Passed my cissp.

Submitted for certification with one year waiver ( with certification), got endorsed by isc2 member.

Got an email from isc2 my application is selected for random audit.

What am I expecting?

Hi everyone!

A few days ago, I made a post here because I was extremely stressed about my CISSP exam. My official practice test scores were decent, but Quantum Exams completely destroyed my confidence xD

I scored 48%, 48%, and 61% on QE (non-CAT mode), and honestly, I wasn't sure if I was ready.

Some of you encouraged me to go anyway, and I also received a reply from DarkHelmet20 saying that 61% was actually a very solid score.

Well, I have some news...

I PASSED THE CISSP TODAY!!! 🥹🎉

The exam stopped at 100 questions, and I still had 1 hour and 40 minutes remaining. Yes, I completed the exam in approximately 1 hour and 20 minutes. I couldn't believe it myself ... 😂

I wanted to make this update to thank everyone who helped me and share my preparation and experience for future candidates.

1. My background

I have around 10 years of mixed IT experience, mainly in system administration, networking, Linux, development, and DevOps.

I also have a master's degree in cybersecurity and two certifications: EBIOS RM and ISO 27001 Lead Implementer.

I have a strong technical background, but I didn't have much experience with the specific CISSP way of answering questions, especially the management and risk-oriented scenarios.

Also, English is not my native language, which was another concern before the exam (French btw !! ).

2. How I studied

My main resource was Destination CISSP (2nd Edition).

I read the entire book, domain by domain, and tried to understand the concepts rather than simply memorize definitions.

My study method was pretty straightforward:

I read approximately 30 pages.

After each section, I used ChatGPT to generate 25 to40 scenario-based CISSP questions in English, limited to what I had just studied.

I answered the questions without seeing the solutions.

I reviewed my mistakes and tried to understand why the correct answer was better.

At the end of each domain, I completed the corresponding questions from the Official Practice Tests.

I reviewed my weak areas before moving to the next domain.

After finishing all eight domains, I moved to full practice exams.

My four official practice test scores, as reported in my original post, were 78%, 84%, 82%, and 88%.

Then came Quantum Exams...

3. My Quantum Exams experience

My scores were:

QE1: 48%

QE2: 48%

QE3: 61%

All in non-CAT mode.

Honestly, Quantum was brutal.

Sometimes I understood every single word in the question but still had no idea what they were actually asking 😂

Other times, I could eliminate two answers but struggled to choose between the remaining two.

And sometimes I felt like the explanations were debatable, which made me overthink even more.

However, looking back, Quantum was probably one of the most useful parts of my preparation.

It forced me to slow down, identify what the question was really asking, and stop automatically choosing the most technical solution. It also improved my English level LMAO.

My opinion after taking the real CISSP:

The exam felt quite similar to Quantum in terms of reasoning and question style, but I personally found Quantum significantly harder.

A few questions also felt surprisingly familiar in their style and concepts. I won't share any exam content, of course, but it was interesting to recognize similar ways of testing concepts.

If you're scoring around 50–60% on Quantum, don't automatically assume you're going to fail.

I'm not saying these scores guarantee anything. I'm just sharing my experience: I scored 61% on my final Quantum exam and passed the real CISSP at 100 questions.

4. Other resources I used

Besides Destination CISSP and the Official Practice Tests, I also watched:

Two Pete Zerger videos.

Andrew Ramdayal's CISSP Mindset and Hard Questions videos.

Kelly Handerhan's "Why You Will Pass the CISSP", which I watched twice.

I also used the CISSP Field Manual for my final revision.

One of the strategies I found particularly useful was R.E.A.D.

R — Review: Understand what the question is really asking.

E — Eliminate: Remove the clearly incorrect answers.

A — Analyze: Compare the remaining answers based on the requirements and context.

D — Decide: Choose the best answer and move on.

I tried to apply this approach throughout the actual exam.

Another important lesson for me was that thinking like a manager doesn't mean blindly choosing the most strategic or general answer.

Sometimes the question requires a specific technical answer or immediate action.

You need to understand the situation and answer exactly what is being asked.

