AZ-802 is not AZ-800 plus AZ-801

One exam where there were two

Microsoft retired exams AZ-800 and AZ-801 on September 30, 2026. Microsoft's exam retirement list

Microsoft's page for its Windows Server associate certification says that once those two retire, AZ-802 remains as the path to earn it. Microsoft's certification page

The training moved with it: the instructor-led AZ-800T00 and AZ-801T00 courses retired the same day, both replaced by AZ-802T00. Microsoft's course retirement list

What the exam weighs

Microsoft's study guide splits AZ-802 into seven skill areas. Deploying and managing AD DS is the heaviest, at 20 to 25 percent, down from 30 to 35 percent on AZ-800. Storage and file services, and monitoring and troubleshooting, are 15 to 20 percent each. Hybrid management of Windows Server, virtual machines, networking, and security are 10 to 15 percent each. Microsoft's AZ-802 study guide

The group that left the AD DS area is hybrid identity. Domain controllers, sites and trusts, users and groups, and Group Policy are all still there.

Hybrid is wider than the one area that carries its name. Domain controllers in Azure sit under AD DS, Azure Files and Azure File Sync under storage, Windows Server VMs in Azure under virtual machines, and Azure Monitor data collection rules and VM Insights under monitoring, besides Azure Arc, Azure Update Manager and Automation runbooks in the hybrid area itself.

What has no line in AZ-802's skills list

Set the retired study guides beside AZ-802's and whole skill groups are missing from its skills list. The study guides say their skill bullets illustrate how a skill is assessed and that related topics may be covered, so read this as where to spend less time, not what to skip. Microsoft's AZ-800 study guide and AZ-801 study guide

• Failover clustering: building, managing and updating clusters, two skill groups on AZ-801. Storage Spaces Direct stays, and it still runs on a failover cluster.
• Backup and disaster recovery: Azure Backup, Azure Backup Server and Azure Site Recovery. Hyper-V Replica stays, now under virtual machines.
• Server migration, 20 to 25 percent of AZ-801: Storage Migration Service, Azure Migrate, IIS and forest migrations. Two migration lines remain, both into Azure Files and Azure File Sync.
• Hybrid identity: Microsoft Entra Connect Sync, Cloud Sync and Connect Health, and Microsoft Entra Domain Services.
• Containers: container hosts and images, container networking, and AKS on Windows Server.
• Network connectivity: the Remote Access role, site-to-site VPN, Network Policy and Access Services, Web Application Proxy and Microsoft Entra Application Proxy.
• Security services around the server: Microsoft Defender for Identity and Microsoft Sentinel ingestion. Defender for Servers stays.

What is new

Two troubleshooting lines in AZ-802's Active Directory group appear in neither retired guide: Kerberos and authentication issues, and secure channel and computer account trust issues. Neither retired guide names Kerberos or the secure channel at all.

Microsoft lists AZ-802 in English only, where AZ-800 was offered in seven languages. Microsoft's AZ-802 exam page

The guide

An AZ-802 exam guide written from this study guide is in its final checks against Microsoft Learn. This page will link it when it is available.