AWS is replacing two of its most popular exams this quarter, and a third update is already live. Registration for SAP-C03 and DVA-C03 opens on October 27, 2026, and SAP-C02 and DVA-C02 close on fixed dates in November. The MLA-C02 beta is already running at half the standard Associate price. Two free hands-on microcredentials for agentic AI complete the aws certification changes 2026.
This guide covers every date, format detail, and content shift that AWS has published so far. If you hold a voucher, a course, or a half-finished study plan for any of these exams, the next five weeks matter. Every fact comes from AWS announcements and certification pages, linked in the Sources section.
The AWS Certification Changes 2026 at a Glance
The aws certification changes 2026 replace SAP-C02 with SAP-C03 and DVA-C02 with DVA-C03. Registration opens October 27, 2026 for both new exams. MLA-C02 is already in beta at 75 USD, in English only. Two new agentic AI microcredentials are free on AWS Skill Builder.
The aws certification changes 2026 bring three exam replacements on a fixed calendar, plus a pair of free lab assessments.
| Exam | What changes | Key dates | Who is affected |
|---|---|---|---|
| SAP-C03 (Solutions Architect, Professional) | Replaces SAP-C02. Adds generative AI, agentic AI, and resilience engineering skills. | Registration opens Oct 27, 2026. SAP-C02 last day Nov 16. SAP-C03 starts Nov 17. | Solutions architects with two or more years of AWS experience. |
| DVA-C03 (Developer, Associate) | Replaces DVA-C02. Adds an AI security task and AI-assisted development across all domains. | Registration opens Oct 27, 2026. DVA-C02 last day Nov 30. DVA-C03 starts Dec 1. | Developers building applications on AWS. |
| MLA-C02 (Machine Learning Engineer, Associate) | Updated exam, in beta now. Adds generative AI, foundation models, and agentic workflows. | Beta live since Sep 29, 2026. General availability Jan 14, 2027, when MLA-C01 retires in all languages. | ML engineers, MLOps engineers, LLMOps engineers, and data engineers. |
| Agentic AI microcredentials | Two new free lab assessments: Securing Agent Identities and Databases for Agentic AI. | Available now on AWS Skill Builder. No subscription required. | Builders who want proof of hands-on agent skills beside a certification. |
One pattern runs through every change. AWS now tests whether you can build with AI, not only whether you know the classic services. Preparation based only on older material will leave gaps.
SAP-C03: What Is New vs SAP-C02
SAP-C03 keeps the headline format of the current exam. AWS lists 75 questions, 180 minutes, and a price of 300 USD for the new version. Those numbers match SAP-C02, so the real change sits in the content, not the wrapper.
The updated exam is organized into five domains:
- Cloud-native architecture design and implementation
- Security, compliance, and governance
- Cost-optimized architecture design
- Resilience, migration, and business continuity
- Operational excellence and automation
AWS will publish the full exam guide, with detailed task statements and domain weights, when registration opens on October 27, 2026. Treat any SAP-C03 weights published before that date with caution.
The content additions show where architecture work is heading:
- Generative AI and agentic AI (11 new skills): Amazon Bedrock integrations, agent architectures with Amazon Bedrock AgentCore, retrieval-augmented generation architectures, Amazon Bedrock Guardrails, and human-oversight workflows for AI operations.
- Resilience engineering: AWS Fault Injection Service, AWS Resilience Hub, AWS Application Recovery Controller, and automated runbooks through AWS Systems Manager.
- Cloud-native patterns (7 new skills): serverless data pipelines, Step Functions workflows, service mesh with Amazon VPC Lattice and Amazon ECS Service Connect, container image security, multi-tenant architectures, and real-time data architectures.
- DevSecOps and observability (6 new skills): pipeline vulnerability scanning, multi-account deployment pipelines, container monitoring, AI and ML metrics monitoring, and synthetic and real-user monitoring.
- Data and analytics (3 new skills): data lakehouse architectures with AWS Lake Formation and Apache Iceberg, real-time and batch analytics pipelines, and cross-account data sharing with AWS Clean Rooms.
- Post-quantum cryptography: AWS Key Management Service with ML-DSA and ML-KEM.
If your SAP-C02 preparation is nearly complete, the outgoing exam remains the faster route to the same title. The decision section below covers that choice.
DVA-C03: What Is New vs DVA-C02
DVA-C03 is the Associate-level half of the aws certification changes 2026. It keeps the familiar format. AWS lists 65 questions in 130 minutes at 150 USD, with a passing score of 720 out of 1,000. Fifty of the questions are scored, and fifteen are unscored trial questions.
