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AI CERTs' entry-level prompt engineering certification, tested by exam AC-130. This guide, current as of October 2026, covers the exam, the seven blueprint domains and their weights, what it costs and how yearly recertification works, the roles it fits, and how it compares with AI+ Prompting Practitioner and other AI certifications.
AI+ Prompting Fundamentals is the entry-level prompt engineering certification from AI CERTs, tested by exam AC-130 and listed in its AI Essentials track. It was formerly called AI+ Prompt Engineer Level 1, the name Training Camp's course page still uses.
It checks that you know how AI models work at a basic level, can write prompts with clear directions and the right output format, can apply techniques like few-shot and chain-of-thought prompting, can prompt image models, and can spot ethical problems like bias and privacy risk. The exam has 50 multiple-choice and multiple-response questions in 90 minutes, with a 70% passing score.
The rename didn't touch the outline. AI CERTs' current program guide lists the same seven modules as the guide it published under the old name, and no technical skills are required. The credential is issued and maintained by AI CERTs, which publishes the exam blueprint and sets the recertification rules.
The history of AI, machine learning, deep learning, neural networks and NLP.
Give directions, format responses, use examples and judge the quality of what comes back.
Weigh tools like ChatGPT, DALL-E and CLIP by their strengths, weaknesses and use cases.
Apply zero-shot, few-shot and chain-of-thought prompting and the methods built on them.
Choose a theme, plan the work, apply AI techniques and reflect on the result.
Deal with bias, fairness, privacy, transparency, accountability and regulation.
Four design choices set it apart from the entry-level AI certifications built around general literacy.
A lot of prompting training stops at chat assistants. This one gives image models a full domain worth 15% of the exam: style modifiers and quality boosters, prompt rewriting, inpainting and outpainting, consistent characters, and the ethical and legal side of AI-generated images.
Project-Based Learning Session is a scored domain at 15%. It covers picking a project theme, planning it, combining text and image models, and presenting the result.
The instructor-led course is a single day, live or virtual. The self-paced version is about eight hours of content, and AI CERTs lists the program in English, Spanish and Brazilian Portuguese.
AI CERTs certifications are valid for one year, short next to the three-year cycle many IT certifications use. To renew, you buy recertification in the AI CERTs store, work through the updated content, and pass a new assessment, as the AI CERTs recertification page sets out.
A yearly check suits a field where the tools change every few months, but it also means a fee and an exam every year. There is a six-month grace period after expiry. After that, you buy the full course again.
The certification, the AC-130 exam, and how recertification works as of October 2026, taken from AI CERTs' own pages, store and candidate handbook.
AI CERTs groups AI+ Prompting Fundamentals with AI+ Foundation, AI+ Everyone Fundamentals and AI+ Executive Fundamentals in its AI Essentials track. The next prompting level, AI+ Prompting Practitioner, sits in the AI Development track.
Exam AC-1302, the developer level of AI CERTs' prompting track. It covers API interaction, multi-turn and stateful prompting, A/B testing and prompt optimization, and integration with development tools. It runs five days instructor-led or 40 hours self-paced and expects Python and REST API familiarity.
Exam AC-900, formerly AI+ Everyone. A beginner course on AI and the future of work, generative AI, workplace productivity, AI agents and responsible AI, with prompting covered in one module out of eight. It uses the same exam format of 50 questions in 90 minutes.
Exam AC-110, formerly AI+ Executive. Built for leaders who drive AI adoption and business transformation, rather than people who write prompts every day. Same one-day course length and exam format.
It's an entry point. AI CERTs puts it in the AI Essentials track and puts AI+ Prompting Practitioner in AI Development, so it starts a prompting path rather than finishing one. After that, the next step depends on whether your work leans toward building, securing or governing AI.
The starting point
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Two questions to settle before you book: can you take the exam, and should this be the prompting credential you go for. The first one is quick.
No experience requirement to meet.
AI CERTs' prerequisites are a basic understanding of AI and a willingness to use AI tools creatively, and its handbook says official courseware isn't required to test. As of October 2026 the AI CERTs store sells the self-paced course for $195, with a one-year subscription to the videos, e-book, podcasts and quizzes, plus the online proctored exam and one free retake. The handbook says vouchers, retakes included, expire six months from purchase unless otherwise noted, so check the date on yours.
Same exam, one day with a live instructor.
AI CERTs delivers its one-day instructor-led course, live or virtual, through Authorized Training Partners. Training Camp's one-day AC-130 boot camp is one of those options, taught on AI CERTs' official courseware with the exam voucher included, so there is nothing extra to buy before you test.
