This disclosure generally relates to systems, devices, apparatuses, products, and methods for wireless communication. A communication system may include a user equipment (UE) that receives a configuration for contention-free random access (CFRA) and a configuration for contention-based random access (CBRA). The UE determines a first random access resource. The first random access resource maps to one or more beams from a target base station. The UE determines a beam quality associated with the first random access resource. The UE initiates a random access request using the CFRA when the first random access resource is a contention-free resource, and the beam quality of the first random access resource is above a threshold beam quality. The UE initiates the random access request using the CBRA when the first random access resource is the contention-free resource, and the beam quality of the first random access resource is below the threshold beam quality.