- What "SRA Training" Actually Covers
- The Five Written Exams and the Lab
- BGP for Internet Routing (4A0-102)
- Virtual Private LAN Services (4A0-105)
- Virtual Private Routed Networks (4A0-106)
- Quality of Service (4A0-107)
- Ethernet VPN Services (4A0-115)
- Training for the Practical Lab
- Sequencing Your Preparation
- Courses, Hands-On Time and Practice Questions
- Frequently Asked Questions
- Nokia Service Routing Architect is a multi-exam path: written exams 4A0-102, 4A0-105, 4A0-106, 4A0-107 and 4A0-115, then the 7-hour ASRA4A0 lab.
- Training is not mandatory to attempt the exams; course prerequisites are preparation recommendations, not extra requirements.
- Each written exam maps to one training area: BGP, VPLS, VPRN, QoS or EVPN.
- The lab has two independent 3.5-hour sections, and topics must be configured and verified, not just recognized.
What "SRA Training" Actually Covers
When people search for SRA training, they usually want one of three things: a list of courses, a study plan, or a sense of how much hands-on practice the certification demands. For Nokia Service Routing Architect, all three matter, because SRA is not a single exam. It is a multi-exam certification, distinct from NRS I and NRS II, that ends in a practical lab on live 7750 SR service networks.
That structure shapes everything about preparation. Training for SRA is really training for six separate bodies of knowledge: five written-exam subjects and one practical assessment that pulls several of them together under time pressure. If you are still orienting yourself, start with What Is SRA Certification? and What Is SRA? to confirm you are looking at the Nokia credential and not another program that shares the acronym.
The Five Written Exams and the Lab
Effective September 8, 2026, the current route requires written exams 4A0-102, 4A0-105, 4A0-106, 4A0-107 and 4A0-115, followed by the 7-hour practical ASRA4A0 lab. Separate IS-IS/OSPF, MPLS and Services Architecture exams are no longer required, although knowledge from those areas still supports your preparation. Multicast 4A0-108 is retired.
There is also an optional 4A0-C02 composite. It substitutes for only 4A0-102, 4A0-105, 4A0-106 and 4A0-107. It does not replace 4A0-115 and it does not replace the practical lab. Candidates weighing the composite against the individual exams should plan training around that boundary: EVPN and the lab need separate attention either way.
| Component | Training Area | Format |
|---|---|---|
| 4A0-102 | BGP for Internet Routing | Written exam |
| 4A0-105 | Virtual Private LAN Services | Written exam |
| 4A0-106 | Virtual Private Routed Networks | Written exam |
| 4A0-107 | Quality of Service | Written exam |
| 4A0-115 | Ethernet VPN Services | Written exam |
| ASRA4A0 | SRA Practical Lab | 7-hour practical, two 3.5-hour sections |
Note that the written exams do not share a single question count or duration, so avoid planning around one generic number. For eligibility mechanics and how the transition treats earlier candidates, see SRA Requirements: Eligibility, Prerequisites & How to Qualify.
BGP for Internet Routing (4A0-102)
The BGP training area starts from Internet inter-domain architecture and the roles service-provider BGP plays, then moves steadily toward SR OS configuration and troubleshooting.
BGP for Internet Routing
Training here should take you from protocol mechanics to operating a peer network on SR OS.
- BGP mechanisms, attributes and interaction with the IGP
- SR OS peer-network design, configuration, monitoring and fault diagnosis
- Routing-policy configuration, verification and troubleshooting
- iBGP scalability through confederations and route reflectors
- Advertise-external, add-paths and fast-reroute operation, configuration and verification
Routing policy deserves disproportionate training time. It shows up in the written exam as a configuration-and-verification topic and again in the lab, where BGP practical scope includes selection, policy and regular expressions. Practicing policy until you can write and test it without hesitation pays off twice.
