Ask HN: Are AWS certs worth it in 2021?

23 points by el_dev_hell 4 years ago | 16 comments

Interested to hear some perspectives.

Bonus points for your thoughts in the below situations:

1. You pay 100% of the cert price out of pocket.

2. Your employer matches 30% of the price (you pay the other 70% yourself).

mooreds 4 years ago |

Are they worth it in terms of "get this cert and you'll be hired"? Almost never, though I think if you get the advanced certs (security, networking) it might open some doors. Those ones are hard! (At least that is what I hear.)

Are they worth it in terms of forcing you to study and learn a broad swath of an important technology ecosystem? Well, would you do it without the cert? You might, but having a test to study for helps focus my efforts. This is the source of most of the value for the associate certs, in my experience. AWS is so sprawling, so even knowing that something exists is valuable. And studying for a cert can force you to learn that.

Are they a differentiator for you? Depends on your experience level, the job type, and the competition.

Context: I taught AWS courses for a while a few years back and held 4 certs at one time. Now I just have one (Solutions Architect, Associate), that I've renewed a couple of times.

cutthegrass2 4 years ago | |

This is exactly the view I hold too.

I viewed them as a guided learning curriculum to keep me focused whilst learning AWS. Otherwise, i'd have drifted off down deep rabbit holes playing with some of the more exotic services and missed the 'boring' but most useful services to learn about.

Have previously held, CDA and SAA but haven't bothered renewing them.

twalla 4 years ago |

Cop out answer: It depends.

I've never cared about certs when hiring and have never really had it come up or be a big deal when interviewing - it's only ever gotten the attention of recruiters or old school companies that I never really had an interest in to begin with. The real purpose of the certs is for consultancies to say "we have x number of AWS certified engineers available for your task" and then depending on the number of certs associated with that entity, AWS will send them more/bigger leads.

I'd take the time you would spend cramming for the cert and study pretty much anything else that interested you and take the money and buy yourself a nice bottle of wine or a fancy dinner.

lfoooo 4 years ago |

In the past (~2016) I did the solutions architect associate and received many invites because of it...

After that, I founded a startup that didn't go well and I'm planning to return to the market in the next months (as swe or devops/sre) and in my preparation plan is, besides other things (practice algorithm, systems design...), take some certs:

- SOA-C02 - AWS SysOps Administrator - Associate (passed last month)

- DOP-C01 - AWS DevOps Engineer - Professional (exam in December)

- CKA - Certified Kubernetes Administrator (Jan/Feb?)

All out of my pocket. I don't think this makes a huge technical difference, but it open doors, the process is great to learn and I also want to be prepared for future interviews, maybe a MANGA/FAANG? :)

908B64B197 4 years ago |

Unless the employer pays for 100% of it, it's not worth the time or the money.

A nice undergrad and previous experience at interesting companies is a much better signal.

cityzen 4 years ago |

I would say if you use AWS daily, yes. At the very least it gives you some baseline knowledge.

If you do not use AWS daily and it's not something that you feel you're lacking, it may be a bit overwhelming.

I used the Solutions Architect Assoc. as a stepping stone to get out of web dev. It was a slow process but it set the wheels in motion and I no longer do web dev. I'm currently studying for the DevOps Pro but not in a huge rush.

awsthrow 4 years ago |

I’m not sure if they have enough cachet to immediately yield ROI from job offers, etc. But I do believe they can offer enormous ROI for increasing your skill as a cloud architect. I used AWS for years before doing any certs and my learning from the certs was easily 10x+ what I learned stumbling through it myself. So I highly recommend them. (Disclaimer - I work for AWS.)

josh_fyi 4 years ago |

There is a counter-signaling effect. The people who are so good that they do not need a certification to prove themselves, do not get one.

So getting one is a signal that you have something to prove.

That said, it's good for juniors who really do have something to prove.

And consultancies like to show lists of certifications of their employees.

warrenm 4 years ago | |

> The people who are so good that they do not need a certification to prove themselves, do not get one.

Alternatively, they get it "just because they can"

giantg2 4 years ago |

I think the contract incentivizes companies to have certified individuals. So it's a benefit to the company.

If the company doesn't pay for it, I wouldn't do it.

holonomically 4 years ago |

I don't know if it's worth it or not. I guess it depends on who finds these certificates valuable. If you have the time and inclination then I think it would be better to get coursera and udacity degrees/certificates than anything vendor specific.

I took a few networking and quantum computation classes on coursera and they were really good.

orsenthil 4 years ago |

It is good for your learning. If you can cash it, earn-it and learn-it.

pibefision 4 years ago |

Yes, it will help you to differentiate from the rest. Some exams are quite good (AWS Sysops includes labs now).

quickthrower2 4 years ago |

Your company would be foolish not to pay.

muzani 4 years ago | |

Why? They pay for the training, but not the certs, but they know who did the training.

quickthrower2 4 years ago | | |

For a small cost they encourage people to do the certs and by doing that their knowledge is consolidated. Their staff get better for a tiny price.