CompTIA A+ Practice Test (220-1201)
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CompTIA A+ 220-1201 (V15) Information
CompTIA A+ Certification Overview
Exam Versions
The current versions of the CompTIA A+ certification exams are:
- 220-1201 (Core 1)
- 220-1202 (Core 2)
These versions were launched in April 2022 and are expected to retire approximately three years from their release date.
The A+ Certification Test
To earn the CompTIA A+ certification, candidates must pass two separate exams: 220-1201 and 220-1202. Each exam has a separate fee and can be taken in any order. Both exams must be completed before the retirement date and must be from the same set of objectives. The certification is valid for three years from the date of passing the exams.
Exam Details:
- Format: Computer-based tests
- Number of Questions: 90 questions per exam
- Time Limit: 90 minutes per exam
- Result Availability: Immediately after completion, following a short mandatory survey
CompTIA A+ 220-1201
The CompTIA A+ 220-1201 (Core 1) exam is a key component of the A+ certification, designed to validate essential IT skills and knowledge. This exam, launched in April 2022, covers a broad range of topics critical for IT professionals, including mobile devices, networking technology, hardware, virtualization and cloud computing, and network troubleshooting. Comprising 90 questions, the test includes multiple-choice and performance-based questions, simulating real-world scenarios to assess the candidate's practical abilities. The 220-1201 exam emphasizes the foundational skills necessary for IT support roles, ensuring that certified individuals are equipped to handle a variety of technical issues. With a 90-minute time limit, the exam challenges candidates to demonstrate their proficiency efficiently, providing immediate results upon completion. The certification remains valid for three years, making it a crucial step for those aiming to establish or advance their careers in IT.
Exam Policies and Procedures
Candidates must agree to CompTIA's exam policies before starting the test. These policies include:
- No Mobile Phones/Devices: Must be left outside the exam room
- Question Review: Candidates can revisit and change answers before submitting the exam
- Submission: Unanswered questions are marked, and a final review is available before submission
Testing Centers
Since July 9, 2012, CompTIA exams are available exclusively through Pearson VUE testing centers. Candidates can book exams online, by phone, or at the testing center. Options include:
- In-Person Testing: At Pearson VUE testing centers
- Online Testing: Through Pearson VUE's online platform
Performance-Based Questions (PBQs)
The A+ exams include Performance-Based Questions (PBQs), which require candidates to perform specific tasks or solve problems in a simulated environment. These questions test real-world skills in areas like command prompts, Windows OS, and networking environments.
Continuing Education (CE) Program
Certifications with the +CE (Continuing Education) suffix, including A+, Network+, and Security+, must be renewed every three years. Renewal options include:
- Retaking the Exam: Passing the latest version of the exam
- Higher-Level Certification: Passing a higher-level CompTIA exam
- CE Program Requirements: Completing CE activities
Lifetime Certifications
Certifications earned on or before December 31, 2010, are valid for life. However, lifetime certifications are no longer available for new candidates.
More reading:
Free CompTIA A+ 220-1201 (V15) Practice Test
Press start when you are ready, or press Change to modify any settings for the practice test.
- Questions: 15
- Time: Unlimited
- Included Topics:Mobile DevicesNetworkingHardwareVirtualization and Cloud ComputingHardware and Network Troubleshooting
A company is planning to quickly scale its infrastructure to meet the varying demands of its new web application. Which cloud characteristic is most essential to ensure the infrastructure can dynamically expand or contract resources as needed?
Rapid elasticity
High availability
File synchronization
Metered utilization
Answer Description
Rapid Elasticity is a key characteristic of cloud computing, allowing resources to be quickly scaled up or down to accommodate the changing needs of an application or workload. This ability ensures that the company only uses and pays for the resources required at any given time, providing both flexibility and cost-efficiency. High Availability ensures uptime and reliability, but doesn't directly address scalability. Metered Utilization provides billing based on use, not the dynamic scaling of resources. File Synchronization is important for maintaining current data across multiple devices and is not concerned with infrastructure scalability.
Ask Bash
Bash is our AI bot, trained to help you pass your exam. AI Generated Content may display inaccurate information, always double-check anything important.
What does rapid elasticity mean in cloud computing?
How does rapid elasticity differ from high availability?
What are some examples of how companies use rapid elasticity?
Which LCD panel technology is best known for providing the fastest pixel-response times but suffers from noticeably narrower viewing angles than IPS and VA panels?
