CPE Policy Changes for 2027
Beginning 1 January 2027, ISACA will evolve its Continuing Professional Education (CPE) requirements to more closely align with our mission to empower our members throughout their career. While the 120 CPEs over three years requirement remains the same, members will have increased flexibility to leverage 30 CPEs for non-domain specific learning; reducing the domain-specific CPE requirements to at least 90 CPEs. This update underscores ISACA’s commitment to meeting professionals where they are and empowering their continued development within their career.
CPE Changes: What You Need to Know
In this video, we'll break down the upcoming changes to ISACA's Continuing Professional Education (CPE) requirements. Learn how the revised focus on certification exam content and domain-related activities will impact your CPE planning.
CPE categories and requirements
CERTIFICATION-ALIGNED
Directly aligned to the certification exam content outline and domains
90–120 CPEs during three-year cycle
- Taking a class on cybersecurity
- Attending ISACA conference or virtual summits
- Participating on the Emerging Tech Advisory Group
- Volunteering for the CISA Working Group
- Developing content/teaching content that is aligned to your certification
- Assisting with review manual development
- Publishing an article on emerging technologies
- Exam item writing for ISACA certifications
- Events from organizations such as IOD, NACD (governance-focused)
PROFESSIONAL-ALIGNED
Skills that support professional growth but are not aligned exam content
Optional 30 CPEs maximum over three-year cycle
- Taking a class on communication skills
- Mentoring a young professional
- Volunteering for SheLeadsTech
- Serving as an ISACA chapter officer
- Serving as an ISACA Board Member
- Attending the Member Experience Leadership Series webinars (MELS)
- Attending leadership conferences
- Attending chapter presentations that are not certification exam content-related
Official Continuing Professional Education (CPE) Policy
This PDF outlines the revised Continuing Professional Education (CPE) policy effective 1 January 2027, designed to ensure ISACA certification holders maintain up-to-date skills aligned with certification exam content.
CPE policy changes FAQs
What are the changes with CPE reporting in 2027?
Beginning 1 January 2027, ISACA is changing the CPE requirements to provide flexibility and support career growth. There is still a 120 CPE requirement, but there is more flexibility in the activities certification holders can choose from to earn those CPE. A minimum of 90 CPE must be aligned to the certification exam content outline or domains for the certification being renewed over the three-year reporting cycle. Between 90-120 CPE can be aligned to the exam content outline.
A maximum of 30 CPE may be related to other professional development, including leadership, soft skills, volunteering and/or mentoring.
How does this change volunteer work for CPE?
The goal of CPE is to ensure that skills directly relevant to the certification are kept up to date. As a result, the updated CPE policy allows for more volunteer work than before to count, but has limits that are lower for certain types of volunteer work that are not directly related to the credential. This means that volunteer work that is aligned with the exam domains will allow for 20 CPE per year and 60 over the three-year cycle. However, volunteer work that is not directly aligned with exams/domains will be limited to 30 CPE maximum over three years. We realize that a small number of volunteers may be impacted by this change, but it is necessary to ensure that exam-related skills and abilities are kept current with market changes.
What are the specific changes to the qualifying volunteering activities?
Volunteering on an ISACA board/committee will be split for exam/domain content outline-aligned and non-exam/domain content outline-aligned activities.
Exam/domain content outline-aligned - 20 CPE maximum per year, and 60 CPE maximum for the three-year cycle
- Examples: advisory groups specific to emerging tech, IT risk or governance, an ISACA certification working group
Non-exam content outline-aligned – 20 CPE maximum per year, up to 30 CPE maximum for the three-year cycle
- Examples: SheLeadsTech Advisory Group, Awards Working Group, Award Reviewers, Volunteering as a Chapter Leader and Academic/Advisory Working Group
Vendor sales/marketing demo presentations
- This activity will no longer qualify for CPE. However, vendor presentations that are case studies and not demos will still count toward CPE.
Is the system enforcing the change?
Instead of making any abrupt changes, we are giving a year of advance notice to ensure a smooth transition. No system changes will happen in the 2026 cycle.
Does this increase how many CPE I need if I have multiple certifications?
No, you will still be able to count activities for multiple certifications as you do today.
Will ISACA conduct more CPE audits?
The audit process will remain unchanged, and no additional audits are planned.
Why is the CPE policy changing?
We want to offer flexibility and broaden the acceptance criteria to recognize that you require both technical and professional skills as you advance in your career.
What other changes will we see?
To make it easier for you to identify content that meets your CPE requirement, the ISACA website will start noting whether CPE opportunities are exam content outline/domain-aligned or professional skill-aligned.
How will conferences be handled?
We will award all CPE from ISACA conferences as domain/exam content outline-aligned. CPE for other conferences will depend on whether session topics are related to the exam content outline/domain or to professional skill development.