Welcome to my MS-220 exam study guide. The MS-220 exam (troubleshooting exchange online) is designed to prove you have the ability to troubleshoot and resolve issues with exchange online. My aim with this guide is to get you fully prepared to take the MS-220 exam and pass. This guide will provide you with directions to all the content you need to create a solid study plan.
MS-220 exam information
Exam snippet from https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/learn/certifications/exams/ms-220
Candidates for this exam work with customers and other stakeholders to understand the details of any issues. They also interact with administrators and peers that work with other related technologies.
Candidates should have experience with PowerShell and the Exchange PowerShell module. The support engineer should also have significant experience deploying, managing, and troubleshooting Microsoft Exchange Online environments.
Path to certification
Skills measured
- Troubleshoot mail flow issues
- Troubleshoot compliance and retention issues
- Troubleshoot mail client issues
- Troubleshoot Exchange Online configuration issues
- Troubleshoot hybrid and migration issues
Is the MS-220 exam hard?
The MS-220 exam is a speciality exam. It is not specifically a beginner, associate or expert level exam. However, you should know that it is not easy… just being an Exchange online administrator for a long time is not enough to pass this exam. When diving into the exam’s skills outline you will see that the content covered is almost every aspect of Exchange online and includes features that you likely do not use every day, or ever…
How to study for the MS-220 exam
Having a solid study plan is key to passing any Microsoft exam. A solid study plan will make learning most effective and give you a good boost of confidence before your exam date. With that being said, I will explain how I prepare for Microsoft exams, which you use for the MS-220 exam.
1. Firstly I review the exams Microsoft Docs that I have listed in this post. Clearly highlight yourself which areas you are already confident with and which areas you know you need to study. This will allow you to focus on topics that are most important.
2. Use the Microsoft Learning Paths from Microsoft Learn to bulk up the previous knowledge you have gained from the official Microsoft documentation. The learning modules will often take the information from the Microsoft documentation and apply it to a real work scenario.
3. Utilise any free trial subscriptions for Microsoft or Azure products to gain real and practical experience for what you are studying. Check out my post if you need help with this: How to get Free Azure Services directly from Microsoft
4. Use YouTube to find exam cram videos that you can whizz through before your exam date. These will both help you solidify the knowledge you already have and help you choose some areas that need additional attention.
MS-220 Microsoft Docs exam study guide
Troubleshoot mail flow issues (20–25%)
Troubleshoot Exchange Online mail flow issues
- review and interpret message headers
- review and interpret message trace results and policies associated with those results
- determine whether a transport rule or conditional routing rule is affecting mail flow
- identify rules that are evaluated and policies that are applied when sending or receiving email
- troubleshoot issues where users cannot send or receive email and no NDR is generated or displayed
- troubleshoot issues where mail destined for one tenant is incorrectly routed to another tenant
- troubleshoot delivery delays
Troubleshoot mail flow issues with external systems
- read and analyze SMTP protocol logs for hybrid deployments and third-party systems
- troubleshoot issues related to mail flow for hybrid deployments
- troubleshoot DNS-related mail flow issues
- troubleshoot SMTP relay issues
- troubleshoot SMTP certificate issues
Troubleshoot other mail flow issues
- identify types of NDRs and interpret NDR data
- determine which active rules impact email attachments
- determine which rules are triggered when an email arrives at a user’s inbox
- troubleshoot issues related to blocked attachment types
- troubleshoot issues with corrupted inbox rules
Troubleshoot issues reported by Microsoft Defender for Office 365
- determine why an email is marked as spam
- determine why messages are being quarantined
- determine whether the sender SPF DMARC and DKIM records are valid
- https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/security/office-365-security/use-dmarc-to-validate-email?view=o365-worldwide
- https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/security/office-365-security/use-dkim-to-validate-outbound-email?view=o365-worldwide
- https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/security/office-365-security/set-up-spf-in-office-365-to-help-prevent-spoofing?view=o365-worldwide
- troubleshoot spam filter policies
- troubleshoot messages that are categorized as false positive or false negative
Troubleshoot compliance and retention issues (25–30%)
Troubleshoot compliance issues
- identify roles required to perform eDiscovery actions
- describe Compliance center retention policies
- troubleshoot eDiscovery issues
- determine what types of holds are associated with an item
- troubleshoot in-place and eDiscovery holds
- search for and delete email messages in an organization
- determine how to clear or purge recoverable item folders
Troubleshoot retention issues
- describe retention tag types and actions
- describe the process for calculating item retention age
- troubleshoot issues creating and applying retention policies
- review and interpret Messaging Records Management (MRM) mailbox diagnostics logs
- interpret message properties used by message records management (MRM)
Troubleshoot Office Message Encryption (OME) and S/Mime issues
- troubleshoot issues with messages that are not encrypted or decrypted as expected
- troubleshoot issues where external users cannot decrypt messages but internal users can
decrypt messages - troubleshoot issues reading, replying to, or forwarding protected messages from Microsoft 365 on mobile devices
- troubleshoot mail flow rules
- troubleshoot revocation issues for encrypted emails
- troubleshoot S/Mime issues
Troubleshoot mailbox auditing Issues
- troubleshoot issues searching audit logs
- troubleshoot user actions (for example user reports an item is deleted but they say they
did not delete) - troubleshoot bulk actions including email creation, moves, modifications, and deletion
- track non-owner actions
- troubleshoot audit log retention period issues
- troubleshoot auditing not working
Troubleshoot journaling
- troubleshoot duplicate journal entries
- troubleshoot mail not being journaled
- troubleshoot journal OME decryption issues
Troubleshoot mail client issues (20–25%)
