While I have been using Azure for almost 10 years I have never gone through the process to get certified in Azure until this year.
Starting in March 2023 I completed the AZ-900 which was the basics of Azure and on June 16th I completed AZ-305 to complete the certification. The AZ-900 This is similar to the AWS Certified Cloud Practitioner exam. With the passing of my AZ-305 exam which completed the Expert Microsoft Certified Azure Solutions Architect Expert cert.
For all my Microsoft Azure exams, my primary education outside of hand-on experience was from John Savill’s YouTube. I listened to them on 2x and ran through each video once then went and took the test.
I completed the following exams and certifications on my path to get the Azure Solutions Architect Expert.
- March 3rd – MS-900 – Microsoft 365 Fundamentals – I know this wasn’t required but I took it to practice taking the tests
- March 20th – AZ-900 – Microsoft Azure Fundamentals
- March 29th – SC-900 – Microsoft Certified: Security, Compliance, and Identity Fundamentals
- March 31st – AZ-104 – Microsoft Azure Administrator
- April 24th – AZ-500 – Microsoft Azure Security Technologies
- June 16th – AZ-305 – Designing Microsoft Azure Infrastructure Solutions
You can see that I took a number of them really quickly back to back. I was able to do this because of my hands-on experience over the last decade of being within the Azure organization and building solutions within Azure daily.
I was able to pass 100% with AZ-104 being the one I got the lowest store on because I didn’t study at all for it.
For those who want to get the same certification I recommend you use things like
- John Savill’s YouTube
- PluralSight
- and even your public library
- Seattle Public Library has Oreilly Books which can include some online videos
Good luck to you!