Virtual Private LAN Services (4A0-105)
VPLS training builds from Ethernet and MPLS foundations, SAPs and SDPs, through basic VPLS creation, to the resilience and scaling features that distinguish an architect from an operator.
Virtual Private LAN Services
Expect to move from building a service to protecting and scaling it.
- Distributed-service MTU implications and FDB maintenance
- Operations, misconfiguration diagnosis, repair and policy-based forwarding
- RSTP loop prevention, and M-VPLS with STP for redundancy and load distribution
- LAG, MC-LAG and active/standby pseudowire resilience
- Deployment scale, H-VPLS hierarchy and PBB control of excessive MAC learning
MTU is the classic trap. A service that looks correct in configuration can still drop traffic because distributed-service MTU does not line up end to end. Train yourself to check MTU early when diagnosing a VPLS fault, since both the written exam and the lab reward systematic troubleshooting.
Virtual Private Routed Networks (4A0-106)
VPRN training covers VPRN architecture and MPLS Layer-3 VPN configuration, including PE route distribution through MP-BGP, and then escalates to complex topologies.
Virtual Private Routed Networks
The progression runs from a single working VPN to multi-provider designs.
- BGP loop causes and prevention
- Configuration, validation, monitoring and troubleshooting
- Full-mesh, hub/spoke and extranet arrangements, plus Internet access options
- Inter-AS models A, B and C: operation, configuration, verification and diagnosis
- Carrier-supporting-carrier VPN architecture, route exchanges, forwarding paths and troubleshooting
The lab-level view of VPRN adds RD/RT planning, VRF import/export behavior, route selection, and static, OSPF or BGP routing between PE and CE. If your training only covers the happy path of a single VRF, you will be under-prepared for those practical combinations.
Quality of Service (4A0-107)
QoS is the broadest of the written subjects by sheer number of mechanisms, and it is where hands-on repetition matters most. Training begins with traffic demands, business drivers, the IntServ and DiffServ models, customer rate limits and 7750 SR processing, then drills into the building blocks.
Quality of Service
Think of this area as a pipeline: classify, meter, queue, schedule, mark.
- Classification using packet headers at SAP and network ingress and egress, match precedence and default network policy
- Token-bucket metering, queue shaping versus policing, and default scheduling with fair-information-rate priorities
- SAP-ingress, SAP-egress and network queues; priority and profile modes; hardware versus service queues
- Ingress and egress policers, profile-capped operation, and access, network and hybrid buffer allocation
- WRED congestion avoidance and slope-policy configuration
- Queue groups, CFHP for SAP and queue-group policers, hierarchical scheduling and egress-port scheduling
- Customer-header versus encapsulation-header marking and remarking across Layer-2, VPRN and IES services
The unweighted nature of these groups means you cannot safely skip a sub-topic on the theory that it is lightly tested. Queue-group redirection and CFHP, for instance, are specific enough that a gap there is easy to expose.
Ethernet VPN Services (4A0-115)
EVPN is the newest addition to the route and the one the composite does not cover, so it deserves its own training block. The scope spans EVPN concepts, operation, benefits and data-plane choices across Layer-2, Layer-3 and data-center services.
Ethernet VPN Services
Work through EVPN by service type, then by resilience model.
- ELAN route types: IMET flooding, MAC-route FDB learning and proxy-ARP
- MPLS and VXLAN configuration and interconnection
- IRB architecture: asymmetric, symmetric interface-less, and numbered or unnumbered interface-ful forwarding
- Ethernet segments, multihoming routes and designated-forwarder election by default or preference methods
- BUM split-horizon protection, aliasing and all-active load distribution, single-active behavior and segment failure
- ELINE VPWS: local and remote circuit identification, route types, and single-homed, all-active and single-active operation
- Interworking of VPWS, VPLS and IRB across EVPN and traditional MPLS networks
A useful training habit is to tie each route type to the behavior it produces. Knowing that IMET routes drive flooding while MAC routes populate the FDB makes verification commands far easier to interpret.
