Earning the Notion Essentials Badge in 2024: All you need to know
A complete guide based on my recent experience with the exam
Notion is an all-in-one software with literally endless capabilities and use cases. It has revolutionized how individuals and teams manage their tasks, projects, information, and more.
There is a growing demand for Notion templates and consulting services. If you are a Notion enthusiast aiming to sell Notion templates or do Notion consulting, you should consider becoming certified.
I recently earned the Notion Essentials Badge (yay!). In this article, I will provide you with all the details about it and provide study recommendations so you can also succeed in the exam and become Notion certified!
Why become Notion certified?
Obtaining official certification from Notion shows your proficiency in using the software. It can also be a valuable credential that can open up new opportunities.
Whether you’re interested in creating and selling Notion templates or offering consulting services to individuals and/or organizations, being certified can make you stand out from the (ever-growing) crowd and establish you as a trusted expert in the Notion community.
Imagine you are looking for a psychological counseling session. Would you rather trust someone who says they know a lot about psychology or someone with a psychology degree? No-brainer, right? Especially if people don’t know you, they might look at your certifications before they show interest in working with you or purchasing your templates.
Notion puts it this way:
Of course, you can do perfectly fine and sell Notion templates or offer Notion consulting without certification. If you are already successful and have gained recognition for your Notion proficiency, you might not need to pursue the badges from Notion.
Currently, Notion offers 3 badges:
- Essentials Badge
- Settings and Sharing Badge
- Advanced Badge
Apart from this, there is a certification program for becoming an official Notion Certified Consultant.
I have only taken the Notion Essentials Badge exam until now, and this is the subject of the present article.
Let’s dive into the details of the exam.
How to sign up for the exam
First of all, the exam is hard. Only sign up for it if you are well prepared and have ample Notion experience. Save yourself from unnecessary frustration.
The first step is registering for the exam on the signup page. You will see an application form that asks you about your personal information and about your prior experience with Notion.
Fill out the form and submit it. It might be a good idea to save your responses to save time in case you need to apply for a second attempt.
Then check your email: You should receive a message within a few minutes informing you that you can take the exam, along with the link to the exam and a personal one-time passcode.
Be aware that you have one week after signing up for the exam to take it. So please check your calendar first and make sure you can allot time for it within the next seven days. Also, remember that once you start the exam, you cannot pause it and save your progress for later. You need to do it in one session.
The exam is free of charge. If you fail on the first attempt, you can sign up for a second attempt after a one-month waiting period.
The Exam: What to Expect
The Notion Essentials Badge exam consists of multiple-choice questions designed to test your knowledge and understanding of Notion’s key features and functionalities. It covers various topics, including database management, page customization, collaboration tools, and integrations with other apps.
You will have to answer 70 multiple-choice questions with 4 options each. Most are single-choice, i.e., only one option is correct, but I also got 2 or 3 questions where I had to select all that apply.
You will see one question at a time, but as long as you don’t submit your exam, you can always go back and modify your answers.
I found the exam very challenging. Some questions are super-specific and not very applied, and some are also worded poorly and hard to understand.
The time limit is 90 minutes. This may seem like a lot for 70 multiple-choice questions, but it’s not. I submitted the exam after 80+ minutes.
An extra info for non-native speakers of English (I am one of them): To my knowledge, the exam is not available in other languages, which depending on your English proficiency may be an additional barrier. Make sure you familiarize yourself with Notion’s terminology and read each question carefully.
Exam Day Tips
On the exam day, ensure you have a stable internet connection, a quiet, distraction-free environment, and 90 minutes of uninterrupted time. As already stated above, you cannot pause the exam. The 90 minutes start to run once you initiate the exam.
Before starting the exam, close Notion and its documentation on all devices. You are not allowed to use any external sources during the exam!
Familiarize yourself with the exam interface and instructions before starting the exam. Carefully read each question before selecting your answer because some are really tricky, and you need to concentrate on tiny details!
Remember that time is limited, so do not waste it on one question. If you don’t know the answer, mark an option anyway (you might get it right by chance!), write down the question number to return to it later if there is time, and move on to the next.
What you should have handy:
- A timer. You will not see how much time you have left on the exam interface.
- Pen and paper. You may need them to sketch out something or write down the question numbers you want to return to if there’s time. You might also want to jot down the topics you found most difficult so you know what to focus on if you do not pass the first attempt.
- A nice cup of coffee or tea to make this situation more comfortable and to celebrate this important occasion of becoming Notion certified!
How to pass the exam
You will need a score of 70% correct or more to pass. That’s at least 49 out of the 70 questions answered correctly.
I was surprised that my exam contained 70 questions because I had read articles about it and watched videos from other users who said they had 60 questions. If you look at the screenshot above, in the email they also indicate that the exam has 60 questions.
I assume that the exam was recently updated; for the same reasons, mine included questions about Notion AI and Q&A, which are relatively new.
If you pass, you will get an email like this:
You will also receive another email with instructions on how to claim your badge. You are then officially Notion certified and allowed to display your badge on social network profiles, your homepage, etc., as proof of your expertise with Notion.
Congratulations!
If you don’t pass, don’t worry! You will be able to take the exam again after a month, and it should be a lot easier for you then because you know what to expect and which subtopics were the most difficult for you to brush up on before your second attempt.
You will only be informed about your final score, not the questions you got wrong (this holds for both outcomes, by the way).
How to study for the exam
As I already said, the exam is hard, and you should only take it if you are proficient in Notion.
One resource I personally used and can recommend is the Notion Academy. It’s free video training from Notion that takes you from beginner to advanced user.