Twisted nematic (TN)
Organic light-emitting diode (OLED)
In-plane switching (IPS)
Vertical alignment (VA)
Answer Description
Twisted nematic (TN) panels were the first LCDs to reach 1 ms (or faster) gray-to-gray response times, making them popular for competitive gaming. Their main trade-off is limited color consistency when viewed off-axis, giving them the narrowest effective viewing angles of the common LCD types. IPS panels offer the widest angles but slower response, while VA panels fall between IPS and TN in both areas. OLED is not an LCD technology and is unrelated to this comparison.
Ask Bash
Bash is our AI bot, trained to help you pass your exam. AI Generated Content may display inaccurate information, always double-check anything important.
What is the Preferred Roaming List (PRL)?
How does the PRL impact domestic vs. international roaming?
What are GSM and CDMA technologies?
During an interview for an IT position at a large enterprise, you are asked whether you are familiar with VDI environments. Which type of technology is the interviewer referencing?
A cloud-based service that automatically deploys security patches to endpoints
A monitoring tool for tracking the health of virtual disks
A centralized virtualization solution that delivers virtual desktops to users over a client device
A hypervisor platform used to host virtual servers such as VMware ESXi or VirtualBox
Answer Description
Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI) is a desktop-virtualization technology in which desktop operating systems run on centralized servers and are delivered to users over a network. Employees connect to these hosted desktops using thin clients, PCs, or other endpoint devices. VDI simplifies desktop management, enhances security, and reduces hardware costs. The option that mentions hosting virtual servers (such as VMware or VirtualBox) is incorrect because VDI specifically refers to desktops, not servers.
Ask Bash
Bash is our AI bot, trained to help you pass your exam. AI Generated Content may display inaccurate information, always double-check anything important.
What are some advantages of using VDI?
What types of clients can connect to a VDI environment?
How does VDI differ from traditional desktop computing?
Which of the following is a cloud deployment model defined in the CompTIA A+ 220-1201 objectives?
Local
Associative
External
Community
Answer Description
For the CompTIA A+ exam, you need to be familiar with four primary cloud deployment models: Community Cloud, Private Cloud, Public Cloud, and Hybrid Cloud. These models define how cloud infrastructure is provisioned and who has access to it. Community cloud is the correct answer as it is one of the four models listed in the objectives.
Ask Bash
Bash is our AI bot, trained to help you pass your exam. AI Generated Content may display inaccurate information, always double-check anything important.
What is a Community Cloud?
What are the differences between Public, Private, and Hybrid Clouds?
What are some common use cases for Community Clouds?
Which type of internal hard-drive interface uses a 40-pin ribbon-cable connector to attach drives to the motherboard?
M.2 NVMe
68-pin SCSI (Ultra-Wide)
Serial ATA (SATA)
Parallel ATA (IDE/PATA)
Answer Description
Parallel ATA, commonly called IDE or PATA, employs a 40-pin female connector on both the motherboard and the drive. Later Ultra ATA versions introduced an 80-conductor ribbon cable to reduce crosstalk, but the connector itself still has 40 pins. The other options have different pin counts: SATA uses a 7-pin data connector, 68-pin SCSI uses 68 pins, and M.2 NVMe drives use an edge-connector card edge rather than discrete pins.
Ask Bash
Bash is our AI bot, trained to help you pass your exam. AI Generated Content may display inaccurate information, always double-check anything important.
What does IDE stand for?
What is the difference between IDE and SATA?
What are the advantages of using IDE hard drives?
A technician is preparing to replace the battery in a customer's smartphone. Which battery chemistry is used in nearly all modern smartphones and tablets because it provides a high energy density while remaining relatively lightweight?
Nickel-cadmium
Lead-acid
Nickel-metal hydride
Lithium-ion
Answer Description
Lithium-ion batteries deliver a high energy-to-weight ratio, making them ideal for portable devices such as smartphones and tablets that require long runtimes without adding excessive mass. Other chemistries-such as nickel-cadmium, nickel-metal hydride, or lead-acid-either suffer from lower energy density, higher weight, or form factors unsuitable for modern mobile devices, which is why they are rarely used in today's handheld electronics.
Ask Bash
Bash is our AI bot, trained to help you pass your exam. AI Generated Content may display inaccurate information, always double-check anything important.
What does ARM stand for and what is its significance in mobile devices?
How does ARM architecture compare to x86 architecture in terms of performance?