The four domains and their weights stay exactly where DVA-C02 put them:
| Domain | Weight |
|---|---|
| Development with AWS Services | 30% |
| Security | 26% |
| Testing and Deployment | 22% |
| Troubleshooting and Optimization | 22% |
That stability is good news: your existing DVA-C02 course still maps onto the new blueprint. Three changes matter inside that stable frame:
- A new AI security task. Task 2.3 adds five skills inside the Security domain. It covers access management for AI services and data privacy controls, such as VPC endpoints and keeping inputs and outputs out of model training. It also covers content filtering, prompt injection protection, and security for AI agent interactions, including tool-use authorization and human approval flows.
- AI-assisted development across all domains. Code generation and automated review sit in Domain 1. Test automation, regression testing, and deployment approvals sit in Domain 3. Error analysis and performance optimization recommendations sit in Domain 4.
- More containers and new services. Container work now spans Amazon ECR, Amazon ECS, Amazon EKS, and AWS Fargate. New in-scope services include Amazon Bedrock, Amazon Bedrock AgentCore, Amazon Q, Kiro, Amazon Data Firehose, and AWS PrivateLink.
AWS also consolidated overlapping skills. DynamoDB drops from four skills to one. Security shrinks from thirteen skills to seven, testing from eleven to five, observability from eight to five, and optimization from nine to six.
Just as useful is what AWS left out of DVA-C03. Prompt engineering, RAG design, AI model selection, Amazon SageMaker AI, and AI governance framework design are all out of scope. Those topics belong to the machine learning exams. Do not spend study hours on them for DVA-C03.
MLA-C02 Beta: Who Should Take the Beta and Why
MLA-C02 is the only part of the aws certification changes 2026 that is already live. Beta registration opened on September 1, 2026, and beta delivery began on September 29. The beta runs in English only, under the beta exam code ME1-C02.
| Detail | MLA-C02 (beta) | MLA-C01 (current) |
|---|---|---|
| Exam format | 85 questions | 65 questions |
| Duration | 170 minutes | 130 minutes |
| Price | 75 USD (beta pricing) | 150 USD |
| Languages | English only | English ended Sep 28, 2026. Japanese, Korean, and Simplified Chinese remain. |
| Validity if you pass | 3 years | 3 years |
The economics favor confident candidates. You pay half the standard Associate price and earn the same certification. The trade-offs are real, though. A beta carries extra unscored questions, which is why the sitting runs forty minutes longer. AWS policy also allows only one attempt at a beta exam. A failed beta means waiting for the standard exam in January.
Content is the bigger reason to consider the beta. AWS kept the same domain structure and added no new domains. The update fills those domains with generative AI work: fine-tuning foundation models, RAG architectures, and agentic AI orchestration. Foundation model selection and expanded Amazon Bedrock coverage also appear. Responsible AI guidance now spans traditional ML and generative AI.
AWS aims the exam at people with at least one year of Amazon SageMaker AI, Amazon Bedrock, and related services experience. ML engineers, MLOps engineers, LLMOps engineers, data engineers, and software developers who ship ML features all fit.
Skip the beta if your preparation leans on MLA-C01 material alone. The generative AI sections have thin third-party coverage so far. The single-attempt rule also punishes a rushed booking. Waiting for general availability on January 14, 2027 costs more, but it buys mature courses and practice exams.
MLA-C02 is one of several AI credentials AWS reshaped this year. Business readers should start with our AWS AI Business Strategist (AIB-C01) guide instead of an engineering exam. Engineers who work with AI agents across vendors can also read our MCP Associate certification guide for the vendor-neutral side of agent skills.
The Free Agentic AI Microcredentials
The microcredentials are the free layer of the aws certification changes 2026. On September 29, 2026, AWS added two of them to AWS Skill Builder. Both are free, and neither one needs a subscription. Each is a timed lab assessment inside a live AWS environment, with no multiple-choice questions. You diagnose a broken setup, fix it under time pressure, and earn a digital badge through Credly when you pass.
AWS Securing Agent Identities Demonstrated
This lab asks you to harden identity and access across a fleet of Amazon Bedrock AgentCore agents. You provision workload identities for self-hosted agents and enforce tag-based access control. You secure inbound access with scoped JWT authorization and choose between SigV4 and JWT per caller. You also migrate agents to production-grade JWT identity verification and establish audit trails for token operations. Covered services include Amazon Bedrock AgentCore, Amazon Cognito, IAM, AWS CloudTrail, Amazon CloudWatch, and AWS Systems Manager. AWS names cloud security engineers and solutions architects as the ideal audience.
