70-332 Exam Guide: Advanced SharePoint Server 2013 Skills, Retirement Status, and a Practical Study Plan
Exam 70-332 was Microsoft’s “Advanced Solutions of Microsoft SharePoint Server 2013” exam. It served SharePoint professionals with experience administering, designing, and supporting SharePoint Server 2013, and Microsoft paired it with 70-331 for the MCSE: SharePoint certification. The important decision now is not how to book a sitting: Microsoft’s retirement policy means 70-332 can no longer be taken. This guide helps former candidates use the exam’s technology scope responsibly, understand its historical certification context, and choose a current learning or credential path instead of relying on outdated exam-dump material.
What did 70-332 validate?
70-332 validated advanced solutions knowledge for Microsoft SharePoint Server 2013 rather than serving as a general introduction to SharePoint. Microsoft’s preparation session identified it as “Advanced Solutions of Microsoft SharePoint Server 2013” and described the intended audience as people experienced with SharePoint 2013.
The exam’s purpose is best understood through its relationship with 70-331. Microsoft described 70-331 as “Core Solutions of Microsoft SharePoint Server 2013” and 70-332 as the advanced companion exam. Together, Microsoft stated, the exams were required for the MCSE: SharePoint certification.
That pairing suggests a progression: core architecture and administration knowledge first, followed by advanced design and operational decision-making. It does not justify treating 70-332 as a current measure of SharePoint Online, Microsoft 365, or modern cloud administration skills. SharePoint Server 2013 is now a legacy platform, so its exam scope should be separated from current product capabilities.
Who was the intended candidate?
The intended candidate had practical experience with SharePoint Server 2013 before attempting advanced exam preparation. Microsoft’s own session description explicitly targeted people experienced with Microsoft SharePoint 2013, not complete beginners.
A suitable historical candidate might have been responsible for a SharePoint farm, involved in solution design, or expected to troubleshoot complex platform decisions. That description is an audience signal, not a claim that Microsoft required a particular job title or prerequisite. The supplied official material does not state a formal prerequisite, mandatory course, years-of-experience threshold, or required certification for 70-332.
Candidates should therefore distinguish three things: what the exam title covered, what Microsoft recommended through its audience description, and what an employer may expect in practice. Do not present Course 20332, a Microsoft Certified Trainer session, or experience with a specific deployment as an official prerequisite. The roadmap poster associated instructor-led Course 20332 with preparation for 70-332, but association is not the same as a compulsory requirement.
Can you still take 70-332?
No. Microsoft’s retirement guidance says that a retired exam cannot be taken and that its associated certification or credential cannot be earned after the retirement date. Microsoft identified all remaining MCSA, MCSD, and MCSE exams, including the MCSE: SharePoint-era 70-332, as retired on January 31, 2021.
This is the first scheduling decision to make. Do not spend money looking for a current appointment, a late registration route, or a replacement test session for 70-332. A website offering “live” 70-332 access should be treated cautiously and checked against Microsoft’s current certification information rather than assumed to be legitimate.
The retirement is also consistent with the age of the underlying platform. Microsoft lists SharePoint Server 2013 under the Fixed Lifecycle Policy, with mainstream support ending April 11, 2018, and extended support ending April 12, 2023. The product documentation remains useful for historical administration and migration work, but the old exam is not a current credentialing option.
What happened to the associated MCSE certification?
Candidates who earned an MCSA, MCSD, or MCSE certification before retirement keep that certification on their Microsoft transcript. Candidates who had not completed the required exams before retirement could no longer earn the associated certification through 70-332.
Microsoft’s retirement communication explained that an existing certification remains on the transcript even after the exams retire. It also described a transcript lifecycle in which the certification would remain in the active section for two years from June 30, 2020, before moving to an inactive section. That historical detail should not be confused with permission to complete an unfinished certification today.
If the credential matters for an employer, partner requirement, or personal record, verify the status in the candidate’s Microsoft transcript. A third-party page, old study guide, or archived course listing cannot establish that a person earned the certification. The official retirement guidance also says that previously earned certifications remain on the transcript.
Is there a current replacement for 70-332?
Microsoft’s July 2019 mapping article listed Teamwork Administrator, requiring MS-300 and MS-301, as the replacement certification path associated with 70-332. That mapping is historical program guidance, not a guarantee that those exam codes or that certification remain current today.