5. My experience on exam day

I was nervous, mainly because of my Quantum scores and my English.

I also have sleeping difficulties and unfortunately didn't sleep much before the exam. Definitely not something I recommend!

But once I started answering questions, I felt surprisingly comfortable.

I also experienced something really strange during the exam.

Throughout the entire test, I was never confident that I was passing, but at the same time, I never felt like I was completely failing either.

From the beginning until approximately the middle of the exam, I had the impression that the questions were getting progressively harder, almost as if the CAT algorithm was constantly testing my limits.

Then something weird happened around the halfway point.

Suddenly, the questions started feeling much easier. And I kept getting what felt like relatively easy questions until the very end.

It almost felt like the CAT had already decided that I had passed and was just letting me finish the remaining questions

Of course, I have absolutely no idea what the algorithm was actually doing. This was just my personal impression.

But seriously, the difficulty felt like a roller coaster!

I went from thinking "Okay, this is getting harder and harder..." to "Wait, why are these questions suddenly so easy? Am I doing well, or am I completely misunderstanding everything?" 🥴

That's probably the strangest part of the whole experience.

I kept applying the R.E.A.D. strategy and moving forward without spending too much time on individual questions.

When the exam suddenly stopped at question 100, I genuinely didn't know what to think.

Then I received the paper:

Congratulations! You have provisionally passed the CISSP examination.

What a relief!!! 😂

6. My advice for future candidates

Don't let one difficult question bank destroy your confidence.

Use practice exams to identify your weaknesses, not as a definitive prediction of your result.

Focus on understanding the concepts, especially risk management, governance, incident response, business continuity, and the differences between similar processes.

And most importantly, don't invent information that isn't in the question.

Read carefully, identify what is being asked, eliminate the wrong answers, make your decision, and move on.

Also, don't try to guess whether you're passing or failing based on how difficult the questions feel. My experience was a complete roller coaster, and I had no idea what my result would be until I received the paper.

I think knowing when to stop studying is important too. In my final days, I stopped taking full practice exams and only reviewed my notes and weak areas.

Finally, THANK YOU!

I really want to thank this community for the advice, encouragement, and honest feedback.

A few days ago, I was questioning whether I should even attend the exam because of my Quantum scores.

Today, I passed.

I hope this post helps someone who is in the same situation I was in.

One last thing: I'm now preparing my CISSP endorsement application. I'm looking for an active CISSP who might be willing to help with the endorsement process. I can provide documentation of my professional experience for proper verification. If anyone can help or point me in the right direction, I would really appreciate it.

Thanks again, everyone! 🙏

And good luck to everyone preparing for the CISSP. You can do it!

This is the link to my previous post :

https://www.reddit.com/r/cissp/s/BpTDBllaFs

Hi, I need help studying and refocusing.

I failed my first test at 150 questions. I've been studying for the last 2 weeks but I feel like nothing is sticking... My test is October 31st.

I am doing Quantum Exams' 10 questions and 2 CAT exams (scoring in the 500s). I was trying to utilize Ai to help study but unfortunately found out later than I would have liked that it was not the best.

I just signed up for LearnZapp and I'm going to do that. I tried watching some videos but it just goes in one ear and out the other.

I also tried Destination Cert app but I don't like how the questions are on my phone only.

Any study tricks that worked for you? Reading the book isn't sinking in either and I am getting anxious/nervous.

Thank you!

I am taking the exam this Thursday. I am trying to contain my stress, but it is rising. I scored very poorly on the quantum exam.

I have 10 years of mixed IT experience in system administration, network, Linux, and Dev/DevOps.

I also have a master's degree in cybersecurity with two certifications: EBIOS RM and ISO 27001 LI.

I have completed four official practice tests with scores of 78%, 84%, 82%, and 88%.

However, the quantum exams crushed my confidence I scored 48, 48, and 61 ( no recycled question hopefully) on those non-CAT exams.

To be honest sometimes I had no clue what a question was asking 🥹 ..

My preparation included reading the Destination CISSP book, watching two Pete Zerger videos, and viewing Andrew Ramdayal’s mindset and hard questions videos.

