29 Honest DevOps Architect Salaries
Over the last several years, a creeping change has overtaken software development. Companies everywhere now depend on DevOps architects to streamline software delivery, break down silos between development and operations, and accelerate product deployment cycles.
Companies are prepared to pay certified cloud architects a high salary because they merge development teams’ methods with workflows that include all other IT professionals.
If you’re a DevOps architect or want to be someday, you should know what you and your skills are worth. The salary a DevOps architect can expect changes drastically from city to city; some are paid in the low $100,000s, while others are paid north of $200,000.
Read on to learn what a competitive DevOps architect salary looks like, where you can find it, and how you can improve your odds of qualifying for the best ones.
What is a DevOps Architect?
A DevOps architect designs and implements structured solutions that integrate DevOps practices across an organization’s technical, operational, and organizational layers. Most come with years of hands-on experience—not just in DevOps roles like engineering, but also in software development or architecture.
While their technical skills in development, configuration, and automation are top-notch, what really sets DevOps architects apart are their leadership and communication abilities. They often lead major workflow changes without formal authority, which means they need to influence teams, align stakeholders, and drive transformation from within.
DevOps architects don’t just “do” DevOps—they live it. In software-focused organizations, they’re essential to reducing release errors, increasing automation, improving reliability, and accelerating deployment cycles. Unsurprisingly, salaries often hit six figures for these high-impact roles.
29 Real Salaries for DevOps Architects
It’s hard to find a competitive salary for any job, much less one that didn’t exist barely two decades ago. A DevOps architect’s salary can change based on many different factors: experience, industry, certifications, training, and, above all, where you work.
We’ve searched the internet for DevOps architects’ salaries. We found job postings in job markets nationwide, pulled job descriptions of DevOps architects in different states, and extracted data from salary-comparison websites. We gathered that together to provide a national snapshot of DevOps architects’ salaries and what those salaries look like on a state-by-state basis.
Almost everywhere we looked, the ranges we saw were so wide that one number didn’t do it justice. So rather than present you with only the average salary, we’ve also analyzed the numbers further and come up with a low-end average, high-end average, and overall average. We’ll start with national averages, but we’ll look at what training, experience, and certifications can move a cloud architect’s salary from the low end into the higher ranges. This data is from ZipRecruiter:
The national average salary for a DevOps Architect is $152,207.
The average high for a DevOps Architect is $174,500.
The average low for a DevOps Architect is $135,500.
As you look at the following chart of 29 cloud architect salaries, pay attention to where the national averages are especially different:
City | State | Low-end Average | Average | High-end Average |
Cleveland | OH | $108,500 | $121,400 | $135,000 |
Springfield | MO | $98,000 | $110,598 | $123,000 |
Columbus | GA | $98,489 | $110,261 | $122,817 |
Tallahassee | FL | $99,792 | $111,720 | $124,000 |
McAllen | TX | $95,800 | $107,255 | $119,000 |
Macon | GA | $99,800 | $111,733 | $124,000 |
Clarksville | TN | $100,600 | $112,629 | $125,000 |
Montgomery | AL | $99,000 | $110,501 | $123,000 |
Jackson | MS | $99,400 | $110,862 | $123,000 |
Mobile | AL | $101,000 | $113,640 | $126,000 |
Shreveport | LA | $102,000 | $114,279 | $127,000 |
Little Rock | AR | $100,000 | $112,473 | $126,000 |
Kansas City | KS | $108,000 | $122,831 | $135,000 |
Newport News | VA | $104,000 | $117,280 | $130,000 |
Rockford | IL | $107,000 | $120,333 | $134,000 |
Tucson | AZ | $105,000 | $118,897 | $131,000 |
Dallas | TX | $110,000 | $123,485 | $137,000 |
Providence | RI | $115,000 | $129,322 | $143,000 |
Chicago | IL | $115,000 | $128,582 | $143,000 |
Austin | TX | $110,000 | $123,982 | $137,000 |
Minneapolis | MN | $116,000 | $130,004 | $146,000 |
Bridgeport | CT | $126,000 | $140,854 | $157,000 |
Washington | DC | $123,000 | $138,057 | $153,000 |
Bellevue | WA | $123,000 | $137,803 | $153,000 |
Denver | CO | $113,000 | $127,735 | $141,000 |
Torrance | CA | $122,000 | $136,437 | $152,000 |
Paterson | NJ | $127,000 | $142,696 | $158,000 |
New York | NY | $129,000 | $145,696 | $161,000 |
San Francisco | CA | $123,000 | $155,899 | $173,000 |
Table data is from Salary.com’s Salary Calculator as of April 2025.