The mapping provides a useful direction for interpreting Microsoft’s shift from product-version exams to role-based certification. It points candidates toward teamwork and collaboration administration rather than toward searching for another exam with an almost identical 70-332 label.
Before choosing a current credential, open the live Microsoft Learn certification catalog and confirm the present status, required exams, replacement relationships, and retirement notices. Certification programs change. The supplied sources support the historical mapping, but they do not provide a current replacement catalogue entry that can safely be presented as active.
What skills should a legacy 70-332 study plan emphasize?
A useful historical study plan should emphasize advanced SharePoint Server 2013 solution work: understanding the platform’s architecture, making design choices, administering a farm, and diagnosing operational problems. The official sources confirm the product, version, and advanced exam title, but they do not supply an official domain list or percentage blueprint.
Do not invent a list of measured-skill percentages. No verified fact supplied for this guide gives domain weights, question counts, passing scores, test duration, languages, or delivery methods. Any page claiming those details should be checked against an official archived blueprint before publication or use.
For practical learning, organize the work around decisions rather than memorized menu paths. Ask what a proposed architecture is trying to achieve, which service or dependency it uses, how it affects operations, what failure would look like, and how an administrator would validate the result. This approach is a recommendation for learning legacy technology, not a claim about undisclosed exam scoring.
Architecture and deployment decisions
Start by mapping the components of a SharePoint Server 2013 environment and the responsibilities attached to each one. The objective is to explain why a design choice exists, not merely to name a configuration screen.
Use a written design exercise: identify business workloads, expected availability, storage and database dependencies, authentication assumptions, and operational ownership. Then record the trade-offs and the evidence an administrator would collect after deployment. Keep this exercise within the SharePoint 2013 context; do not silently substitute SharePoint Online features for server terminology.
Service and solution administration
Study how an administrator would reason about services, shared capabilities, permissions, and solution behavior in a farm. For each topic, connect configuration to an observable outcome such as a user capability, an administrator task, or a diagnostic symptom.
A strong revision note has four fields: purpose, dependency, configuration decision, and verification step. This format exposes gaps quickly. If a note contains only definitions, expand it with a scenario that requires choosing between two plausible administrative actions.
Operations, continuity, and troubleshooting
Treat operational readiness as a sequence of evidence-gathering steps. Define the symptom, identify the affected scope, check dependencies and recent changes, test a minimally risky correction, and document the result.
Practice separating a farm-wide issue from a service-specific issue and a permissions issue from an availability issue. The recommendation is deliberately diagnostic rather than a promise about question formats. Microsoft’s supplied material does not state that a particular troubleshooting scenario or lab type appeared on 70-332.
How should you prepare with the official material available?
Use Microsoft’s SharePoint Server documentation as the technical reference, the Ignite preparation session as historical orientation, and the lifecycle page to keep the platform’s age visible. The official SharePoint guide covers planning, deployment, administration, backup and recovery, monitoring, upgrading, and applying updates for SharePoint Server versions including 2013.
Begin with product documentation, then convert each major topic into a decision record. Finish by explaining the design to another administrator or writing a short incident response. This sequence is more reliable than reading disconnected summaries because it tests whether you can connect architecture, configuration, and operations.
The Microsoft Ignite session was designed as a fast-paced review of exam topics and test-taking techniques and was led by a Microsoft Certified Trainer. It can provide historical context, but its 2015 publication date means it should not be treated as a current exam update or a substitute for checking retirement status.
Build a baseline before studying
Write down what you can already do in SharePoint Server 2013: deploy, configure, secure, monitor, recover, or troubleshoot. Mark each area as demonstrated, partly understood, or unknown. This baseline determines whether legacy technical study is worthwhile or whether your main goal is migration knowledge.
If you no longer have access to a SharePoint 2013 environment, use documentation-driven diagrams and configuration walkthroughs rather than pretending that reading alone proves operational competence. Where a lab is possible, keep it isolated and use it to validate concepts, not to reproduce leaked exam content.
Study by dependency chains
Study a topic together with its prerequisites and observable consequences. For example, an administrative change should lead to questions about affected users, dependent services, data protection, monitoring, and rollback.