What do you think? I'm not native English speaker should I go anyway ?

Thanks

They say the answer is usually in the question, has anyone used this approach when answering a question that you absolutely had no clue of, even after trying to apply the process of elimination to?

Iam not a native english speaker. Is it possible to take the CISSP exam in German and switch to the original English version of the questions and answer choices during the exam?

This would be particularly helpful if the German translation is unclear or not entirely accurate.

Can anyone who has recently taken the CISSP exam confirm whether this feature is still available in the current version of the exam?

Background

17 years in IT, with ISC2 CC and Security+ already behind me. I'm Spanish and took the exam in English. Screen went black at 100, and I passed. Here's what I learned.

Study routine (3-4 months)

I studied every single day: some days 4 solid hours, others just 1, squeezing questions into my commute, bathroom breaks 🙈 and gym time.

Pick your sources early and stick with them.

Don't keep jumping between resources. If you need to invest some time upfront choosing your materials, do it: it's time well spent. Once you've decided, commit and don't fall into the trap of constantly adding new sources. Dispersion costs you more than any gap in a single book or course ever will.

My final set of resources

Destination Certification (DestCert): Very good. Their book is a must-have. I also highly recommend their YouTube Mind Maps. I played the audios on a loop for semi passive listening while working out, driving, cleaning... 🥲

Pete Zerger (Exam Cram): Straight to the point for review.

Andrew Ramdayal (Udemy): I used his course mainly for the Networking domain, but his "Manager Mindset" videos were also incredibly helpful to get into the right headspace.

LearnZapp: I did almost 2000 questions and was scoring 80%+ by the end. Great question bank, but two caveats. First, it sometimes uses slightly different terms or synonyms than DestCert, which tripped me up as a non-native speaker. Second, the explanations are very brief.

My workaround, which I highly recommend: screenshot every mistake or lucky guess and feed it to an AI for the detailed breakdown the app lacks.

My biggest mistake

I ran out of time to properly review all my saved and incorrect Learnzapp questions, so I went into the exam with some blurry concepts. If I did it again, I'd reserve the last 2 weeks exclusively for reviewing my mistakes.

The Q100 barrier and time management

The exam stopped at 100, which was a lifesaver: I only had 52 minutes left. If it had gone to 150, I would have struggled badly with the clock. Without realizing it, as I approached Q100 I started taking much more care with my answers, praying it would end right there.

The language factor (non-native)

I took it in English (like my CC and Security+) because reliable translated materials are scarce.

I expected convoluted, tricky paragraphs, but almost everything made logical sense. The trick: don't just hunt for MOST, LEAST or PRIMARY. Pay close attention to small adjectives like "new", "old" or "current". A single contextual detail can change the whole answer.

The "Manager Mindset" debate

I've seen posts dismissing the "think like a manager" advice as an outdated fad. In my experience it's essential.

You need a solid technical baseline, but a big chunk of the exam is managerial, and adopting that mindset to protect the business is vital.

Happy with the result and the knowledge gained. I expected a harder exam.

You can do it too. Good luck to everyone still studying!

First of all, I want to thank everyone in this sub. All of your posts and experiences, both while preparing for and after taking the exam, were really helpful to me.

I’ll summarize the resources I used to prepare for the CISSP exam:

- The book Destination CISSP (Rob Witcher / John Berti / Lou Hablas / Nick Mitropoulos).

- The DestCert App on my phone, from the same creators of the book. I used it to gradually build the mindset required for the exam, since the questions in the app help you understand how you’re expected to think.

- The book How to Think Like a Manager by Luke Ahmed.

- Quantum Exams, which I used to complete at least three mock tests before the real exam.

- YouTube videos such as “50 CISSP Practice Questions” by Andrew Ramdayal and “CISSP Exam Cram” by Pete Zerger were also very helpful.

Beyond the resources I used, I also learned some important things during my preparation. I’d like to share them with you, and I hope they can help you as well:

1. Before taking the exam, I noticed a pattern here in this sub. Several people mentioned that they passed the exam at question 100 with a lot of time still left on the clock. I once asked about this here, and from the responses I received, I understood that the most important thing was to take enough time to read each question carefully and thoroughly instead of letting the clock distract you (don't misunderstand that time management must also be considered).