DevOps Architect Salary Trends: Where You Work Matters
DevOps architect salaries vary widely depending on location—and coastal cities still dominate the high end of the pay scale. San Francisco leads the pack with an eye-popping average salary of $155,899 and a high-end average of $173,000. New York, Paterson, and Bridgeport aren’t far behind, all offering six-figure averages and competitive top-end salaries.
These numbers highlight a key truth: location can make or break your earning potential. Cities with large tech footprints—especially on the coasts—tend to offer the highest pay. That’s partly because of the cost of living, but also because of the density of high-tech employers relying on DevOps expertise.
That said, you don’t have to live in Silicon Valley to earn a strong salary. Cities like Minneapolis ($130,004), Chicago ($128,582), and Dallas ($123,485) also offer competitive compensation. Even in traditionally lower-paying markets like Springfield, MO or Macon, GA, DevOps architects can still earn well into the six figures, with average salaries around $110,000–$112,000.
Another trend worth noting: salary range varies more in high-paying markets. San Francisco has a $50,000+ gap between low and high averages. Compare that to a market like Macon, where the range is just over $24,000. That suggests more volatility—and potentially more competition—at the top, while middle markets may offer more consistency.
The takeaway? If you’re open to relocating (or even just remote work with a coastal-based company), you could boost your paycheck significantly. And regardless of location, certifications and experience can push you toward the high end of the pay scale—sometimes by $30,000 or more.
4 Salary Considerations for DevOps Architects
DevOps architecture is one of the most challenging IT jobs. It’s even harder to describe a roadmap to making it a career. If you’re early in your career, you might be looking for the mile markers to aim for, and if you’re late in your career, maybe you want to convert your time and experience into a DevOps architect role. No matter where you find yourself, you should know how to become a DevOps architect and get into higher salary ranges.
Experience is one of the first things that determines a DevOps architect’s salary: you need breadth and depth to succeed. Certifications go a long way to proving and validating that experience, and DevOps architects with certain certifications get paid better salaries than their counterparts without certs. Of course, knowing the tools of the DevOps trade and the specific tools your company uses is crucial as well.
Experience Requirements for DevOps Architect
A DevOps architect is often one of the most highly valued members of an IT team because they bring a broad, cross-functional perspective rooted in real-world experience. They’ve often walked in the shoes of software developers, QA engineers, sysadmins, SREs, and cloud specialists—which makes them uniquely qualified to connect the dots across teams and technologies.
The software development life cycle is at the heart of a DevOps architect’s responsibilities. No matter what job experience a DevOps architect has, they must know how their organization defines the lifecycle. If the company has a CI/CD pipeline, they need to understand it thoroughly—if there is no CI/CD pipeline, they have to be prepared to implement one.
The position of a DevOps architect is made even more challenging because they’re usually responsible for championing a DevOps transformation at an organization, but not from a position of formal authority. In today’s environment, a DevOps architect must understand not just a company’s tech stack, but its culture, workflows, and business goals.
They're often tasked with driving transformation without formal authority, meaning their success depends on influence, not hierarchy. That requires exceptional communication and leadership skills, plus the ability to align both executives and frontline engineers around shared goals.
Top DevOps Tools Every Architect Should Know
The list of DevOps tools is constantly evolving—but a few key platforms consistently show up in job descriptions and high-paying roles. If you’re aiming for a top-tier DevOps architect salary, these are the tools and concepts to master:
GitHub
It’s tough to imagine a DevOps architect who doesn’t know what GitHub is, but maybe you’re just starting your career and haven’t run into a “git repo” yet. GitHub is the go-to platform for source control and collaboration, making it easy for teams to track changes, work together on code, and manage versioning cleanly and reliably.
Salary impact of GitHub on a DevOps architect’s salary: Huge. GitHub is foundational to modern DevOps workflows. A DevOps architect who can manage repositories, establish best practices, and guide teams in GitOps methodologies (like infrastructure as code stored in Git) is a major asset. Being able to teach GitHub usage and integrate it deeply into company workflows sets you apart.
