350-801 CLCOR Lab Guide 2026: Two Labs, Not One
A quarter of this exam moved to the cloud in February, and that quarter is the only part you can lab for nothing. The rest needs a server and a contract.
- 350-801Exam
- 120 minTime
- $400Fee
- 6Domains
- Webex sandboxCheapest lab
- 48 GB hostRAM needed
Table of Contents
The minimum lab
If your study material lists Call Control at 25% and a QoS domain at 10%, throw it away - that is v1.1 and it stopped being testable on 2 February 2026. The v2.0 blueprint has six differently named domains, On-Premises Call Control jumped to 30%, and there is a new Cloud and Hybrid Services domain worth 25% that is largely Webex Calling and Control Hub. That restructure is good news for your wallet: the new quarter of the exam is the only part with a genuinely free lab, while the on-premises part still wants a server and, more painfully, a Cisco service contract to download the software at all.
One Publisher and no Subscriber halves the memory and costs you only cluster failover practice, which the blueprint touches lightly. A second CUBE configured back to back as a pretend carrier is the cheapest credible PSTN and lets you practise trunk redundancy, DNS SRV and translation rules without buying numbers. The Windows box is not optional filler - LDAP sync, DNS SRV records and NTP are examinable, and Cisco's own free sandbox ships one for exactly that reason.
Where to build it
Split the decision the way the blueprint now splits: an on-premises platform for 75% of the paper, and a cloud organisation for the other 25%.
| Platform | Good enough? | Cost | What decides it |
|---|---|---|---|
| Webex Developer Sandbox | Yes | $0 | The single best free unlock here. It gives you administrator access to a licensed Webex organisation through Control Hub, which is the whole new 25% domain. |
| VMware ESXi on a used server | Yes | Used hardware | The only supported hypervisor for the Collaboration applications, and the only path that runs current releases. |
| Cisco DevNet Sandbox | Version-locked | $0 | A free sandbox bundles a Call Manager with Emergency Responder and a Windows AD server - but at version 14, not 15. The sandbox platform is also mid-rebuild. |
| Cisco dCloud | Tiered access | $0 with an account | Free with a Cisco account, but content is gated by access level - a plain guest account can only join sessions someone else shares. |
| EVE-NG / KVM / Proxmox | Old versions | $0 | Works up to Call Manager 14SU1 and breaks after it, because Cisco removed KVM support. A real option only if you deliberately lab an older release. |
| CML / GNS3 | No | - | Wrong tool. These applications are VM appliances, not router images. Use CML only for the gateway and the surrounding routing. |
Do not build a Collaboration lab around a network emulator. Build it around a hypervisor, and put the gateway in the emulator only if that is where the rest of your practice already lives.
Images and horsepower
The published per-application minimums, which are what your host has to add up to.
| Component | What it is | Where it comes from |
|---|---|---|
| Unified Communications Manager 15 | Call control - 30% of the exam | 2 vCPU and 10 GB on release 15; the 14 profile is 6 GB, which is why labbing 14 is cheaper |
| Unity Connection | Voicemail and message waiting | 2 vCPU and 10 GB on release 15 |
| IM and Presence | Presence and messaging | 1 vCPU and 6 GB on release 15 |
| Catalyst 8000V as CUBE | The gateway and session border controller | Carries the CUBE feature set; 4 GB is enough for plain CUBE |
| Windows Server | Active Directory, DNS, NTP and DHCP | Examinable in its own right under Infrastructure and Design |
| Webex App | The softphone the blueprint now names | Free. Note v2.0 dropped Jabber and Skinny from the objectives |
An all-release-15 stack is about 30 GB of guest memory before the gateway and the Windows box, so 48 GB is the practical host figure and 64 GB is comfortable. An all-release-14 stack is about 18 GB, which is the single biggest lever you have - and a legitimate one, because the concepts are identical. Use SSD storage: these are appliance installers with long install times.
The build list
Work top to bottom. Each step is a thing you build and then break on purpose, and each one is tagged with the blueprint domain it covers, so by the end you have touched the parts of the syllabus a lab can reach.
Stand up AD, DNS and NTP firstInfrastructure 15%
DNS SRV records, forward and reverse zones, NTP. Nothing else installs cleanly without them, and they are examinable in their own right rather than being setup overhead.
Install the Publisher and sync users from LDAPOn-Prem Call Control 30%
One Publisher, no Subscriber. Get LDAP sync and authentication working, then build partitions, calling search spaces and translation patterns until dial-plan logic is second nature. This is the biggest domain on the paper.
Register the Webex App and place a callProtocols and Endpoints 10%
Onboard with activation codes rather than hunting for a physical phone. v2.0 names the Webex App on desktop and mobile and drops Jabber, so this is the endpoint the exam means.