To make good use of it, you need to engage with the content actively: Take notes, try out what they show in the videos, play around with Notion’s features, and pay special attention to their terminology.
Another option is to sign up for the Notion Mastery program. It’s a course and learning community founded by Marie Poulin, one of the most knowledgeable Notion users in the world, and it’s probably the best Notion training you can get.
Now, let’s look at different subtopics in detail and how important (or not) they are for the exam.
Please note that this information is based on my experience with the exam and that yours may be different. It seems that Notion has a bigger pool of questions, and they randomly draw 70 questions from it for each exam attempt.
I will cover different subtopics in descending order based on their importance for the exam-starting with the most important ones.
1. Databases
This was the most important topic on my exam! Make sure you know about:
- Database views and what they can and can’t do
- Database relations and rollups: How to set them up and what they do
- Differences between spreadsheets (e.g., Excel) and Notion databases
- Database properties
- Grouping options, filtering, and sharing
Tips: Work with databases in your workspace. Play around with different properties, relations, and rollups. Try out different database views and pay close attention to what you can and cannot do with each. Test filtering, sorting, and grouping functions extensively.
Key resources:
- https://www.notion.so/help/intro-to-databases
- https://www.notion.so/help/relations-and-rollups
- https://www.notion.so/help/guides/using-database-views
- https://www.notion.so/help/data-sources-and-linked-databases
- https://redgregory.notion.site/Database-v-s-Spreadsheet-e33d11ec56e44483ae42b03849d79fd3
2. Pages and blocks
This was also an important topic on my exam, in particular:
- Basic page and block operations, such as moving them, links & backlinks, and formatting options
- Permission levels on pages and subpages
- Embeds
- Following pages, notifications about edits on pages
- Searching for pages with the Search function (Quick Find)
Tips: Pay special attention to what types of blocks exist and which text formatting options Notion offers. Also, try out the Search function and observe what it does (admittedly, I had barely used it before).
Key resources:
- https://www.notion.so/help/search
- https://www.notion.so/help/create-links-and-backlinks
- https://www.notion.so/help/embed-and-connect-other-apps
3. Sharing and permissions
This was a huge topic! If you are like me and only use Notion as an individual, you will be unable to answer several questions about its collaborative use successfully. Hence, you need to study about teamspaces, sharing, commenting, etc. That’s what I focused on before the exam, and it paid off. Some things you should know about include:
- Permission levels on pages
- Differences between members and guests in a workspace
- Sharing private pages with others or to the web
Study tips: Extensively review the documentation if you have no experience with using Notion’s collaborative features. You may also partner with a friend or set up an additional Notion account with another email address to try different things. Pay special attention to what happens when you share information from a private page, e.g., if a shared database has a relation with a database that’s on a private page.
Key resources:
- https://www.notion.so/help/sharing-and-permissions
- https://www.notion.so/help/add-members-admins-guests-and-groups
4. Workspace and sidebar
This topic came up less than the first three on this list, but you should also be familiar with it, especially:
- Which sidebar sections exist, and in which section do different pages appear
- Know what a workspace is and what differentiates it from a teamspace
Key resources:
5. Notion AI
Notion AI is a relatively new feature and was also covered in the exam. You should:
- Know what you can and cannot currently do with Notion AI
- Know how to access Q&A and what it does
Key resources:
6. Notifications
As someone who uses Notion individually, I initially had no idea about this topic. Fortunately, I had studied it before the exam because a few questions came up about notifications. Take a look at:
- In which cases and how (sidebar badge, email, mobile push notification) Notion notifies you
- Know how to set reminders for you and others
Key resources:
- https://www.notion.so/help/updates-and-notifications
- https://www.notion.so/help/comments-mentions-and-reminders
7. Other topics
I had only one question about formulas and none about plans and pricing, but I heard that these topics came up on others’ exams, so make sure you take a look at these as well.
Additional resources I recommend
There are some videos and articles that I looked at before my exam and found helpful:
- The Notion essentials exam is no joke by Matthew Jira on YouTube
- Notion Certified Exam | what to expect, tips to be successful & more by Sara Loretta on YouTube
- Your Notion Certified Study Guide Is Here (article by Stephanie Fois)
- Want to Clear the Notion Essentials Badge? (article by Ajinkya Bhat)
- Getting Notion Certified is fairly difficult. Here’s what you need to know before giving the test (Reddit)
There is also a wealth of blogs and instructional YouTube videos on the internet. Apart from the Notion Academy and Notion Mastery mentioned above, I can recommend Red Gregory and Thomas Frank. They have very good tutorial resources.
You may also want to check out my Notion Essentials Badge Exam Prep Companion. The template contains 70 practice questions inspired by the real exam questions, together with solutions, explanations, and resources for each question. If you use it correctly, you will likely save yourself the frustration of not passing the exam and having to wait a month to attempt it again.
Alternatively, check out this flashcard deck from Jeremy or the Notion Essentials Badge Study Cards Pro by Nagaraj.
So, I hope this article will become a valuable and helpful resource on how to earn the Notion Essentials Badge in 2024 and beyond.
Good luck with the exam and joining the group of Notion-certified creators!
Disclaimer: This article contains affiliate links, which means that if you make a purchase through one of these links, I might receive a small commission, at no extra expense to you.
Originally published at http://creatorschmidt.com on May 24, 2024.
Hello! I am Dr. Schmidt, a psychologist, academic, and Notion creator. I enjoy sharing my thoughts about different topics here on Medium. If you like my work, follow along!
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