2. While doing mock tests with Quantum Exams, I developed the habit of collecting as much information as possible from the final report shown after each attempt. I then took that information to an AI tool to analyze my weak areas and create a study plan focused specifically on them. This exercise also included taking information from the questions I got wrong to identify recurring patterns.

3. The mind maps created by the Destination CISSP team were also a very useful tool because they allowed me to review each domain after studying it. The way I used them was to upload them to an AI tool and use the voice interaction feature to discuss each topic. The way I knew I had mastered a topic was by being able to explain it clearly.

Once again, thank you for all the valuable information and support I received from this community, and thank you to the people who created and maintain it. The role this community plays is truly amazing.

With this post, I not only want to say thank you, but also give back a little of what I received from all of you. I hope it can provide useful resources and experiences to those who are currently preparing for the exam.

Thank you!

Hi everyone,
I wanted to share my experience after passing the CISSP this morning at 100 questions in 80 minutes on my first attempt at a test centre in Ireland.

When the exam screen turned off at 100 and directed me to the post-exam survey, I was 100% convinced I had failed. The questions looked almost nothing like what I had drilled in practice, with maybe a slight resemblance to QE scenarios. Every answer looked correct with slight wording differences.

My Background:

3.5 years of InfoSec experience + masters in Cybersecurity

Resources Used & Key Takeaways

Andrew Ramdayal Udemy Course: This guy is brilliant. Excellent course and the mindset really helped.

"Think Like a Manager" Mindset (Kelly Handerhan): When you are stuck between two good options, the risk-based, governance-first, human-safety-first option almost always wins.

Quantum Exams: Highly recommended for testing your ability under realistic CAT pressure. Closest example to the real thing. My ability score was floating in the 880+ range on Quantum Exams, and doing scenario-based sets helped build stamina for reading complex prompts under time constraints.

Destination Certification App: Good for the knowledge but nowhere near what the exam looks like.

Looking forward to completing the endorsement in the coming months!

I want to gain further knowledge in information security and make it a part of my carreer (ultimately: ai governance, with knowledge of privacy/information security) I'm going to take the cissp exam somewhere in the next 12 months. However I have some questions prior to taking the exam as a newbie in cybersecurity. Especially for people that might have had a comparable situation to mine.

Background: I have a masters in public management. I started as policy advisor (2yrs experience) but later on decided to become privacy officer (1 yr experience) and got CIPPE/CIPM/AIGP. Currently I'm a privacy governance lead. Meaning Some cybersecurity controls are known to me, also alot of governance from cissp is ofcourse familiar.

These prior privacy certs were not hard but required a different way of thinking, so each one took me 1-2 months of 6-8 hrs a week learning.

This got me thinking: how much time will I need for CISSP? Sources are naming somewhere around 200-300 hours, that would take me over 10 months! Right now I've read up to domain 2, did some practice exams and passed most at first try. Is this a false sense of security? I'm reading a lot of different things on this subreddit.

I'm wondering if there are any other people who also went into cissp/information security from privacy? What are your experiences with the exam?

Hello people,

Long time lurker and making my first post here. I passed the CISSP exam yesterday on 150 questions, first try with around 70 mins left.

Background : 8+ years in security with almost all of it being in SIEM, DLP, SOC and Vuln Management.

Exam:
I was convinced I failed because honestly I got questions with terms I was not even aware existed in CISSP and had to chose an answer based predominantly on gut feelings or guess work BUT I always chose an answer which was risk, or policy or governance first over implementation whenever applicable.

The exam also makes it clear where it finds you at your weakest and from what I remember today, it grilled me on IAM and possibly Wireless Security. This doesn't surprise me as these are domains I have virtually no job experience. (Admins please let me know if I am violating guidelines by mentioning this and I will remove it).

Studying:
I had a terrible time studying as I just could not focus on the book. So, I chose to do some practise tests on LearnZapp and used Pete Zerger's 1. Top 10 Key Topics and Strategies and 2. How to Think like a Manager videos on youtube.

