5 DevOps Certs You Should Earn in 2024

DevOps is a constantly shifting sector of the IT world. If you ask twenty different techs what DevOps is, you could get twenty different answers. However, one of the most significant commonalities between those answers will always be automation. Therein lies the difficulty of defining DevOps. Automation means a lot of different things.

The five certifications below will be essential for the DevOps community in the future. Each focuses on automation in one way or another. So, keep reading and find out why these are 5 DevOps certs you should earn in 2024. 

1. Terraform Associate

Terraform is a monolithic IaaS management application. Again, a big part of DevOps is automation. In today’s world, that means automating the cloud. Terraform helps deploy cloud-based infrastructure quickly, relying on “blueprints” created by engineers while doing the heavy lifting itself. 

Another prominent feature of Terraform is its ability to deploy and connect different cloud resources. Terraform can handle spinning up a VM in EC2 and connecting it to blob storage in Azure, while GCP powers the serverless compute resources for this mythical application. It does all that while keeping inventory of your currently deployed assets and uncovering which vendor’s product you’re no longer using. 

Point blank, if you’re going to be a DevOps engineer, you need to learn Terraform, and earning the Terraform Associate certification is a great way to show your expertise in the solution.

See also: 3 Reasons DevOps Pros Need to Learn Terraform.

2. Microsoft Certified: DevOps Engineer Expert

Microsoft Azure is the second largest cloud vendor in the world, and its market share is growing. Azure has made some significant strides in the DevOps area, too. 

Increasingly, organizations will want and need DevOps engineers with experience working in Azure, and this certification can prove you are up to the challenge. If you are interested in learning how to use Azure DevOps, check out this CBT Nuggets training that thoroughly covers the concepts of DevOps, containers, CI/CD, infrastructure as code, and source control.

3. AWS Certified DevOps Engineer – Professional

AWS is the largest cloud vendor, and Amazon isn’t likely to lose its crown anytime soon. The industry entry certification for any new DevOps engineer is the AWS Certified DevOps certification. 

A primary concern with using AWS is controlling costs because AWS can get expensive quickly. The devil is in their pricing details. For instance, deploying a static website to S3 might seem cheap, but egress fees can pile up quickly for popular websites with high monthly traffic. Understanding how to use AWS in the DevOps world while controlling costs is an invaluable skill set. 

Another concern is implementing the right product. AWS offers the most diverse collection of cloud products compared to any other vendor. There are thirty different ways to do the same thing, and DevOps engineers must understand which product best fits their use case. Solidify your AWS knowledge with this certification and other AWS certifications. 

4. CompTIA Cybersecurity Analyst

It’s projected that cybersecurity will be the fastest-growing area in IT over the next decade. And businesses are already struggling to find qualified cybersecurity analysts. 

What does this have to do with DevOps? Again, DevOps means automation. You’ll need to understand every aspect of cybersecurity you can to lockdown automation processes, and the CompTIA Cybersecurity Analyst is an excellent foundational certification for that. Everything you need to know to earn the CompTIA Cybersecurity Analyst cert can be applied to DevOps and other aspects of IT services. 

Prepare for the CompTIA CySA+ (CS0-002) exam with this online training. 

5. Kubernetes Security Specialist

DevOps engineers should strive to learn anything security-related to any tools or cloud vendors they use, and the Kubernetes Security Specialist is a perfect example. Since Kubernetes may experience a market boost in the next few years, DevOps engineers need to understand how to secure their clusters. 

Our Certified Kubernetes Security Specialist (CKS) Online Training can prepare you to minimize microservice vulnerabilities and set up and harden Kubernetes clusters.

Ready to Learn DevOps?

We’ve given you five DevOps certifications to earn in 2024. This is far from an exhaustive list, but earning any of these certifications will make you invaluable in the DevOps world.

CBT Nuggets offers a variety of DevOps training to help you prepare for these certifications and others. Not a CBT Nuggets subscriber? Sign up for a one-week no-strings-attached trial to see what we offer!