Practice makes perfect and Salesforce exams are notoriously tricky. That’s why we’ve created our practice exam pack to help you prepare, test your knowledge and gain confidence.
Here are some of my top tips to keep in mind when studying for and taking the exam – use them during these practice exams to get comfortable using them so you can stay calm when exam day arrives!
Focus on the big topics
Taking the Salesforce Platform App Builder exam is not just about getting certified. Studying for the exam is about learning the skills needed to become an awesome Admin that can provide true value to a business. This means it’s important to study all the topics and hone your skills. That said, be sure to pay special attention to the big topics with the highest weightings as you can expect a lot more questions on these.
Pay attention to the question and read it twice
When taking the exam, pay particular attention to the question, and read it through a few times. For the scenario-based questions there will be clues in the answer that provide hints to the correct answer. Keep an eye out for keywords that would eliminate certain answers.
If you are taking the test onsite, you can use the pencil and paper provided to draw out a data schema, role hierarchy or any other diagram that will help you visualize the answer.
Read every answer twice
You should read every answer carefully and at least twice. It can be easy to skim the answers and accidentally choose the wrong answer because they look similar.
Eliminate the obviously wrong answers
When deciding on the answer, be sure to use the process of elimination to get rid of the answers that are definitely incorrect. Salesforce likes to throw in answers that are made up features or just plain incorrect. They also like to throw in curveballs, such as features that appear to be correct but aren’t best practice.
You can often disqualify these by focussing on standard Salesforce features that accomplish a task. For example, you could build a custom approval process with Process Builder, but why do this when there is the standard Approval Process feature available?
Mark for review
You have a great tool at your disposal, the “Mark for review” feature. On each question, you will have a checkbox that you can mark so you can come back to the question easily later. This is great if you cannot think of an answer right at that moment, or if you are unsure about your answer. We also include this feature in our practice exams!
Look for clues that might help answer earlier questions
As you move through the exam, you might come across questions and answers that help you identify the correct answer to an earlier question!
Try to go through the full exam twice
Keep the momentum going on your first pass through the exam: don’t dawdle over questions you have no idea about and use the “Mark for review” feature heavily, then move on to the next question. This should allow enough time for you to go through the exam a second time.
Stick with your first answer
If in doubt, stick with your initial answer. With the limited time available to you, if you don’t feel anymore confident on your second pass through the exam, then stick with your original answer and move on.
Use all your time
If you follow these tips there’s no chance you won’t use all the time! Give yourself the greatest chance of success by carefully reading each question and answer and going through the exam twice.
Focus your studies using section level scoring
At the end of each full practice exam, we provide section level scoring. Pay attention to the areas you are scoring poorly (or lower than you would like) and focus your studies here.
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Hi, I’ve concluded a test but in the end where I was reviewing my answers, I switched through topics, and the screen where shows the answer went to the initial screen, making myself start all over again, how can I track my percentage history and how can I see the answer review on those tests I’ve already finished?
You can review the correct answers immediately after an exam (or after each question if you select that option at the beginning of the exam). However, once you navigate away from an exam, you can no longer review the questions without going through the exam again.
We are working on adding historical results to our courses – it’s on our roadmap!
I was logging in an excel. Not ideal but i noticed this issue. Glad to hear of future updates.
Hi! Is there a way to review questions after completing?
You can review the correct answers immediately after an exam (or after each question if you select that option at the beginning of the exam). However, once you navigate away from an exam, you can no longer review the questions without going through the exam again.
Hi, I’m confused by why some of the quizzes are numbered and some are titled after the outline. Can you explain please? Thank you.
The numbered quizzes are complete 60 question exams that cover the full range of topics on the exams. The exams that are titled contain only questions relevant to that topic.
Hi! I have completed again the topic about Salesforce Fundamentals, and there was a question that was a little confusing, which was about how to display the opp’s average amount grouped by Account. (in the answer was saying we supposed to use the Summary Formula).
But, I have created a new report in my Trailhead sandbox and I only grouped by Account and then used the AVG function on amount field, which lead me to the same point of the question, using one less step.
So, is it really needed to use the Summary Formula, or is just another way to achieve the same goal?
Thanks in advance.