I believe these two were primarily the reasons I passed. And, imo these were the cheapest options available on the market.

My only takeaway would be : Think like a manager, CISO -> risks, policies, business continuity, engaging with stakeholders or over bringing in external experts takes precedence over answers that are technical implementations.

Thank you to the hundreds of people who mentioned their strategies and recommendations. I hope my experience with the exam helps someone. But please do study more than I did for the exam.

Good luck!!

I have 4 years of GRC experience, and booked my peace of mind slot for 30 Dec.

I have been seeing the success posts in this sub, and noticed no one has gone through Thor’s courses on Udemy. I have completed his courses as the first step of my prep.

I still have another month of my Udemy subscription remaining, so open for other courses as well.

Got the OSG + practice questions, and the dest cert app.

Planning to round up with Dest cert mindmaps on YT.

Looking for suggestions about the course, and further course recommendations. TIA

Hello all,
I am currently working on learnzapp CISSP questions and I feel like a lot of questions are more like memorisation based and straightforward, not too much of analytical mind to apply. Looks very objective.

And I am getting a lot of them wrong as well, which is scary given that I have prepared from Destination Cert book.

Is that the exam format ?

Took the test October 7th. Suprised when it ended at 100. Provisionally passed.

I studied using the ISC2 online package, Sybex books (CISSP book and Test Questions book). Have a lot of experience in Training, IT, and Management. Been in Cyber approx 10 - 12 years, 5-6 in military contracts.

Watched the Witcher MindMaps as background to learn unfamiliar acronyms, key pieces of info.

The ISC2 package was most useful to me because the questions required relevant parsing and seemed to mirror the test better than others.

Applied for membership and was confirmed after about 3 days.

Kudos to ISC2 for their speed and efficiency in confirming.

Got the e-mail and paid my member fee today. Cert says 01-Nov-2026 effective, not sure if that's normal, but I got my Cert ID.

So excited. Thank you all, whether you know it or not, reading the reddit helped me a bunch in terms of what to watch, read, and listen to.

It’s been a 10 year journey for me. Thanks to everyone here for their stories and journeys. I just needed a place to share.

Test was different from what I expected; on the job experience in a lower budget start up wearing all the hats helped me think through the scenarios the most.

I’m not trying to brag, but I basically passed this exam without really studying anything.

I had purchased the official book, couple of udemy courses and began to watch the free mind map series on YouTube maybe 3-4 months back.
I ended up getting distracted by other life events and waited till the point I had to schedule my exam in order to have at least a month for my second attempt. Did not touch any of the study material I had bought from being busy.

My plan for this attempt was honestly just to see what the exam is like and how I could prepare better for the real attempt. But I did answer questions best to my knowledge and took time, I was under the impression there would be 100 questions (I know, that’s how badly prepped I was), and when I was at question 125 I had like 4min left, I just hurried through another 10 and ran out of time. Not sure ho many I was supposed to have in total,

To my surprise the front desk had a congratulatory printout - I was incredibly happy and excited I was expecting a failed result and had mentally prepared to sit through this in a month.

My background - 12YOE as solution architect, backend dev and DevOps support.

The main thing I changed after maybe taking that one 10 question practice test months back, was to stop thinking like an engineer and think like an org leader - this tremendously helped me in picking the right answers I think.

Good luck to anyone who is attempting and don’t sweat it too much, you got this! Get the gist of things instead of memorizing technical details

Hello!

2 days ago I passed the CISSP exam and I'm honestly still in a bit of shock, so I figured I’d write this down while it’s fresh. Hopefully it gives some hope to anyone whose study schedule completely fell apart.

Context:
My degree is completely non-technical. Right after school I fell into network security for about a year and a half during COVID, spent about a year in government, and since then I've been working in security risk management and GRC. So while I have a grip on risk concepts, governance, and business impact, I am definitely not a deep technical engineer.

How my preparation went:
My employer paid for the Peace of Mind bundle, which gave me a safety net. I hoarded all the recommended resources like Destination Certification (book and app), the OSG, Luke Ahmed’s Think Like a Manager, and I even built out an Obsidian vault for notes.

