PfMP® tests portfolio management judgment: selecting and sequencing investments to match strategy, establishing governance and decision rights, monitoring portfolio health, managing portfolio-level risk, and communicating outcomes and trade-offs to stakeholders.
For the latest official exam details and requirements, see:
https://www.pmi.org/certifications/portfolio-management-pfmp
Official exam snapshot (PMI)
Source: PfMP Examination Content Outline.
- Items: 170 total
- Scored vs pretest: 150 scorable + 20 unscored pretest items (pretest items are dispersed throughout the exam)
- Format: multiple-choice
Official domain weights (PfMP)
PMI’s outline specifies the proportion of scored questions by domain:
| Domain | Weight | Target scored items (out of 150) |
|---|
| Strategic Alignment | 25% | 38 |
| Governance | 20% | 30 |
| Portfolio Performance | 25% | 38 |
| Portfolio Risk Management | 15% | 22 |
| Communications Management | 15% | 22 |
What questions tend to reward
- Strategy-to-investment traceability: decisions that clearly map to strategic priorities and constraints.
- Governance realism: clear decision rights, thresholds, and escalation paths (avoid “hero” decision-making).
- Portfolio health thinking: aggregation, trends, and trade-offs across many components (not single-project optimization).
- Systemic risk: dependency and correlation risks, reserve thinking, and risk ownership.
- Credible communications: accurate, consistent, stakeholder-appropriate reporting that enables decisions.
Common pitfalls
- Treating PfMP like “bigger PMP” (portfolios are about selecting/balancing investments and sustaining strategic alignment).
- Confusing outputs (deliverables) with outcomes (benefits/value).
- Optimizing one component while harming portfolio-level constraints (capacity, dependencies, strategic fit).
- Communicating activity instead of evidence (metrics, trends, benefits progress, decisions needed).
A practical prep loop
- Use the Syllabus as your checklist.
- After each task set, review the matching part of the Cheatsheet and write a short “miss log.”
- Do focused drills in Practice, then re-drill the objectives behind every miss.
- Finish with mixed sets that blend strategy, governance, performance, risk, and communications scenarios.
Official references used for this syllabus
The learning objectives are derived from the PfMP Examination Content Outline plus PMI standards and practice guides (The Standard for Portfolio Management, PMBOK®/Standard for Project Management, and Benefits Realization guidance).