Hi Philip. Thanks for your comment. The scenario and question is purely to test someone’s knowledge of Summary Formulas, e.g. the need to add a grouping and the functions available. As you say, you could do this without creating a Summary Formula and based on your comment I appreciate this may be confusing. I’ll be sure to update the question to a new scenario to avoid confusion.
Hi Christine, I’ve concluded the course, and I’ve learnt a lot, thank you for being able to create this course.
I have a suggestion about the certification, it could show how many questions we have answered, I mean, it was like 600 questions, it should be there to emphasize the difficult and algo contain the average score made in those exams.
Thank you in advance, hopefully I will pass on the exam 🙂
Thanks for your feedback! Where would you like to see the number of questions answered? I would like to look into creating this functionality for you!
We also have historical results on our development roadmap to enable you to see past scores – is this what you were hoping for?
Hi Christine,
I’m enjoying your course so far. The only thing I miss is, when I do an Examen, the ability to see my score on each topic, I only see the overall score which doesn’t give insight in which topic needs my attention.
Hi! Are you taking a topic level exam of a full quiz? The full quizzes also display a score for each sestion/weighting. If you are not seeing this, please let me know which exam is affected and I will investigate!
Hi there could you please help me understand why this question’s answer is System Validation Rules: it seems all options are executed before Before Triggered Flows hence I’d like to confirm: is the right answer the one that is further away from Before Trigger? Thank you !
Question:
In the order of execution, which of the following fires before Before Triggered Flows?
options:
Assignment Rules
Custom Validation Rules
System Validation Rules
Duplicate Rules
====
According the order of execution fluxogram displayed for this question’s answer:
Before triggered step/position 13
Assignment Rules step/position 9
Custom Validation Rules step/position 5
System Validation Rules step/position 5
Duplicate Rules step/position 6
Standard System Validation is step 2b on the diagram which is the step before “Before Triggered Flows”. System Validation is often run again at step 5.
Hi, I can’t understand how the message is helping the users since the rule clearly states : “let users know the Close Date must be less than today’s date”- therefore the users should pick a past date.
While the message marked as the correct answer states “the Closed Date must be greater than today’s date”- therefore users should pick a future date. Thank you!
Q:What would be the most appropriate Validation Rule error message to let users know the Close Date must be less than today’s date for open Opportunities?
A:The Close Date must be greater than today’s’ date for open Opportunities
Thank you so much for pointing out this error – the incorrect screenshot has been used. I’ve replaced it and also adjusted the question and answer to be clearer.
you’re welcome! thank you for the prompt answer
Why is there no way to pause a quiz? Yesterday I managed to finish 65 of 85 questions but had no time to finish. Today I find my answers weren’t saved and this isn’t the first time that this happens. It’s really annoying.
All exams are set to automatically save every few seconds so you can resume them. I’m sorry you are experiencing an issue. Could you please let me know which exam is not saving?
I think the problem is when I close the tab or my computer turns off. I’ve now kept the tab open for days and this works. But it would be very nice to have an actual ‘save exam’ button so I can turn off my computer without worrying.
Although now I continue working on my https://courses.salesforceben.com/courses/salesforce-platform-app-builder-practice-exams/quizzes/salesforce-fundamentals-23-5/
suddenly in stead of checking the answer after eacht question like I selected when I started the exam, now it just saves the answer and continues to the next one without showing me the answer first.
Hi!
When you start or continue an exam you have the choice to view the answer after each question or at the end – it sounds like you’ve selected the wrong option. If you exit the exam and re-enter it, you can choose the correct option.
Best, Christine
Hi,
Closing a tab or switching off the computer shouldn’t make any difference. The exams are set to save every 5 seconds without you needing to do anything. When you next access to exam, it will say “Continue” instead of “Start”. The only time it will struggle with this is if you are using a private or incognito browser.
If you are still having issues, please could you record your screen to show the loss of progress and lack of “Continue” option and email to christine@salesforceben.com for me to investigate?
Thank you!
Thanks for this exam package, which has been of great help preparing me for my upcoming exam. A question about one of the questions (in Platform App Builder Exam 4), if I may:
‘What would be the most appropriate Validation Rule error message to let users know the Close Date must be less than today’s date for open Opportunities?’ Surely the answer is ‘Invalid Entry’, because all of the other messages suggest to the User that the Close Date must be greater than (not less than) today’s date?