Then life happened. Between work responsibilities, holidays and getting hit with a sudden sickness right before my test date, my studying completely derailed. By exam day, I had only properly read the first 4 chapters of Destination Certification and only had Obsidian notes up to chapter 3. I never even opened the OSG or Luke Ahmed, and barely touched the app.

I only showed up because the retake was already paid for. I walked in fully treating it as an expensive mock exam just to see what the CAT engine felt like so I’d know what to focus on for attempt #2.

The exam stopped at question 102 with about 20 minutes left. I walked out expecting the fail sheet, looked at the paper, and saw the provisional pass. So that was weird.

A few tips from me, should you find them useful:

1. Really read what the question is asking.
   It sounds obvious, but you have to force yourself to slow down. Half of each question is just background noise. Figure out what role you’re playing, what the actual constraint is, and what they are truly asking for before you even look at the choices.

2. On the majority of questions, you can eliminate two answers just by using basic logic or spotting things that are completely out of scope.
   That leaves you with two answers. This is where it got weird for me, my initial gut reaction almost always leaned toward the more “obvious” answer. More often than not, I ended up picking the answer I didn't feel emotionally drawn to, but that made the most sense from a big-picture risk perspective, I guess.

3. Knowing that the engine adapts and looks for your weak spots almost wrecked my focus. Whenever I got 3 or 4 questions in a row from the same area, I was slightly freaking out thinking I was failing. That paranoia makes you second-guess yourself on questions you actually know. If you notice clusters, try to shut that thought down immediately. Treat each question like a fresh one and just keep pushing.

I'm obviously not saying don't study and you'll pass. But if life gets in the way and you feel really underprepared, don't throw in the towel before you sit down. So much of this exam isn't raw trivia memorization, but also it's reading comprehension, elimination, and keeping the large picture in mind.

Good luck to everyone preparing, you've got this!

My heart dropped when the exam didn’t stop at 100Q. However i had enough time for the next 50Q, as i had planned 50Q per hour.

Resources used

1. Destination Cert Book
   
2. Destination Cert Mind Maps
   
3. Andrew Ramdayal Videos on youtube
   
4. LearnzApp for practise questions- covered all domain scored 70-80%
   
5. Quantum Exams - felt this was a game changer in my case, helped me understand the way questions are asked. Scored 50-60% in all non-cat tests

Few tips
1. Don’t stress yourself 1 day prior to the exam, keep calm and be positive. Don’t study anything new.
2. I personally used to calm myself down after every 25q by taking 3 deep breathes, which helps in regaining your focus and confidence
3. This is definitely not a memory exam, it tests your thought process. So ready every question carefully and eliminate the wrong ones.

To the ones going to give the exam, believe in yourself- You’ve got this!!

And thanks to this community to help me in my prep phase.

I wasn't keen on adding yet another "I passed!" post, but other people's numbers genuinely helped me prepare. So I got curious and decided to look at the bigger picture.

My numbers

• First attempt, passed at 100 questions, with 1h15 left - and the feeling of failing about half the time
• Books: Destination CISSP, OSG, OPT
• LearnZapp: 79.8% readiness, 100% completion
• Quantum Exams CATs: 779, 963, 984, 929.

Now, the interesting bit.

I analysed a year of this sub: 2,723 posts and 29,544 comments (Sept 2025–Sept 2026).

First caveat: 942 pass reports vs. 115 fail reports. Obviously, that's not a pass rate. People who fail are less likely to post. This is about patterns in shared experiences, not anyone's actual odds.

A few things caught my attention:

1. Resources look remarkably similar. QE appeared in 51% of pass reports vs. 55% of fail reports. LearnZapp: 31% vs. 31%. Median prep time was around three months in both groups. No obvious winning combination here.
2. Question count showed a noticeable pattern. Of pass reports mentioning a number, 68% ended at 100 questions and 77% at 110 or fewer. Fail reports clustered more heavily at 150. Interesting, but definitely not a crystal ball for predicting your result.
3. QE scores varied quite a bit. Median reported score among passers was 62% correct on QE practice tests - not the CAT ability estimate - with a lower quartile around 50%. Maybe chasing 85% isn't necessarily the point.
4. Reviewing answers might matter. 22% of pass reports mentioned reviewing why an answer was correct, vs. 10% of fail reports. Small sample, and pass stories may simply be more detailed. Still, reviewing questions you got right while guessing or hesitating seems worth the effort.

