data Collection and Transformation
Data quality drives model quality, so this domain covers sourcing and cleaning.
- Gathering data from suitable sources and recognizing quality problems
- Cleaning, transforming and preparing datasets for modeling
- Spotting issues such as missing values, imbalance and bias introduced at collection time
Domain 3: Feature Engineering
Feature engineering is a separate domain in the current outline, which matters because older material folded it into data preparation.
- Selecting, creating and transforming input variables
- Encoding and scaling approaches and why they suit different algorithms
- Reducing dimensionality and avoiding leakage between training and test data
Domain 4: AI Algorithms and Models
The conceptual core: knowing which family of technique fits which problem and how to judge the result.
- Matching problem type to approach, including natural language processing (NLP) use cases
- Model-evaluation metrics and how to read them for a given task
- Explainability: why a model produced an output and why that matters to stakeholders
Domain 5: Application Integrity and Deployment
This is the exact wording used in the revised PDF. Application integration remains objective 5.1 within the domain.
- Integrating a model into an application
- CI/CD concepts for shipping AI components reliably
- Security considerations for AI-enabled systems
Domain 6: Maintaining and Monitoring AI in Production
The lifecycle does not end at launch, and the final objective in the document, 6.5, closes out the exam's scope.
- Monitoring performance after release
- Detecting drift as real-world data diverges from training data
- Planned decommissioning when a model should be retired
For a deeper domain-by-domain breakdown with study angles, read ITS-AI Exam Domains: Complete Guide to All 6 Content Areas. When you want to test yourself against this structure, the ITS-AI practice tests are organized around these same six areas.
The 2026 Revision and the Legacy Outline Problem
The exam objectives were revised, and candidates need to be careful about which version they are reading. Pearson/Certiport announced on April 29, 2026 that the IT Specialist AI certification was being updated, and Certiport's exam content updates archive lists the English update as June 30, 2026. Other-language rollouts have different dates, so the English release statement should not be assumed to apply elsewhere.
Here is the practical trap. Pearson's general IT Specialist resources page still links an older outline carrying a 2025 copyright and a five-domain structure. That legacy document should not be treated as complete current English coverage. The revised six-domain outline separates out topics that the older one blended together, including feature engineering, NLP, explainability, human interaction, feasibility, evaluation metrics, CI/CD, security, drift and decommissioning.
| Aspect | Legacy outline (copyright 2025) | Current English objectives (copyright 2026) |
|---|---|---|
| Number of domains | Five | Six |
| Feature engineering | Not a standalone domain | Domain 3, stands alone |
| Deployment and integrity | Narrower treatment | Domain 5, Application Integrity and Deployment |
| Production monitoring | Limited | Domain 6, including drift and decommissioning |
| Safe to study from for the English exam? | No, incomplete | Yes, this is the current scope |
Exam Format, Fee and Scoring Mechanics
Format and timing
The exam is a computer-based, proctored knowledge assessment. Pearson's MindhubPro listing estimates 45-50 questions with a 50-minute maximum. Treat that as a variable range rather than a fixed form length; your particular form may land anywhere in it. The 50 minutes is timed exam time and excludes administration steps and the tutorial screens. A generic IT Specialist tutorial document (copyright 2021) mentions a 36-40 question estimate, but that figure is older and generic, so the exam-specific listing is the better reference. The tutorial remains useful mainly for learning how answer-option navigation works on the interface.
Fee
The exam-only voucher is displayed at USD 127 at web/member pricing on Pearson MindhubPro. Vouchers are country-restricted, are unavailable in some listed markets, and expire 12 months after purchase. That voucher expiry is a separate matter from how long the credential stays valid once earned. For a full cost walkthrough including retakes, see ITS-AI Certification Cost: Complete Pricing Breakdown.
Scoring
The passing score is 700 on a 1-1000 scale. This is a scaled score, so it is not equivalent to answering 70 percent of questions correctly. Certiport does not publish pass rates, which is why any specific pass-rate figure you see quoted should be treated skeptically; the discussion in ITS-AI Pass Rate: What the Data Shows explains what can and cannot be said responsibly. For scoring detail, see ITS-AI Passing Score: Exactly What You Need to Pass.
Registration Channels Compared
There are two distinct ways to sit the exam, and they use different vouchers that are not interchangeable.
| Feature | Pearson VUE / OnVUE channel | Certiport Authorized Testing Center (CATC) channel |
|---|---|---|
| Voucher | Exam-only voucher listed at USD 127 | US-only CATC voucher with retake listed at USD 133 |
| Where you test | Pearson VUE test centers or online via OnVUE | A Certiport Authorized Testing Center |
| Online proctoring | OnVUE requires a system check and a live webcam proctor | Not usable through OnVUE or Pearson VUE centers |
| Extra costs | Check at checkout | Proctoring may cost extra |
| Geography | Country-restricted | US-only |
CATC sessions have their own conditions: photo and signature identification, a signed non-disclosure agreement, parental consent for candidates under 18, and no personal paper or communication devices in the room. For scheduling logistics, see ITS-AI Exam Dates: Testing Windows, Deadlines & Scheduling.