Docker
Docker is a tool that packages an application along with all its dependencies into a neat, portable container. This means an app can run the same way everywhere—regardless of environment or operating system. For DevOps architects, knowing how to design, build, and deploy containers is key to building scalable, reliable systems.
Salary impact of knowing Docker: Huge. Docker isn’t optional—it’s standard. Without it (or equivalent experience), competing for the best-paying DevOps architect roles is tough. Companies expect you to know containerization inside and out, and Docker is still the most widely used tool in that space.
Kubernetes
Kubernetes is a container orchestration platform that helps teams deploy, scale, and manage containerized applications automatically. While Docker gets you a container, Kubernetes gets you a system. Load balancing, self-healing, rollbacks, monitoring—it all happens here.
Salary impact of Kubernetes on a DevOps architect’s salary: Huge. Kubernetes is now a must-have in the architect’s toolkit. Combined with Docker, it enables automated, scalable deployments across cloud and on-prem environments. Without Kubernetes knowledge, you’re likely to hit a salary ceiling fast.
Terraform (or Pulumi)
Terraform and Pulumi are modern infrastructure-as-code (IaC) tools that let DevOps architects define and manage cloud infrastructure using code. These tools bring consistency, repeatability, and automation to provisioning resources across providers like AWS, Azure, and GCP. Terraform is declarative, while Pulumi uses general-purpose languages like TypeScript or Python—choose your flavor.
Salary impact of Terraform or Pulumi on a DevOps architect’s salary: Considerable. Infrastructure-as-code is core to scaling modern systems. While Puppet and Chef were once the go-to tools, today’s companies want DevOps architects who can plan, write, and manage IaC workflows with tools like Terraform or Pulumi. Mastering either can unlock senior-level roles and bigger paychecks.
Jira
Jira started as a bug tracker but evolved into a flexible platform for agile project management. DevOps architects often use Jira to plan sprints, track deployments, and keep everyone on the same page—whether it’s Kanban, Scrum, or a hybrid model.
Salary impact of Jira on a DevOps architect’s salary: Considerable. Probably more important for a DevOps architect than knowing Jira backwards and forwards is knowing what Jira does and why. Jira is one of the best tools for what it does; however, it’s not perfect for every company. Justifying a high salary as a DevOps architect requires demonstrating judgment: choosing an alternative when it’s right and not forcing every problem into a Jira-sized hole.
6 Best Certifications for DevOps Architects
The term “DevOps” covers a lot of ground—from writing the first line of code to tearing down legacy infrastructure. A successful DevOps architect understands the full lifecycle and can speak the language of both development and operations. The right DevOps certifications prove you’ve mastered every step along the way.
AWS Certified DevOps Engineer — Professional
This AWS certification for DevOps Engineers straddles the two pillars of AWS’ certification track: Operations and Development. It validates a DevOps engineer’s ability to manage CI/CD systems, security, metrics, high availability, and automation on AWS.
Impact on a DevOps architect’s salary: Significant
Despite “engineer” being in the name, this is the AWS certification for DevOps architects. If your company uses AWS—or plans to—you’ll be expected to lead and design DevOps pipelines in that environment. This cert proves you're up to the task.
Microsoft Certified: DevOps Engineer Expert
This Microsoft certification focuses on implementing DevOps practices using Azure DevOps and other Microsoft tools. It covers collaboration, code, infrastructure, testing, source control, CI/CD, and feedback strategies.
Salary Impact: Significant
If your organization relies on Microsoft technologies, this cert is practically a requirement. DevOps architects with this certification bring the credibility and technical know-how to command higher salaries in Azure environments.
Google Cloud Professional DevOps Engineer
Google’s DevOps certification tests your ability to apply site reliability engineering (SRE) principles, build CI/CD pipelines, monitor systems, and ensure service performance using Google Cloud tools and services.
Salary impact: Considerable
Whether your company uses GCP today or may in the future, this cert demonstrates a broad and modern understanding of cloud-based DevOps practices. It also shows you’re ready to lead with tools like Cloud Build, Stackdriver, and Cloud Operations.