Add voicemail and presenceOn-Prem Call Control 30%
SIP trunk Unity Connection to the Publisher, prove message waiting lights, then bring IM and Presence up as a subscriber to the same cluster.
Put two gateways back to back and pretend to be a carrierGateways and SBCs 10%
One CUBE faces Call Manager, the other plays the provider. Now you can practise dial peers, translation rules, trunk redundancy and DNS SRV without buying a single number.
Do the whole cloud domain in the free sandboxCloud and Hybrid 25%
Locations, numbers, trunks and route groups, dial plans, call permissions, directory sync and role-based access - all of it inside Control Hub, all of it free. Note the verbs: this domain says Configure, not Describe.
What you can and cannot lab
Cisco publishes the domain weightings but not the number of items or the passing score, so treat the percentages as how the paper is built rather than as a target. The column that matters here is the last one.
| Domain | Weight | Labbable | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Infrastructure and Design | 15% | Partly | TODO |
| Protocols and Endpoints | 10% | Partly | TODO |
| On-Premises Call Control | 30% | Partly | TODO |
| Voice Gateways and Session Border Controllers | 10% | Partly | TODO |
| Cloud and Hybrid Services | 25% | Partly | TODO |
| Media and QoS | 10% | Partly | TODO |
The walls you will hit
The wall on this exam is not licensing. It is getting the software at all.
Cannot be labbed at home
- You need a service contract to download the software. The Collaboration application installers require a contract associated with your Cisco account, and contracts come through an account team, a partner or a reseller. There is no public trial download. This blocks more home labs than any technical requirement.
- Current releases will not run on KVM. Cisco removed KVM support after 14SU1, so the free-hypervisor route caps you at an older release and current versions need ESXi.
- No hardware transcoding. The virtual gateway supports software media termination only - no DSP farm, no hardware transcoding. That needs a physical router with a DSP module.
- No real carrier and no real phones. Back-to-back gateways simulate a provider well enough for dial-plan work, but number portability, emergency calling and phone hardware behaviour such as power negotiation and phone VLAN assignment need the real thing.
- Licensing beyond the evaluation window. Call Manager runs fully in demonstration mode for a 90-day evaluation, after which you keep what you configured but cannot add devices or users.
Read the walls against the weights and a plan appears. The 25% cloud domain is free and unblocked, so do it first and do it thoroughly. The 30% call-control domain needs the software, so solve the contract question early or use the version-locked free sandbox. Everything left is small, and two of those small domains are largely conceptual.
A lab proves you can build it. Questions prove you can pass.
The blueprint is only half the exam — the other half is answering under a clock. Start with the free question sets, then $5.99 unlocks the full 350-801 CLCOR bank.
Free 350-801 CLCOR practice test350-801 CLCOR exam pageFAQ
What changed in CLCOR v2.0?
Everything about the domain structure. The last date to test v1.1 was 2 February 2026. v2.0 has six domains: Infrastructure and Design 15%, Protocols and Endpoints 10%, On-Premises Call Control 30%, Voice Gateways and Session Border Controllers 10%, Cloud and Hybrid Services 25%, and Media and QoS 10%. The cloud domain is new, and it uses Configure verbs rather than Describe. Jabber and Skinny were dropped in favour of the Webex App.
Can I lab Cisco Collaboration for free?
A quarter of it, genuinely. A free Webex Developer Sandbox gives you administrator access to a licensed Webex organisation through Control Hub, which covers the new 25% Cloud and Hybrid Services domain outright. The on-premises applications need a service contract to download, which is the real barrier.
Can I run Call Manager on Proxmox or EVE-NG instead of ESXi?
Only older releases. The install works up to 14SU1 and fails from 14SU2 and release 15 onward because Cisco removed KVM support. ESXi is the only supported hypervisor, and it is what current releases require.
How much RAM does a CLCOR lab need?
About 30 GB of guest memory for a release-15 stack of Call Manager, Unity Connection, IM and Presence and a gateway, so plan a 48 GB host. A release-14 stack is about 18 GB and fits in 32 GB, and the concepts are identical - that version choice is the biggest lever you have.
Sources
Exam facts come from Cisco. Lab guidance is marked as official or as practitioner consensus where the two differ:
- https://learningcontent.cisco.com/documents/marketing/exam-topics/350-801-CLCOR-v2.0-new.pdf
- https://www.cisco.com/site/us/en/learn/training-certifications/exams/clcor.html
- https://developer.webex.com/admin/docs/developer-sandbox-guide
- https://www.cisco.com/site/us/en/learn/training-certifications/exams/policies.html
Checked September 5, 2026. Cisco revises exam topics and changes image licensing without notice — confirm before you spend anything.