Which Azure Certification is Your perfect fit?

Clearing Certification on latest technology may turn out to be a game changer for your career. Especially, when it comes to Azure Certifications, which not only adds a weight-age to your resume in general. But also helps you to add a few extra bucks in your hourly charges.

Why read this article?

When we have already entered into the year 2020, many corporate companies highly recommend their employees to clear Azure Certifications this year. Moreover, we have seen major changes with the certification path and exams by Microsoft in last one year. If you are also one of them who is willing to get certified in Microsoft Azure. But somehow feeling confused about which certification and badge is perfect, for them this article is a must read.

For more than a decade now, providing official trainings on Microsoft Technologies to many people. Here, I have decided to share some of my key learning with the latest certification tracks available for Microsoft Azure. Furthermore, I will try to add maximum certification information in this article for all of you. And, I promise to keep you updated with all the happenings around Microsoft Azure certification.

Clarification

Microsoft has created Role Based Certification path for different Job Roles. For those who want to see list of all the Role based certification that it is available here. In this article, we are going to focus only on Microsoft Azure related Certifications. We will also discuss about Role based Certification. Not only that, I will give my extra inputs on each exam details along with it. Above all, I will also give you an elaborated guidance upon how to prepare and pass a particular certification exam. If you have already decided a particular certification track and only interested in how to prepare for exam. I highly recommend you to go through another article on Azure Certifications preparation which covers 20 days road map plan to be Azure Certified.

Primarily, Microsoft Azure certifications are based on Job Roles. It has specially designed levels for each certification exams denoted by the exam code. To understand this properly and make a decision about a particular exam you have to understand only two rules.

Rule Number 1

You should take certification based on your Job Role and Years of Experience in that Job role. 

 If you have less than 3 years of experience and working as an application developer then obviously you should not try for AZ-300 and AZ-301 exams. In spite of that you should go with AZ-204 exam.

Rule Number 2

Focus on the exam code number which indirectly shows complexity of that exam like… 

AZ-104 is the easiest exam to clear (Level 100) 

AZ-204 is bit more complex than Level 100 exams (Level 200)

AZ-400 will be even more complex and advanced 

That’s the reason Microsoft has categorized certifications in three different categories as per this official link : Certification Overview To understand this even a bit easier way, let’s take a look at below table which shows list of azure certifications based on Job roles.

There are Exam Badges which you will get once you clear any of the above certification. 

Moreover, getting a particular Badge is also an important factor. You can proudly showcase the badge you achieve with others. So, for now you can pick one from the above table that match with your Job role but do not hurry. 

The world of IT is full of opportunities and that’s why you should choose your certification track wisely. As there may be chances that few exams you consider to be a perfect match for you now can be a game-changer for you in the future. Means it can be perfect for your future designation.

Connected Exams

There are many exams which are connected like AZ-300 and AZ-301. To be more specific, first you need to clear AZ-300 and once you clear it then only you can appear for AZ-301 (logically). Above all, on clearing both the certification you become eligible to get the certification badge with stars. And that particular badge entitles you as : Microsoft Certified Azure Solutions Architect Expert

Note : You can get your badge from Acclaim that manages all of your badges and provides it to you when you earn it.

To understand full certification path, you can go through official link provided in each exam. You can then check if that is connected to any other exam or not. Apart from that, you can check which title and badge you will get through it.

Badges

As we discussed earlier in Certification Overview, there are different levels of certifications and it is categorized like following

And when once you clear exam and get the badge from Acclaim. This is something it will be visible in your badge when you earn. For example, here I am showing you here my two-star badge and three start badge which I got last year after clearing Azure architect and Azure Security exams.

Azure Certifications - Let’s Dive into it

Now, if you do not have any experience in technical things. And just a business user associated with cloud technologies then Microsoft has AZ-900 for you which is a very entry level certification. I do not recommend this to any technical person not even tech students.

For those people who have 0 to 3 years of experience in IT field. If they are looking to explore cloud technologies or willing to make career in azure technology. My best advice would be to start with fundamental azure certifications are for you only like AZ-104, AZ-120 and AZ-204.

People having 4+ years of experience and have some exposure to Azure Cloud or other popular cloud technology like GCP and AWS. I highly recommend to go for certification that are associated with AZ-104, AZ-204 and then continue with AZ-300, AZ-400 & DP-200.

Finally, now if you have enough exposure in your field. And that we can count you as a subject matter expert for your work then its better to opt advance level certification like DP-201, AZ-301, and AZ-500.

Important Piece from Azure Training

Deciding certification exam is one thing and preparing for that certification exam in a right way is another thing.

“Making a Decision is a first step towards success”

Now, that you have decided one exam code it is for sure that you are going to be a azure certified very soon. Let me help you with some more useful information about the certification. This piece of information usually I share with my corporate audience when I train them on a particular certification exam. Even after going through all the information mentioned here, you are finding it difficult. You can always reach out to me through any of the medium mentioned in my profile section for any certification exam.

You will find many awesome azure tutorials on Mentor’s Tag website. Also, if you are interested in online trainings dedicated for Azure Certifications for your career. We take a pride in saying that we are one of those few Azure training providers that guarantee for ideal results in Azure Certification. BUT, if you decide that you want to prepare by yourself only in a self-learning mode then here I have few useful tips for you.

1.  Every azure certification exam page is having and skills document available in that.

1. If you have a question from where you can start preparing for these exams then you must start from Azure Learning path. But I never advice that by only using learning path you can clear the certification exam. So, if you are thinking that by following this learning path you will clear the exams then sorry to say that's a day dreaming. But I am sure you will get clear understanding of all the useful topics and azure tutorials form this which will super interesting.