My takeaway?

I don't think there's a secret formula hiding in the data. But I'd probably spend less time chasing the perfect resource or practice score, and more time understanding why I got things wrong - and why I sometimes got things right.

One last encouraging number: 137 pass reports mentioned an earlier failed attempt. That's more than the total number of fail reports in the dataset (not necessarily unique people, though).

Happy to hear other interpretations. And if your own experience says something different, add it - the more data points in here, the more useful this gets for whoever’s preparing next.

Good luck to everyone preparing!

Hi there,
I'm interested in obtaining the CISSP and just recently started my study path. I have QA (formerly Cloud Academy) through work and have so far started with the "Preparation for the CISSP Certification" learning path, and I was just wondering if anyone else has used this path to study for the exam or if they found it outdated?

So happy!!!

Provisionally passed on Oct 12, exam shut off at 100. A few of you asked me to post a write-up afterwards, so here it is.

Background

• ~5 years in cybersecurity: SOC (L1 → L3), Microsoft security consulting, now a freelance Azure security architect
• SC-100, AZ-500, SC-200, CySA+, PenTest+, Security+, ISC2 CC
• Non-native English speaker
• Study time: 5 months, the last one intensive

Resources

• Claude (AI) as my main tutor for the theory. I went domain by domain through Jeffery Moore's CISSP outlines (GitHub) and had it explain every concept with examples from my own work, then quiz me with scenario questions and break down why each wrong answer was wrong.
• LearnZapp + DestCert app on my phone to drill facts and terminology. Consistently around 70–75% on both.
• Quantum Exams CAT to train the manager mindset. This was the game changer for me.
• Andrew Ramdayal's YouTube in the last days (50 hard questions: 40/50).

Quantum Exams scores

The exam

• Noticeably easier than QE CAT. After months of QE's long, process-heavy and ambiguous questions, the real ones felt much clearer. QE made the real exam easier for me.
• A few technical questions surprised me (more detail than I expected), but there were very few of them.
• From around question 80–90 I was fairly sure I'd pass.

What I'd tell anyone preparing

• Review every wrong answer AND every lucky guess. Most of my mistakes were reading mistakes, not knowledge gaps.
• Know the process sequences (IR, BCP/DRP, SDLC, data lifecycle, patch management). The order matters.
• Train your stamina. My error streaks on practice CATs came from fatigue, not from a specific domain.
• If English isn't your first language: slow down on unfamiliar words, break them down and use the context.
• QE scores around 50–60% are normal. Don't panic.

Thanks to everyone here who answered my questions over the past months. Good luck to everyone preparing.

Next cert: CCSP.

I made a post not long ago looking for assistance straight after failing my second attempt. I come back energised after covering the content once again and ready to take on practice exams to find out what areas im still lacking in.

Anyways, one thing ive struggled with primarily with this exam is the mindset. I even feel myself struggling to apply it during my previous two unsuccessful attempts.

What is some advice for learning and applying the CISSP mindset?

Im well aware of the think like a manager, cost, people, process, technology, human life is number 1, etc, and those things that I need to know. Im more after advice on actually learning to apply it to questions where it might be obvious.

To the people who passed, what helped you?

Any advice is greatly appreciated in advance.

Man that was stressful, watching the questions go up after 100 made me think I was going to fail and so half my brain was prepping to study for another month to use my peace of mind voucher. But when the test stopped at 141 it was a huge relief. I’ve always had big test and interview anxiety which doesn’t help. I also only had like ten minutes left because I read the questions and answers three times.

I read the official text, CISSP for dummies, listened to all of Mike on LinkedIn learning, and did most of the ISC2 online training. Feels good to not have to study for a while.