AWS Databases for Agentic AI Demonstrated
This lab covers the data layer that agentic AI applications run on. You configure Amazon Aurora PostgreSQL and Amazon DynamoDB for agent access and memory. You set up pgvector and Amazon Bedrock Knowledge Bases for document retrieval. You configure MCP servers to debug agent database interactions and optimize their queries. Covered services include Amazon Aurora PostgreSQL, Amazon DynamoDB, Amazon Bedrock, AWS Lambda, Amazon CloudWatch, and AWS Secrets Manager. AWS aims it at database engineers, database solutions engineers, solutions architects, and AI and ML engineers.
Treat these labs as proof of practice beside a certification, not as replacements for one. AWS draws the line itself: certifications validate what you know, and microcredentials validate what you can do. The Securing Agent Identities lab pairs neatly with the new AI security task in DVA-C03. The Databases lab pairs with MLA-C02 study, where RAG data pipelines carry real weight.
The two new labs join a portfolio of ten microcredentials, including AWS Agentic AI Demonstrated. Try the free Preview Experience on Skill Builder first. It teaches the lab interface, so your scored attempt measures skill rather than orientation.
Should You Book the Old Version or Wait?
These changes force one decision on every current candidate. AWS gives the same reassurance for both flagship exams. A credential earned on the outgoing version stays active through its original expiration date.
- You are nearly ready: book SAP-C02 by November 16 or DVA-C02 by November 30. You earn the same certification title sooner, with mature courses and practice exams behind you.
- You are starting now: register for the new version when booking opens on October 27. Build the published AI additions into your plan from day one.
- Your voucher expires soon: spend it on whichever version fits the voucher window. A real attempt beats an expired voucher.
- Your employer pays for one attempt: wait for the new version. Its blueprint matches the skills hiring managers will request through 2027.
- You need the ML credential in English: the beta is your only route until January 14, 2027. MLA-C01 closed in English on September 28, 2026, so there is no old version left to book.
Whichever route you choose, confirm the exam code on screen before you pay. Both versions can appear side by side in the Pearson VUE catalog during the window.
A 30-Day Action Plan for the AWS Certification Changes 2026
The aws certification changes 2026 run on fixed dates, so this plan works backward from them. It runs from today to the DVA-C03 launch on December 1. Build your weekly study blocks with our free study timetable generator, then pin the actions below around them.
- Days 1 to 5: decide your version and mark your deadline in writing. The MLA-C02 exam guide is already published, so download it now if that is your exam. SAP and DVA guides land on October 27.
- Days 6 to 12: close the AI gaps first. Work through Amazon Bedrock and Amazon Bedrock AgentCore fundamentals. Take one free agentic AI microcredential as an honest skills check.
- Days 13 to 20: sit two timed practice exams, aimed at the November deadlines for old versions or a December or January sitting for new ones.
- Days 21 to 30: book your exam through Pearson VUE and verify the exam code twice. Taper your study to weak domains only. Keep one full rest day before the attempt.
Prefer paper on your desk? Download the free printable AWS Exam Changes 2026: Dates and Decision Sheet (PDF). It lists every deadline in this guide on one page, with a decision checklist on the second.
AWS Certification Changes 2026: FAQs
Does my SAP-C02 or DVA-C02 credential expire when the old exam retires?
No. AWS states that your credential remains active through its original expiration date. Exam retirement only closes new bookings on the old version.
When do the full SAP-C03 and DVA-C03 exam guides arrive?
AWS will publish both guides when registration opens on October 27, 2026. The MLA-C02 exam guide is already available.
Can I still take MLA-C01?
In English, no. The last English sitting of MLA-C01 was September 28, 2026. The Japanese, Korean, and Simplified Chinese versions continue during the beta period. All versions retire on January 14, 2027, at MLA-C02 general availability.
Are the new microcredentials a replacement for AWS Certification?
No. AWS positions microcredentials as a complement to certification, not a substitute. A microcredential proves hands-on skill in one narrow area, inside a live lab. A certification proves broader knowledge across a full job role.
Do SAP-C03 and DVA-C03 cost more than the exams they replace?
No. AWS lists SAP-C03 at 300 USD and DVA-C03 at 150 USD. Both prices match the versions they replace. The MLA-C02 beta costs 75 USD, which is half the standard Associate price of 150 USD.
Dates last checked against AWS on 22 October 2026.
Sources
- AWS Training and Certification Blog: Certification updates from AWS Training and Certification, September 2026
- AWS Training and Certification Blog: Prove your agentic AI skills, two new Microcredentials now available
- AWS Certified Solutions Architect, Professional (SAP-C02 and SAP-C03)
- AWS Certified Developer, Associate (DVA-C02 and DVA-C03)
- AWS Certified Machine Learning Engineer, Associate (MLA-C01 and MLA-C02 beta)
Lauren Brooks is a finance professional writing on professional exams, study strategies, and finance careers.
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