Cloud Native Computing Foundation Kubernetes Certifications
The Cloud Native Computing Foundation (CNCF) is part of the nonprofit Linux Foundation, and it has developed a series of certifications aimed at standardizing knowledge and use of Kubernetes.
There are three CNCF certifications for anyone who works in DevOps to choose from: Certified Kubernetes Administrator (CKA), Certified Kubernetes Application Developer (CKAD), and Certified Kubernetes Security Specialist (CKS). They’re not cheap. Each is $300, but having one or all demonstrates mastery of that area of Kubernetes.
Salary Impact: Considerable
Kubernetes is at the heart of modern DevOps, and these certifications show deep fluency. Even though they aren’t architect-specific, having at least one on your résumé makes you a go-to expert in any container-heavy shop.
What Type of Companies Need DevOps Architects?
Software development is where companies are hungriest for DevOps architects, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t many other industries willing to pay big salaries to hire one. Plus, many industries and companies are racing to model themselves as highly agile environments.
The thing that separates a DevOps architect from a DevOps engineer is often their mindset. DevOps is a workflow and a state of mind before it’s a set of tools. A DevOps architect who can convince a company to think differently about their entire workflow and then solve all the problems that come up in implementing it will find a good salary no matter where they look, not just in software.
Software Development Companies
DevOps and all of the productivity methodologies related to Agile are based on software development at their heart. The trend started, accelerated, and was popularized by the software industry, and it’s also the natural home of a DevOps architect. That also means it’s the most competitive field for a DevOps architect to seek work in.
Career impact of working in software development: Huge and complicated. We learned earlier that the most competitive job markets for a DevOps architect are also the ones most likely to pay the best salary, but this is a double-edged sword.
On the positive side, the salaries for a DevOps architect are likely to be a lot higher in the software development industry, plus most of the industry doesn’t have to be convinced about the value of DevOps. On the other hand, it might take far more training, certifications, and experience to differentiate yourself from other DevOps architects who’ve all come up in the software industry.
Hardware Manufacturers
DevOps may have cut its teeth in software, but hardware manufacturers were paying attention to it. Many of the same benefits and drawbacks exist in hardware manufacturers — they’re already familiar with DevOps, and it’s highly competitive. But there are substantial differences between the two. Hardware manufacturers ship physical objects that they can’t just roll back. A DevOps architect’s job in the hardware industry would feel pretty different from their software counterparts.
Career impact of working for hardware manufacturers: Big. The idea of Continuous Integration/Continuous Deployment (CI/CD) pipelines are exciting for many hardware manufacturers. Also, incorporating feedback into the design is an age-old problem in hardware, and DevOps architects who can promise a pipeline that makes more agile, responsive, and resilient hardware will receive high salaries for their trouble.
Content and Service Providers
The differences between a company like Adobe (a software developer), Hewlett-Packard/HP (a hardware manufacturer), and Netflix (a content platform) may seem like splitting hairs. Still, for a DevOps architect, they should look very distinct. A DevOps architect’s job is to spot places where a pipeline for automation, integration, and feedback can optimize the end product.
Content and service providers are constantly looking for that and need to scale their services upward and downward rapidly — in ways that hardware manufacturers and software developers often don’t. The best salaries for DevOps architects wait for those who can provide agility to a company no matter the industry.
Career impact of content and service providers: Significant. Service providers and content delivery platforms are still within the software/hardware ecosystem, so they can typically understand DevOps and offer a career path for DevOps architects. Some wish to take on a very agile problem-solving methodology, and a DevOps architect who can help plan and implement one for them can look forward to a great salary.
How to Increase Your Salary as a DevOps Architect
The career of a DevOps architect calls for creativity, curiosity, and the courage to challenge the status quo. Whether you're aiming to become one or are already in the role, the key to earning top salaries is understanding where DevOps fits—and where it should go next.
It's not just about knowing the tools; it’s about understanding why they matter and how to apply them strategically. While others focus on using tools, DevOps architects lead with vision, bridging development and operations with bold ideas and practical solutions.
They’re not just technical experts—they’re leaders, communicators, and problem-solvers. The path to a high-paying DevOps architect role is built on experience, but certifications can fast-track your journey by proving your expertise where it counts.
Want to learn more about DevOps? Check out the complete list of online DevOps courses on CBT Nuggets.
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