Troubleshoot connectivity and authentication issues
- describe how to obtain Outlook client configuration information
- troubleshoot Exchange authentication policies
- https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/powershell/module/exchange/set-authenticationpolicy?view=exchange-ps
- https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/exchange/clients-and-mobile-in-exchange-online/disable-basic-authentication-in-exchange-online
- troubleshoot client access rules
- troubleshoot issues with modern authentication
- troubleshoot Outlook on the Web (OWA) sign in issues
- troubleshoot auto-discover issues
- outlook client cannot connect to Exchange Online mailbox
- https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/exchange/troubleshoot/outlook-issues/office-365-troubleshooting-resources
- https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/exchange/troubleshoot/outlook-issues/connection-to-microsoft-exchange-is-unavailable-error
- https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/exchange/troubleshoot/outlook-issues/outlook-connectivity-issues-when-spi-enabled-on-router
- troubleshoot Outlook continuously asking for Exchange Online password
Troubleshoot calendaring Issues
- review and analyze mailbox and calendar diagnostic logs
- troubleshoot broken manager/delegation issues
- troubleshoot Resource Booking Assistant issues
Troubleshoot calendar sharing issues
- troubleshoot permissions issues related to calendar sharing
- troubleshoot issues publishing and accessing calendars shared with external users
- determine why content for a published calendar is not up to date
Troubleshoot issues with mobile devices
- identify mobile device access states and what the states indicate
- review mobile devices statistics to confirm the reason for a block
- review the Allow Blocked Quarantine (ABQ) list to identify blocked or quarantined
devices - troubleshoot Exchange device access rules
- review and interpret ActiveSync logs to troubleshoot Outlook Sync EAS connection
issues - troubleshoot connectivity issues with native ActiveSync
Troubleshoot Exchange Online configuration issues (15–20%)
Troubleshoot provisioning issues
- interpret and troubleshoot validation errors encountered during object provisioning
- determine when to restore or recover an inactive mailbox
- https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/compliance/inactive-mailboxes-in-office-365?view=o365-worldwide
- https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/compliance/recover-an-inactive-mailbox?view=o365-worldwide
- https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/compliance/restore-an-inactive-mailbox?view=o365-worldwide
- troubleshoot issues managing resource mailboxes
- troubleshoot issues purging deleted users
Troubleshoot recipient issues
- troubleshoot automatic email forwarding
- https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/turn-on-or-off-automatic-forwarding-in-outlook-com-6246987c-6c8f-4144-b255-14fc07007dad
- https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/topic/45aa9664-4911-4f96-9663-ece42816d746
- https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/security/office-365-security/external-email-forwarding?view=o365-worldwide
- troubleshoot matching issues with Azure AD
- troubleshoot distribution list membership issues (including dynamic distribution groups)
- https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/exchange/troubleshoot/mailflow/emails-not-delivered-dynamic-distribution-group
- https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/exchange/troubleshoot/groups-and-distribution-lists/cannot-manage-group-synced-from-on-premises
- https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/exchange/troubleshoot/groups-and-distribution-lists/dynamic-distribution-group-members-not-receive-emails
- troubleshoot issues with archive mailboxes including auto-expanding archive mailboxes
- https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/office365/troubleshoot/archive-mailboxes/mailbox-full-warning-though-not-reached-quota?view=o365-worldwide
- https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/compliance/enable-archive-mailboxes?view=o365-worldwide
- https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/compliance/enable-autoexpanding-archiving?view=o365-worldwide
Troubleshoot org-wide settings
- troubleshoot domain setup and configuration issues
- troubleshoot address book policies
- troubleshoot address lists
- troubleshoot allowed file types
- troubleshoot mailbox plans
- troubleshoot Client-Access Services (CAS) mailbox plans
Troubleshoot public folder Issues
- troubleshoot Exchange Online access to public folders
- troubleshoot mail-enabled public folders
- troubleshoot issues sending email to public folders
- troubleshoot hybrid access to public folders
- troubleshoot load-balancing issues for public folders
Troubleshoot hybrid and migration issues (10–15%)
Troubleshoot hybrid configuration issues
- troubleshoot Hybrid Configuration Wizard issues
- troubleshoot hybrid mail flow issues
- troubleshoot free/busy issues for hybrid deployments
- https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/exchange/troubleshoot/calendars/hybird-free-busy-diagnostic
- https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/exchange/troubleshoot/calendars/cannot-view-freebusy-information-for-remote-user
- https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/exchange/troubleshoot/calendars/cannot-access-freebusy-info-of-non-internet-facing-ad-site
- troubleshoot issues synchronizing remote recipient attributes with Exchange Online
Troubleshoot migration issues
- troubleshoot endpoint creation issues
- review migration users and move requests
- troubleshoot slow migrations
- troubleshoot Data Consistency Score (DCS) issues
- troubleshoot failed migrations
- troubleshoot public folder migration issues
MS-220 Microsoft Learn Paths
Microsoft learning paths are designed to give you full and in-depth resources to study for the exam in question and in our case for the MS-220 exam (troubleshooting Exchange online).
Microsoft has not officially released a dedicated training path for the MS-220 exam yet however I have collated a list of related paths which will aid towards your study for this exam.
Summary
Thank you for taking the time to ready my MS-220 exam study guide for troubleshooting Exchange online. I hope this guide has helped you prepare to take and pass the exam!
Some other posts you may find helpful with the MS-220 exam and other Azure exams!
- Complete Azure Training and Online Learning Guide
- Use the Microsoft Exam Sandbox to Prepare for Microsoft Exams
- Use these Azure labs for hands-on learning
- Reschedule Microsoft Exams | Everything You Need to Know
- How to get Free Azure Services directly from Microsoft
- What is the true Microsoft Azure Certification Cost
