As I start to delve into the world of Microsoft’s Azure cloud, and being what it seems to be an IT certification hoarder, I’ve decided to take the beginner level AZ-900: Microsoft Azure Fundamentals Exam to start my Azure certification journey. The exam is equivalent to the AWS Certified Cloud Practitioner and the cloud neutral certification CompTIA Cloud Essentials+, both of which I have. Since I’m completely new Azure, this served as a perfect starting point to start learning this awesome public cloud. I’ve recently started a new job that requires me to have extensive Azure skills, so I’ve been using the platform professionally for just under a month. The exam preparation was literally my introduction to Azure.

For the study material, Microsoft offers some really good self-paced training for the exam, free of charge. In addition, I also used the Udemy AZ-900: Microsoft Azure Fundamentals Exam Prep course. Given that the exam objectives are regarding the core Azure services at a high-level, I think these two training materials are more than sufficient for anyone who already knows another cloud platform like AWS, and wants to have the core foundational knowledge to be successful in Azure and pass the AZ-900 exam.

The exam itself was recently updated a few days ago, so I studied using the old exam objects. I did, however reviewed the changes and made sure I was completely familiar with the changes. Thus said, this has to be the most easiest IT certification exam that I’ve taking so far, it was also the shortest. I finished the exam in about 35 minutes!

This is just the beginning, my goal is to obtain the Microsoft Certified: Azure Administrator Associate and Microsoft Certified: Azure Developer Associate by the end of this year. Both of which will be much more difficult to obtain.