What are some other applications of ARM architecture apart from smartphones and tablets?
Which email protocol retrieves messages by downloading them to the client and, by default, removes the copies from the mail server after retrieval?
IMAP
POP3
MAPI
SMTP
Answer Description
Post Office Protocol version 3 (POP3) is designed for one-way message retrieval: the client connects to the mail server, downloads the messages, and-unless configured otherwise-deletes them from the server.
Why the others are wrong:
- IMAP keeps messages on the server and synchronizes the mailbox across devices instead of deleting messages after download.
- SMTP is a delivery protocol used to send email from client to server and between servers.
- MAPI is a Microsoft API for messaging; it is not an internet-standard retrieval protocol.
Ask Bash
Bash is our AI bot, trained to help you pass your exam. AI Generated Content may display inaccurate information, always double-check anything important.
What does POP3 stand for and how does it work?
What is the difference between POP3 and IMAP?
What role does SMTP play in email communication?
Which of the following ports belongs to a standard protocol used to query data from an Active Directory server?
443
143
23
389
Answer Description
Lightweight Directory Access Protocol (LDAP) is an open-standard protocol used to query directory based databases such as Active Directory. LDAP uses TCP 389 by default.
Ask Bash
Bash is our AI bot, trained to help you pass your exam. AI Generated Content may display inaccurate information, always double-check anything important.
What is LDAP and how does it work?
What is Active Directory?
What other ports are commonly used for protocol communication?
Which service model provides hardware and software tools online for application development?
Infrastructure as a Service
Software as a Service
Platform as a Service
Backup as a Service
Answer Description
Platform as a Service (PaaS) is a model that provides both hardware and software tools online. It supports the development, testing, deployment, management, and updating of applications without requiring developers to manage the underlying infrastructure.
Ask Bash
Bash is our AI bot, trained to help you pass your exam. AI Generated Content may display inaccurate information, always double-check anything important.
What exactly does Platform as a Service (PaaS) provide developers?
How does PaaS differ from Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS)?
What types of applications are typically built using PaaS?
A healthcare organization wants to implement an electronic health record (EHR) system that can be accessed by doctors and staff from various locations with minimal administration overhead. Which cloud-computing model would be most suitable for this scenario?
Platform as a Service (PaaS)
Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS)
Community cloud
Software as a Service (SaaS)
Answer Description
Software as a Service (SaaS) is suited for this scenario because it provides software applications over the internet. It requires no installation, maintenance, or administration from the organization's IT staff, as the service provider manages everything. This allows the healthcare organization to quickly deploy and use the EHR system with minimal local hardware requirements and offers accessibility from any location with an internet connection. Other models like IaaS and PaaS require more administrative overhead and technical management from the organization.
Ask Bash
Bash is our AI bot, trained to help you pass your exam. AI Generated Content may display inaccurate information, always double-check anything important.
What exactly does Software as a Service (SaaS) mean?
How does SaaS differ from IaaS and PaaS?
What are the advantages of using a SaaS model for a healthcare organization?
What distinguishes a modular power supply from other types of power supply units when assembling a custom computer system?
It exclusively uses 24-pin connectors, avoiding the need for any 20-pin connections in modern computer systems.
It has cables that can be detached and left out if they're not needed, improving cable management within the computer case.
It provides a built-in uninterrupted power supply backup battery to keep the computer running in case of a power outage.
It comes with cables pre-bundled with zip ties to facilitate better organization and airflow inside the case.
Answer Description
A modular power supply allows the user to connect or disconnect cables based on the individual needs of the PC components. This leads to improved airflow, better cable management, and a cleaner look inside the case. Because each unused cable can be detached at the PSU, it eliminates unnecessary cable clutter, which is especially beneficial in smaller cases or for high-performance systems where efficient cooling is essential. The fixed cables on non-modular power supplies, on the other hand, must remain in the case even if they are not connected to any components.
Ask Bash
Bash is our AI bot, trained to help you pass your exam. AI Generated Content may display inaccurate information, always double-check anything important.
What are the benefits of improved cable management in a computer system?
How does a modular power supply work in terms of cable attachment?
What are the differences between modular, semi-modular, and non-modular power supplies?
A client copied a 10 GB video file from an external hard drive to a desktop in about five minutes. The same file now needs to be copied to another computer, and the client wants to use the fastest built-in port on that destination PC. Which port type should the technician recommend?