Create one page per dependency chain. Put the starting requirement at the top, the design or configuration choice in the middle, and validation and recovery actions at the bottom. Revisit the page after a day and explain it without looking. This tests reasoning and reveals where terminology has replaced understanding.
Use retrieval and explanation
Close the documentation and answer questions in your own words: What problem does this component solve? What would break if its dependency failed? Which evidence would distinguish two likely causes? How would you communicate the risk of a change?
Keep answers tied to SharePoint Server 2013 and label any knowledge that comes from a later product version. Version confusion is a major risk when studying a retired exam because current documentation also covers SharePoint Server Subscription Edition, 2019, 2016, and 2013.
What should a practical roadmap look like?
A practical roadmap has four passes: establish the historical scope, refresh platform fundamentals, work through advanced design and operations, and then make a credential decision. Because 70-332 is retired, the final pass is not an exam booking; it is deciding whether to preserve legacy knowledge, prepare for migration work, or pursue a current role-based certification.
Set the length of each pass according to your experience and available lab access rather than copying an unsupported timetable. The sources do not provide an official preparation duration. A shorter plan can work for a specialist refreshing known material; a broader plan is appropriate when the platform is unfamiliar or the goal is migration responsibility.
Pass one: confirm the target
Read the official retirement guidance first and record the conclusion: 70-332 is not a schedulable exam. Then identify why you were considering it. Possible goals include documenting historical SharePoint capability, supporting an existing server estate, preparing for modernization, or selecting a current credential.
If the goal is a Microsoft certification, stop the 70-332 study plan here and inspect the current Microsoft Learn catalogue. If the goal is technical work on an old farm, continue with a product-focused learning plan and avoid describing the result as a newly earned certification.
Pass two: rebuild the foundation
Review the SharePoint Server 2013 platform model, deployment prerequisites, administration responsibilities, and core terminology. Use Microsoft’s SharePoint Server guide to locate the relevant planning, install, manage, backup, recovery, monitoring, and upgrade material.
Produce a simple environment diagram and a responsibility matrix. The diagram should show components and dependencies; the matrix should show who configures, monitors, backs up, recovers, and approves changes. This creates a reference for later advanced scenarios and exposes assumptions that a glossary would not.
Pass three: solve advanced scenarios
Work through scenario briefs that require a design or operational recommendation. Each brief should include a stated business need, technical constraints, an expected risk, and a validation plan. Write the recommendation before consulting the reference answer or documentation.
Review every decision for version accuracy. A solution that is sensible for a cloud service may not apply to SharePoint Server 2013, and a current server feature may not have existed in the exam’s historical scope. Keep a dated source note for every important conclusion.
Pass four: choose the next credential or work outcome
Use the historical Microsoft mapping only as a starting clue. Confirm which current role-based certification, training path, or migration skill now matches your job objective. Microsoft’s stated move from MCSA, MCSD, and MCSE exams toward role-based certifications is the reason a direct code-for-code replacement should not be assumed.
For a work outcome, finish with a documented migration or operations portfolio: an architecture diagram, risk register, backup and recovery procedure, monitoring checklist, and upgrade or migration decision record. For a certification outcome, replace those deliverables with the current official skills outline and requirements.
Which study mistakes create the most risk?
The biggest mistake is treating a retired exam as a current purchase opportunity. The next is studying from material that mixes SharePoint Server 2013 with later server releases or cloud services without labeling the difference. A third is confusing familiarity with terminology for the ability to make and validate an administrative decision.
Avoid exam dumps, leaked questions, and memorization claims. They do not establish genuine platform competence, and no source supplied for this guide says that such material guarantees a pass. Instead, use official documentation, controlled practice, explanation, and scenario-based review.
Do not publish or trust invented blueprint percentages. The supplied evidence gives the exam name, audience, historical certification relationship, and retirement context, but no measured-skill weights. If a later official blueprint is located, attach every percentage to its exact domain name and version before using it.
Version mixing
Mark every note with its product version. SharePoint Server documentation now presents several releases together, while the historical exam concerned SharePoint Server 2013. A feature, administration workflow, or support recommendation from another release should not be inserted into a 70-332 study claim without verification.
When reading a current page, follow the version-specific link and record whether the instruction concerns 2013, 2016, 2019, or Subscription Edition. This small habit prevents a modern recommendation from being mistaken for historical exam coverage.