Unless I’m both misreading things and misunderstanding how Opportunities work, I think the question needs rewording to ‘What would be the most appropriate Validation Rule error message to let users know the Close Date must be greater than today’s date for open Opportunities?’
Best,
Fergus
Hi Fergus,
Apologies – you have correctly identified a typo!
The question should read “What would be an appropriate Validation Rule error message to let users know the Close Date must be greater than today’s date for open Opportunities?”
I have updated it accordingly.
We really appreciate you letting us know.
Which is the correct Validation Rule formula to ensure that the Close Date of an Opportunity is greater than today?
I have chose : CloseDate > TODAY()
It tells me it’s the wrong answer… Can you please clarify?
“Incorrect
The correct formula is CloseDate TODAY() is using the greater than symbol, we need to use the less than symbol for our Validation Rule to identify records where the Close Date is less than today.
CloseDate < TODAY will not work as TODAY must have the parentheses ().
There is no need to use an IF statement such as IF(CloseDate < TODAY(), TRUE, FALSE) to achieve our requirement."
We are checking to see if the Close Date less than Today. You need to use the Less Than symbol which is < not >.
Hi Christine, I’m experiencing a technical issue this evening – when I open any of the quizzes, I don’t have the “Next” button underneath the quiz question. I logged in earlier today and everything was working fine. I logged in again this evening to finish one of the quizzes and the “Next” button is gone. I’ve tried accessing the content in Chrome and MS Edge. Who can I contact about this?
Many thanks.
Hi Clare,
Can you please clear your cache? This should resolve the issue. If not, drop me an email at christine@salesforceben.com.
I believe there may be an error in one of the questions from Exam 1.
Q: Which is the correct validation rule formula to ensure that the close date of an Opportunity is GREATER than today?
I believe that is meant to read LESS, as the correct response is marked as CloseDate < Today() and the answer notes also refer to "less than today".
Thanks
Hi John!
Thanks for your comment. Let’s break this down a little more to clear up any confusion.
We want to check that the Close Date of an Opportunity is in the future e.g. greater than todays’ date.
To do this, we will use a validation rule to see if the Close Day is less than today’s date e.g. in the past.
Validation rules fire when the rule is not met – when the record does not meet the criteria.
The validation rule must use the less than symbol as it is checking if the Close Date is less than today’s date. If the Close Date is less than today, we want the validation rule to fire and show an error, prompting our user to add a Close Date in the future.
Wow, 85 questions for process automation and logic, I like it! Definitely learned a few new things in that section. However, I’ve been noticing some similar (or the same) questions in comparison to the basic admin practice exams. Should we expect that may happen on the platform app builder exam, or is it unlikely to see a question from the admin exam?
Hi David,
Yes, the Admin and Platform App Builder both cover very similar topics in automation! The use cases for Flow and Approval Processes. There is definitely quite a lot of overlap, however PAB also includes formula fields, roll-up summary fields and validation rules in more depth.
On Platform App Builder Exam #2, I chose “Text to Picklist” for the following question:
Which of the following scenarios can result in data loss (Choose 3)?
It was marked wrong even though it can be seen in the potential data loss list on the Salesforce Help page (Changing from Text to Picklist) because data in the text field might not apply to the new picklist. If I’m not mistaken, the question should say “choose 4”.
Apologies – you are absolutely right! It should be choose 4 options. The question has now been updated!
Nice! I love the images and videos included with these questions upon review. It makes it super easy to see what is wrong and WHY another option is correct. Plus, it eliminates the need to go do studying and/or research in most cases because I can actually recall what I saw and why it’s correct. These are valuable resources for all admins, even if they are not going for more certifications!
Thank you!
Hi Christine
Thank you so much for this course! I used it as a guide to practice and to improve to the point I got my certification 🙂 so so grateful!
Congratulations on passing your exam!
Hi Christine, I think the wording of this question and answer is misleading.
“Which Validation formula is valid to make sure the ‘Phone’ or ‘Email’ fields are completed when converting a Lead?”
To me, this is to be understood in a way that the converted lead should have an email OR a phone number OR both. Remember, the wording is “make sure the ‘Phone’ OR ‘Email’ fields are completed”
Surprisingly, the explanation of the answer is “We stitch the first part of the query together with the next part using &&. We can use an OR statement to ensure that BOTH ‘Phone’ or ‘Email’ are complete.”
