Open Group ArchiMate 3 Foundation Book

You can pass OGA-031 without ever opening a modelling tool, but not without knowing the language's rules by heart. The ArchiMate 3 Foundation paper is 40 closed-book multiple-choice questions in 60 minutes, and 24 correct answers (60%) pass. It asks which element, relationship or layer a situation calls for, so vocabulary drills and diagram reading beat long hours of passive reading.

That framing matters because ArchiMate is often described as "just boxes and arrows". At Foundation level the arrows are the exam. A question may describe a customer-facing service, an application component and a server, then ask which relationship joins two of them, or which element type fits a described thing. Candidates who can draw well but have not memorised the definitions lose marks to candidates who have. This guide covers the exam format, the language you need to know, the relationship rules, a four-week plan and the route on to the Practitioner paper.

What does the OGA-031 exam look like, and which ArchiMate version does it test?

OGA-031 is the Open Group's ArchiMate 3 Part 1 exam, and passing it earns the ArchiMate 3 Foundation qualification. There are no prerequisites. The paper is supervised and closed book, so no specification, notes or tools are allowed, and each correct answer scores one point. The Open Group's own ArchiMate examinations summary lists these terms, and they match the figures below.