A one-day entry certification won't qualify you for an AI engineering role on its own. It shows structured prompting skill in jobs that already use AI. These roles come from the job titles and audiences AI CERTs lists for the certification:
Designs, tests and refines the prompts a team depends on. AI CERTs lists Prompt Engineer first among the job roles for this certification, and Domains 2 and 4 (31% of the exam between them) cover the principles and techniques that work rests on.
Plans and produces written and visual content with generative AI. Content creators are on AI CERTs' list of intended audiences, and the image model domain covers style modifiers, inpainting and the legal questions around AI-generated images.
Uses AI for campaign copy, personalization and customer engagement. AI CERTs names digital marketers as an audience, and the ethics domain covers the bias and privacy problems that matter most in public-facing material.
Shapes how people talk to chatbots and virtual assistants. AI CERTs' role list includes Interaction Designer and Communication Developer, and its July 2026 brochure lists Conversational AI Designer among the alternate titles.
Uses prompts to summarize, query and explain data. Data scientists and analysts are on AI CERTs' Who Should Enroll list, and techniques like chain-of-thought prompting and retrieval augmented generation carry straight into analysis work.
Builds features on top of language models. AI CERTs lists developers as an audience for this certification, but the API and integration material sits in AI+ Prompting Practitioner, so treat this one as the groundwork.
The most useful comparisons are the next level up in AI CERTs' own prompting track and EC-Council's entry-level AI credential, which gives prompting a fifth of its exam.
| AI+ Prompting Fundamentals | AI+ Prompting Practitioner | EC-Council AIE | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Issuer | AI CERTs | AI CERTs | EC-Council |
| Exam Format | 50 questions in 90 minutes | 50 questions in 90 minutes | 75 multiple-choice questions in 2 hours |
| Passing Score | 70% (35 of 50) | 70% (35 of 50) | 70% |
| Prerequisites | AI basics, no technical skills | Programming (Python recommended), REST APIs, AI basics | None |
| Focus | Prompting for text and image models | Prompting in development: APIs, optimization, tooling | AI literacy and responsible use |
| Official Course | 1 day, or about 8 hours self-paced | 5 days, or 40 hours self-paced | 2 days (16 hours) |
| Exam Cost | $195 self-paced course with exam | $495 self-paced course with exam | $299 bundle with voucher |
| Renewal | Recertify every year | Recertify every year | Pass the exam again every 3 years |
| Best For | People who use generative AI tools at work | Developers building with language models | Anyone whose work involves AI tools |
Prices are as of October 2026. Both AI CERTs prices are for the self-paced course with the exam and one free retake included. The two AI CERTs prompting certifications share an exam format, so the real gap between them is technical depth, while AIE trades yearly recertification for a three-year term.
Certification Matchups: the published facts, strengths and weak spots of 33 certifications, side by side.
We're an AI CERTs Authorized Training Partner, and our AC-130 boot camp covers every exam domain in one day of live, instructor-led training, in person or live online. Enrollment includes AI CERTs' official courseware with videos, e-books and quizzes, hands-on labs and a capstone project, a mobile study app, exam-style practice questions, your exam voucher, a free retake if you need one, and 180 days of one-on-one coaching after class.
The wider AI certification field, other AI credentials, and the privacy, agent and legal questions behind the ethics domain.
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A February 2026 federal ruling found that conversations with consumer AI chatbots are not privileged. What that means for the company data employees paste into AI tools.
How California's chatbot laws stack on top of each other, what AB 1609 adds for customer service bots, and why AI training is turning into a compliance issue.
How to read an official exam outline, use domain weights to plan study time, and turn the objectives into a study plan. The same method works on the AC-130 exam blueprint.
The AI+ Prompting Fundamentals exam blueprint splits AC-130 into seven domains that follow the seven course modules. Principles of Effective Prompting and Introduction to AI Tools and Models are the largest at 16 percent each, four domains sit at 15 percent, and the AI foundations domain is the smallest at 8 percent. Click any domain for what it covers.
The smallest domain. An introduction to AI and its history, machine learning basics, deep learning and neural networks, and natural language processing. It closes with the fundamentals of prompt engineering and the part prompts play in getting accurate, relevant output from a model.
Tied for the largest domain. Giving directions, formatting responses, providing examples, evaluating response quality and dividing labor across prompts. The domain then has you apply those five principles together and fix prompts that fail.
Tied for the largest domain. How AI tools and models differ, a closer look at ChatGPT and GPT, image generation with DALL-E, emerging tools built on GPT, specialized and advanced models, and Google AI. It ends with comparing tools and matching them to practical scenarios.
Zero-shot and few-shot prompting, chain-of-thought prompting, self-consistency, generated knowledge prompting, prompt chaining and tree of thoughts. It also covers retrieval augmented generation and graph prompting, with real-life scenarios and practice exercises.