Ethernet port
USB 2.0 port
HDMI port
USB 3.0 port
Answer Description
USB 3.0 (also labeled SuperSpeed USB 5 Gbps) provides a theoretical data rate of 5 Gbps-roughly five times faster than Gigabit Ethernet (1 Gbps) and more than ten times faster than USB 2.0 (480 Mbps). HDMI ports are intended for audio-video signals, not file transfers. Therefore, using a USB 3.0 port will minimize the copy time for the 10 GB file.
Ask Bash
Bash is our AI bot, trained to help you pass your exam. AI Generated Content may display inaccurate information, always double-check anything important.
What is the maximum transfer speed of USB 3.0?
How does USB 2.0 compare to USB 3.0 in terms of speed?
What are the common uses for an HDMI port?
You are the IT administrator of a small office. A group of users in a secluded part of the building is reporting intermittent wireless connectivity that worsens throughout the day. These users connect their devices to a Wi-Fi extender, which has not been moved or adjusted recently. Considering the scenario, which action should you take first to troubleshoot this issue?
Immediately replace the Wi-Fi extender assuming it has become faulty without further investigation.
Examine the Wi-Fi extender for signs of overheating, such as a high surface temperature or operational instability as the day progresses.
Switch all affected devices to an alternate Wi-Fi channel and monitor for improvements.
Update the extender's firmware to the latest version available, regardless of the current issue's symptoms.
Answer Description
The correct answer is to verify if the extender is overheating, given that the issue worsens throughout the day, implying a problem that escalates with continued use. This could indicate a thermal issue with the hardware. Changing the Wi-Fi channel might be a consideration if there were indications of wireless interference, but in this scenario, the gradual nature of the problem suggests a hardware limitation or failure rather than a new source of interference. Replacing the extender without diagnosing first would be premature. Lastly, updating the firmware could be useful if the issue were related to a software bug, but the progressive nature of the connectivity problems points towards a potential hardware overheating issue.
Ask Bash
Bash is our AI bot, trained to help you pass your exam. AI Generated Content may display inaccurate information, always double-check anything important.
What are common signs that a Wi-Fi extender is overheating?
How can I check if a Wi-Fi channel switch would be beneficial?
What is the importance of firmware updates for Wi-Fi extenders?
You have been tasked by the network team to assign a server a new static IP address. When you try to apply the IP 172.256.1.15 with a subnet mask of 255.0.0.0, the system returns an error. What is causing the error?
The DHCP server is not assigning an IP address, so the computer generated an APIPA address.
172.x.x.x is a Class B address but the subnet mask is the default for Class A.
There is not enough information provided to determine the problem.
The IP address is invalid.
Answer Description
In IPv4 each octet is 8 bits, so its decimal value must be between 0 and 255. Because the second octet in 172.256.1.15 is 256, the address is syntactically invalid and the operating system rejects it. APIPA addresses (169.254.x.x) are unrelated because you are manually configuring a static IP. Likewise, DHCP plays no role in this manual assignment, and there is no requirement that a Class B network (172.x.x.x) use its historical default subnet mask (255.255.0.0); using a Class A mask with a Class B address is legal but uncommon. Therefore, the only real problem is the invalid octet value.
Ask Bash
Bash is our AI bot, trained to help you pass your exam. AI Generated Content may display inaccurate information, always double-check anything important.
What is an IP address and how is it structured?
What are some common reasons an IP address may be considered invalid?
What does APIPA mean, and how does it relate to DHCP?
During a presentation, a projector that was functioning properly suddenly produces no visible output, while the status indicators suggest normal operation. You notice a faint smell similar to burning electronics. What should be the FIRST step in troubleshooting this issue?
Replace the video cable connecting the projector to the source.
Inspect the projector bulb for visible damage or discoloration.
Adjust the projector's brightness and contrast settings from the menu.
Reboot the computer connected to the projector to reset the video output.
Answer Description
Noticing a faint smell similar to burning electronics when a projector fails to produce visible output is a strong indicator that the projector bulb has likely burned out. Checking the bulb for signs of damage, discoloration, or the smell of burned materials would be the first step in confirming the cause before considering replacement.
Ask Bash
Bash is our AI bot, trained to help you pass your exam. AI Generated Content may display inaccurate information, always double-check anything important.
What are the signs of a burned-out projector bulb?
Why is checking the bulb the first step in troubleshooting projector issues?
What could cause a projector bulb to fail prematurely?
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