How hard is the NCP-AII exam? +
It's a genuine Professional exam aimed at people who build GPU clusters. Cluster Test and Verification (33%) and System and Server Bring-Up (31%) together make up nearly two thirds, and questions test which step comes first, which tool validates what, and how to read results. Engineers who deploy clusters but have never formally validated one with NCCL tests, HPL burn-in or DCGM diagnostics lose the biggest block of points.
How many questions are on NCP-AII and how long is it? +
The exam has 70 to 75 questions with a two-hour time limit, taken online in English through NVIDIA's exam platform (you need a Certiverse account). The domains are Cluster Test and Verification 33%, System and Server Bring-Up 31%, Control Plane Installation and Configuration 19%, Troubleshooting and Optimization 12% and Physical Layer Management 5%.
What is the passing score for NCP-AII? +
NVIDIA reports NCP-AII as pass or fail and does not publish the passing score. Don't rely on averages: aim for strong practice results in Cluster Test and Verification and Server Bring-Up specifically, because those two domains are 64% of the exam and a weakness in either is very hard to offset elsewhere.
How much does NCP-AII cost and what experience is expected? +
The exam costs $400. There are no formal prerequisites, but NVIDIA recommends 2 to 3 years of hands-on experience deploying, configuring and validating GPU-based servers and AI clusters, plus data center fundamentals. The certification is valid for two years from issuance, and you recertify by retaking the exam.
Which tools should I know for NCP-AII? +
Expect NCCL tests, HPL burn-in, DCGM diagnostics and ClusterKit for validation; NVIDIA SMI, BlueField DPUs and DOCA drivers for HGX and DGX bring-up; and Base Command Manager, Slurm with Enroot and Pyxis, and the NVIDIA Container Toolkit for the control plane. Kubernetes-only engineers often find the Slurm-based stack unfamiliar, so get hands-on time with it if you can.
What's the difference between NCP-AII and NCP-AIO? +
NCP-AII covers getting a cluster built and proven: server bring-up, physical layer, control plane installation and validation. NCP-AIO (AI Operations) covers running it afterwards - administration, monitoring, workload management and troubleshooting in production. If your job is deployment and acceptance testing, take NCP-AII; if you operate existing clusters day to day, NCP-AIO is the closer fit. NCA-AIIO is the Associate-level overview of both.