Who Should Take It, and Who Hires for It
The IT Specialist program targets students, career changers and early-career technologists who want a recognized credential demonstrating applied AI literacy. It is not positioned as a senior data-scientist qualification. Realistic fits include:
- Students in IT, computer science or data programs who want a third-party credential on a résumé.
- Career changers moving from general IT support, analytics or software roles toward AI-adjacent work.
- Early-career analysts and developers who will be asked to participate in AI projects and need shared vocabulary with data and engineering teams.
- Educators and training programs that use Certiport-delivered certifications as course outcomes.
Employers who value it tend to be those hiring for junior roles where AI project literacy matters more than deep model-building: IT departments adopting AI tools, consultancies, and organizations that run structured upskilling programs. The credential does not replace a portfolio or practical experience; it signals that you understand the lifecycle and its vocabulary. For role-level discussion, see ITS-AI Jobs, and for the financial side, ITS-AI Salary Guide: Complete Earnings Analysis and Is the ITS-AI Certification Worth It? Complete ROI Analysis.
Readiness: The 150-Hour Profile
The program suggests approximately 150 hours of preparation, and the objective profiles describe candidates as having at least that much exposure. This is a readiness profile, not an application requirement: nobody checks a log of hours before you register. Use it as a rough calibration. If you are coming from a course or bootcamp that already covered data preparation and basic modeling, you may need less raw study time and more attention to the lifecycle domains at the edges, namely Domain 1 (problem framing) and Domain 6 (monitoring and decommissioning), which are the areas most often skipped by learners who focus on algorithms.
If you are wondering how demanding the exam is relative to that investment, How Hard Is the ITS-AI Exam? examines the difficulty drivers in detail.
Key Takeaway
The exam rewards lifecycle breadth. A candidate who knows algorithms well but has never thought about drift, CI/CD or feasibility will lose points in Domains 1, 5 and 6 even though those sound like "soft" topics.
Validity and Recertification
Credentials awarded on or after 2025-06-18 are valid for five years. Earlier awards remain non-expiring. When a five-year credential reaches the end of its validity, recertification means buying a new voucher and passing the current exam, which may differ from the version you originally took. Keep this separate in your mind from the 12-month window on an unused voucher: one governs how long you have to schedule and sit the exam, the other governs how long your earned credential lasts.
Sequencing Your Preparation by Domain
Rather than a generic weekly template, sequence your study around how the six domains depend on one another. Data quality problems explain model behavior, and monitoring concepts only make sense once you understand what was trained. One workable order across roughly six weeks:
Domains 1 and 2
- Practice framing problems and judging feasibility before touching data
- Work through data-quality issues: missing values, imbalance, collection bias
Domain 3: Feature Engineering
- Study encoding, scaling and selection, and why leakage invalidates results
Domain 4: Algorithms and Models
- Match problem types to approaches, including NLP
- Read evaluation metrics and explain model output
Domains 5 and 6
- Integration, CI/CD and security, then drift, monitoring and decommissioning
Mixed review
- Timed practice against the 50-minute limit using the ITS-AI practice tests
For a fuller plan, see the ITS-AI Study Guide: How to Pass on Your First Attempt, and keep the ITS-AI Cheat Sheet handy for last-day review of facts like the 700 scaled score and the voucher rules. If you want structured learning material rather than self-directed study, see ITS-AI Training.
Frequently Asked Questions
It is the Information Technology Specialist - Artificial Intelligence certification, issued by Pearson and administered by Certiport. Passing the exam earns the IT Specialist - Artificial Intelligence credential, which verifies knowledge of the applied AI project lifecycle.
The current English objectives list six: AI Problem Definition; Data Collection and Transformation; Feature Engineering; AI Algorithms and Models; Application Integrity and Deployment; and Maintaining and Monitoring AI in Production. An older five-domain outline still circulates but is not complete current English coverage.
You need 700 on a 1-1000 scaled score. Because it is scaled, it does not correspond to a fixed raw percentage of correct answers. Certiport does not publish pass rates.
Pearson's listing estimates 45-50 questions in a 50-minute maximum. The exam-only voucher is displayed at USD 127, and a US-only CATC voucher with retake is listed at USD 133. Vouchers are country-restricted and expire 12 months after purchase.
Awards on or after 2025-06-18 are valid for five years; earlier awards do not expire. Recertifying requires a new voucher and passing the current version of the exam.