How image models generate pictures, style modifiers and quality boosters, prompt rewriting for image models, inpainting and outpainting, realistic images and consistent characters. The last topic is the ethical and legal side of AI-generated images.
Applying the course to a project: selecting a theme, planning and design, prompt engineering during implementation, combining text and image models, then evaluating and presenting the result. A guided example, sample projects and an evaluation framework round it out.
Bias and fairness in AI models, privacy and data security, transparency and sustainable AI development. It then works through ethical scenario analysis, AI regulation and governance, ethical frameworks for AI development, and where AI governance is heading.
Domains and weights reflect the AI+ Prompting Fundamentals exam blueprint for AC-130 as published by AI CERTs on its certification page and store, checked on October 21, 2026. The course also has an optional module on AI agents, which is not part of the blueprint.
The questions candidates ask most often when researching AI+ Prompting Fundamentals and the AC-130 exam.
AI+ Prompting Fundamentals is the entry-level prompt engineering certification from AI CERTs, tested by exam AC-130. It sits in AI CERTs' AI Essentials track and covers AI basics, the principles of effective prompting, prompting techniques for text and image models, a project-based session, and AI ethics.
Yes. AI CERTs' certification page and store both list that as the former name of AI+ Prompting Fundamentals (AC-130), and the seven modules match the program guide AI CERTs published under the old name. The developer-level course was renamed the same way and is now AI+ Prompting Practitioner (AC-1302).
There is no experience requirement. AI CERTs lists two prerequisites: an understanding of AI basics and how AI is used, with no technical skills required, and a willingness to think creatively and use AI tools. AI CERTs' candidate handbook also says you don't need its official courseware or partner training to attempt an exam.
The exam has 50 multiple-choice and multiple-response questions and a 90-minute time limit. You need 70%, or 35 correct answers, to pass. It is taken online through AI CERTs' proctored exam platform, and the candidate handbook says a live remote proctor checks your government-issued ID before you start.
The exam blueprint lists Foundations of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Prompt Engineering (8%), Principles of Effective Prompting (16%), Introduction to AI Tools and Models (16%), Mastering Prompt Engineering Techniques (15%), Mastering Image Model Techniques (15%), Project-Based Learning Session (15%), and Ethical Considerations and Future of AI (15%). Only the AI foundations domain is light.
As of October 2026, the AI CERTs store lists the self-paced course at $195 USD. That covers a one-year subscription to the videos, e-book, podcasts and quizzes, an AI mentor, and the online proctored exam with one free retake. Instructor-led versions are sold through AI CERTs' Authorized Training Partners, Training Camp included, with the exam bundled in.
AI CERTs certifications are valid for one year. To renew, you buy recertification in the AI CERTs store, complete the updated course content, and pass a recertification assessment. There is a six-month grace period after expiry. Miss it and you have to buy the full course again. Earning a higher-level AI CERTs certification can also meet the requirement.
AI+ Prompting Fundamentals (AC-130) needs no technical skills and runs one day instructor-led or about eight hours self-paced. AI+ Prompting Practitioner (AC-1302) is the next level up and is written for developers. It runs five days or 40 hours, expects Python and REST API familiarity, and covers API interaction, prompt optimization and development tools. Both exams have 50 questions in 90 minutes.
AI CERTs doesn't claim either for this certification. Its July 2026 brochure says its programs adhere to ISO 17024:2012 criteria, and its accreditation page says it is actively pursuing ANAB accreditation. Following a standard and holding accreditation against it are not the same thing. The certification pages make no DoD 8140 claim.
AI CERTs ties it to prompt engineer, interaction designer, user experience engineer, and communication developer roles, and lists content creators, digital marketers, analysts, developers, and business professionals among its audiences. It is an entry credential. On its own, it won't qualify you for an AI engineering or data science job.
No. AI CERTs says no technical skills are required, and none of the seven domains is a programming domain. You do need to understand machine learning, neural networks, and natural language processing at a conceptual level, and to know what techniques like chain-of-thought prompting and retrieval augmented generation are for.
AI CERTs' instructor-led course is one day, live or virtual, and the self-paced version has about eight hours of content on a one-year subscription. AI CERTs does not publish a recommended study time beyond the course length.
It depends on what you need it for. It fits if you use generative AI tools at work and want a short, structured course on prompting for both text and images, with a credential at the end. It fits less well if you want a credential that stays valid for several years without an exam, or if you need developer skills like API work, which sit in AI+ Prompting Practitioner.
If you're weighing AI+ Prompting Fundamentals or Prompting Practitioner for yourself, sorting out funding, or planning prompting training for a whole team, tell us where you are and we'll help you plan the next step.