So now – suddenly – BOTH fields are required to be filled in. The problem seems to be the wording of the question. It should rather be
“Which Validation formula is valid to make sure the ‘Phone’ AND ‘Email’ fields are completed when converting a Lead?”
Kindly have a look at this response and consider an update of the wording. Thanks! Cheers Joachim
Thanks for letting me know! I completely agree that my wording on the explanation was not adequate. I have rephrased it.
“We stitch the first part of the query together with the next part using &&. We can use an OR statement to ensure that both ‘Phone’ or ‘Email’ are complete. The OR will capture if either ‘Phone’ or ‘Email’ are blank – if we used an AND statement, both fields would need to be empty to match our criteria.”
to
“We stitch the first part of the query together with the next part using &&. We can use an OR statement to ensure that ‘Phone’ or ‘Email’ are complete. The OR will capture if either ‘Phone’ or ‘Email’ are blank – if we used an AND statement, both fields would need to be empty to match our criteria.”
This removes the erroneous “both” that was confusing things. The question is testing how to check for Phone OR Email.
Hi Christine,
I just signed up. Is the practise test questions are updated to the current? If I’m not wrong, the last update was on July 22, 2022. I do not see last updated date anywhere on course card.
The date you are referring to is the originall course launch date. Our exams and courses are updated a minimum of 3 times per year, in line with the latest Salesforce release. Most recewntly, our exam were updated in May/June 2023. This is all explained on the Course page where you purchased the course.
The questions don’t save when i get out off the text to continue later
Hi Eric,
Can you tell me which exam this is affecting?
Until now it happens in: Salesforce fundamental, App Deployment, Data modeling and Exam 1.
I can’t explain why, but the plataform never save where i stopped to continue later.
Hi Eric,
I’ve checked and the exams are definitely set to save your progress automatically. Could you see if clearing your cache resolves the issue? Automatic saving won’t work in an incognito browser if that is what you are using.
Hello Christine,
Practice exam 5, is not opening up, could you please check?
-Thanks
Mahadeva
Could you clear your cache and see if this resolves the issue?
Hello! I press to continue an exam that started this morning, the questions appear, but when I select the answer, the check button does not appear to go to the next question. Help!
Apologies – it seems that we had a little bug following a platform update. This has now been resolved. You may need to clear your cache again.
I finished most of the tests. They were very helpful. Initially, I selected the check as you go but I switched to checking at the end after completing a couple practice tests. Yesterday, I passed the official certification exam.
Congratulations!
Hi Christine,
Thanks for this amazing course. Today I passed my Platform App builder cert exam.
I have been studying for the exam for the last 3 months, but I have to say that looking at these practice exam question and the explanation and articles I learnt a lot more.
Congratulations!
Hi Christine, On Question 24 from Platform App Builder Exam 1, wouldn’t the controlling field be Lead Source and not, Purchased List? I thought that Purchased List was one of the Controlling Field “values” and that the actual field you select as the controlling field in Salesforce is Lead Source.
Hi Cherie,
I think my explanation could be misleading! Thank you for pointing this out. I have reworded the explanation for clarity.
Hi Christine, I don’t see 10 quizzes
Could you let me know what exams you see?
Hi, I just completed Salesforce Fundamentals section and I have observed that question number 53 and 65 are contradicting with respect to field level security. Could you please have a look at it?
Hi Kusum,
The questions switch around so we cannot identify the questions using the question numbers. Please let us know the specific questions by copying and pasting the actual question. Thanks!
Hi, For the past two days now, when I click finish on my courses, it is loading ad recording my answers but it never completes the load so I have not been able to review my answers and see some corrections. Kindly fix and revert
Please could you try clearing your cache?
Why is it that every time I’m taking a topic quiz and leave and log back in to continue only the first 10 questions are saved and all the rest of the questions I’ve answered are no longer answered? Pretty ridiculous and bad. This is very frustrating and should be fixed ASAP.
Hi Glenn,
The practice exams are set to save every 20 seconds. We are not getting any other reports of an issue. Please try clearing your cache and let us know if the issue is resolved.
I have cleared the cache and am still encountering the same issue. I have tried the exam on all my devices and getting the same issue.
Hi Glenn,
I have escalated this to our developers to investigate and find a solution. I will get back to you as soon as possible.
Hi Christine Marshall, thank you for the support and the course. Finally i get my app builder certification.
Congratulations!