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ProfessionalVendor-neutralISACA· issued from US

CSX-P

ISACA Cybersecurity Practitioner

ISACA Cybersecurity Practitioner

Official page at ISACA↔ Compare with another cert
Exam fee
$760
Ongoing
$45/yr AMF · 20 CPE/yr
Study time
80–160 hrs
Delivery
Test center
Validity
3 yrs (renewal cycle)

› Quality score

24.5 / 40

Four-axis SecProve rubric, each 0–10. SecProve editorial assessment — each axis carries a written justification so you can push back on any single call without dismissing the whole score.

Blueprint rigor
How well-defined and rigorous the exam blueprint is.
Five-domain blueprint mapping CIS / NIST controls; less granular than CISSP.
6.5/10
Practical evidence
Hands-on labs / written reports vs pure MCQ.
Live lab portion in a virtualised environment — ISACA's most hands-on credential.
7.5/10
Currency & upkeep
How aggressively content is kept current with the field.
Refreshed irregularly; lab content is the most up-to-date piece.
6.5/10
Market recognition
How often this signal actually moves a hiring decision.
Recognised inside ISACA-tracked SOC programs; modest brand pull outside. [Holders: 5k, 2024-12]
4.0/10

› Market signals

public, citable inputs to the recognition score
Holders worldwide
5,000
as of 2024-12 · source

› Exam format

Hands-on exam in virtual lab environment, 4 hours. Incident detection, response and recovery.

Passing score
Lab-based (pass/fail across cyber-task scenarios)
Retake policy
Fee: $575 per attempt
Wait: 30d between attempts
Cap: 4 attempts/year

ISACA member $575 / non-member $760. 4 attempts per rolling 12-month window.

› Recertification

Valid for 3 years. 120 CPE over 3 years + annual AMF.

› 3-year cost of ownership

Exam (1×)
$760
AMF (3×)
$135@$45/yr
Total
$895

Excludes study materials, training, retake risk, and lost-wage opportunity. Use as a floor estimate.

› NICE Framework work roles

The NIST NICE work-role IDs this cert maps to. NICCS lookup.

PD-WRL-003PD-WRL-001OG-WRL-014
Recognition
Global
Exam languages
en

› Core domains covered

The 3 domains this cert is centrally about. Passing the exam demonstrates working knowledge of each.

A10Security Operations

SOC operations, SIEM tuning, SOAR playbooks, alert triage, log analysis, runbook development.

A11Detection Engineering & Threat Hunting

SIGMA/YARA/Suricata rule writing, hypothesis-driven hunting, log deep-dives, detection gap analysis.

A7Incident Response & Forensics

IR playbooks, memory/disk/network forensics, chain of custody, malware analysis.

› Prerequisites

Experience

No formal prerequisites. Recommended: 3–5 years SOC/incident response experience.

› Study materials

Curated starting points. Not exhaustive — vet each against your learning style and the current exam version.

Official guides
Training providers
  • ISACA CSX Training Platform
Practice tests
  • CSX Lab Practice Environment
Free / community

› Version & lifecycle

Current version
2024 refresh
Released
2024-01

Performance-based, hands-on cyber-task evaluation in a virtualized lab.

› Salary signal

Cyber analyst / SOC tier 1-2, US, 2-5 years.

$90K–$135K
median $110K

ISACA Salary Survey + Glassdoor 'Cybersecurity Analyst' aggregations · 2024 · US base only · p25–p75 range

› How it compares

vs
CCOA

Both are ISACA technical-tier credentials. CSX-P is broader hands-on; CCOA is SOC-analyst-specialized.

↔ Compare side-by-side

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