Training for the Practical Lab
The ASRA4A0 lab is where training shifts from understanding to doing. You design and implement live 7750 SR service networks, interoperate, diagnose performance problems and resolve faults using either classic CLI or MD-CLI. The issuer states the lab content is unchanged.
Because the lab spans BGP, QoS, VPLS and VPRN practical scope, your lab training should integrate those areas rather than treat them separately. Practice scenarios where a single network needs a VPRN with hierarchical QoS applied, or a VPLS with BGP autodiscovery and MC-LAG protection. Decide early which CLI flavor you will use and drill it until syntax is automatic.
One caution: the lab page still displays superseded prerequisite exams. For current eligibility, rely on the dated September 8, 2026 program update and the current certification table. Candidates who were previously lab-eligible retain that eligibility under the announced transition. For a view of how demanding this stage is, read How Hard Is the SRA Exam?.
Sequencing Your Preparation
Order matters because the domains build on each other. This is the one place a timeline helps, and it is tied directly to SRA content rather than to generic scheduling advice.
BGP and routing policy
- Study 4A0-102 first; VPRN and the lab both depend on BGP fluency
- Practice policy and route reflector configuration until it is routine
VPLS then VPRN
- Cover SAPs, SDPs, MTU and FDB behavior, then resilience features
- Move to MP-BGP VPN routing, then inter-AS models A, B and C
QoS and EVPN
- Build QoS bottom-up from classification to hierarchical scheduling
- Treat EVPN as a separate exam, since the composite does not replace it
Integrated lab practice
- Combine services, QoS and BGP in timed, verify-everything scenarios
- Rehearse both 3.5-hour halves independently
For a broader plan that layers study resources on top of this order, see the SRA Study Guide, and for a domain-by-domain breakdown consult SRA Exam Domains: Complete Guide to All 6 Content Areas.
Courses, Hands-On Time and Practice Questions
Nokia publishes dedicated course pages for BGP, VPLS, VPRN, QoS and EVPN services, mirroring the written-exam structure. No paid course materials were accessed for this review, so this article describes the published scope rather than reviewing course quality. Whether you take formal courses or self-study, the topics above are what you need to master.
Practice questions fill a different role from courses. They help you find gaps in recall and reasoning, particularly for the written exams. Use original supplemental material that is not presented as actual exam content; the SRA Exam Prep practice tests are independent study aids with no issuer endorsement and no guaranteed results. After a practice session, revisit the relevant domain rather than just memorizing answers, and use the SRA Cheat Sheet for quick last-pass review of must-know facts.
Key Takeaway
Match the training method to the assessment. Written exams reward recall and reasoning across five defined topic groups; the lab rewards configuration speed and verification discipline. Use courses and practice questions for the first, and sustained hands-on repetition for the second.
Before committing to a budget or timeline, check SRA Certification Cost and SRA Exam Dates, and consider whether the effort fits your goals using Is the SRA Certification Worth It?. You can start with a quick knowledge check on the main practice test site.
Frequently Asked Questions
No. Training is not mandatory to attempt the examinations, and course prerequisites are preparation recommendations rather than additional current SRA examination requirements.
The current route requires 4A0-102, 4A0-105, 4A0-106, 4A0-107 and 4A0-115, followed by the 7-hour ASRA4A0 practical lab, effective September 8, 2026.
No. The optional composite substitutes only for 4A0-102, 4A0-105, 4A0-106 and 4A0-107. It does not replace 4A0-115 or the practical lab.
Separate IS-IS/OSPF, MPLS and Services Architecture exams are no longer required, though that knowledge can still support preparation. Multicast 4A0-108 is retired and is not a current SRA requirement.
It lasts 7 hours as two independent 3.5-hour sections, excluding a 1-hour lunch. You configure and verify topics on live 7750 SR networks using classic CLI or MD-CLI, and not every topic necessarily appears.