Confusing an associated course with a requirement
Course 20332 was associated with 70-332 on Microsoft’s SharePoint certification roadmap, and Microsoft also provided an exam-preparation session. Neither supplied fact establishes that completing the course was mandatory.
Use a course when its structure helps you learn, but judge readiness by demonstrated understanding and documented practice. Describe it as a preparation resource, not as an official prerequisite.
Ignoring the retirement decision
A candidate can waste substantial effort by completing a legacy study plan before checking whether the exam is available. Make status verification the first task, not the final footnote.
For historical knowledge, continue deliberately. For certification, redirect immediately to the current Microsoft Learn catalogue. For an existing credential, check the transcript rather than assuming that retirement erased it; Microsoft says previously earned certifications remain there.
What delivery and pricing details are actually verified?
No current delivery method, appointment format, exam duration, question count, languages, passing score, or booking process is verified for 70-332 in the supplied official research. Since the exam is retired, presenting historical or third-party logistics as current would mislead candidates.
The supplied evidence does include a historical transition-exam price of $99 USD, but that fact concerns certain transition exams and does not establish a price for 70-332. It should not be reused as an exam fee. Microsoft also notes that prices vary by country or region in the transition-exam context.
The practical action is simple: do not use an old exam page or a search-result snippet to make a scheduling or budget decision. Confirm any current exam’s delivery, price, languages, duration, and registration rules on its live official Microsoft Learn page. If those details are not shown there, contact the official testing-provider route linked by Microsoft rather than guessing.
How does SharePoint Server 2013’s lifecycle affect study value?
SharePoint Server 2013 reached the end of Microsoft extended support on April 12, 2023. That makes 70-332 primarily relevant to legacy estates, historical certification records, migration planning, and technology comparison—not to a new claim of current platform currency.
The lifecycle does not make the technical knowledge useless. Organizations may still need to understand an old deployment before upgrading or migrating it, and Microsoft’s SharePoint guide includes migration and upgrade material for older versions. The distinction is between maintaining useful legacy knowledge and presenting it as a current product credential.
Study with an exit objective. Decide whether each topic supports an immediate operational task, a migration risk assessment, a documentation requirement, or a broader understanding of SharePoint architecture. If it supports none of these, prioritize current role-based skills instead.
What should you do next?
First, stop treating 70-332 as a bookable exam and verify your Microsoft transcript if you previously passed it or earned the related certification. Next, define your objective: legacy SharePoint support, migration, historical credential documentation, or a current certification. Then choose resources and practice tasks that match that objective.
For legacy support, read the SharePoint Server 2013 planning, deployment, management, backup, recovery, monitoring, and upgrade documentation and build version-labelled scenario notes. For migration, document dependencies, risks, validation checks, and rollback considerations. For certification, use the historical Teamwork Administrator mapping only as background and select a current Microsoft Learn path after checking its live requirements.
Finally, keep your study record honest. Say that you studied advanced SharePoint Server 2013 concepts or supported a legacy environment; do not imply that preparation produced a new 70-332 result. A precise record is more useful to an employer than an outdated exam label presented without retirement context.
Conclusion
70-332 remains a useful reference point for understanding advanced SharePoint Server 2013 administration and the older MCSE: SharePoint pathway, but it is not a current exam option. Microsoft retired the remaining MCSA, MCSD, and MCSE exams on January 31, 2021, and SharePoint Server 2013 later reached the end of extended support. Use the official material to preserve or apply legacy knowledge, verify any existing transcript entry, and move certification planning to a current role-based Microsoft Learn path. That decision avoids unsupported scheduling claims and keeps preparation aligned with the work you actually intend to do.
Official sources
- Exam and assessment lab retirement | Microsoft Learn
- learn.microsoft.com
- learn.microsoft.com
- SharePoint Server 2013 - Microsoft Lifecycle | Microsoft Learn
- Mapping Microsoft 70-xxx Exams to New Role-based Certifications
- Exam Prep Session for Exam 70-331 and Exam 70-332: SharePoint Server ...
- MCSA, MCSD, MCSE certifications retire; with continued investment to ...
- MCSE_RoadmapPoster_SharePoint-V6 - download.microsoft.com
