Cpher

For senior Linux/automation roles in regulated industries, RHCSA → RHCE pathway often preferred over LPIC-2 due to enterprise vendor backing + hands-on credibility.

Coursera GCP DevOps specialization standard prep. SRE Book + SRE Workbook references heavily — read them. Hands-on with Cloud Build + Cloud Deploy + GKE essential.

For bug bounty hunters / web app pentesters, CBBH + BSCP the modern budget-friendly stack. CWEE the natural HTB next step for advanced web exploitation.

Compared to BSCP: CBBH broader scope (more report-writing, longer exam, more diverse vulnerabilities). BSCP cheaper. Both gaining strong HR recognition in 2024-25.

$400 USD exam fee. Elastic's own training courses (~$1,500-$3,000) cited as standard prep. Self-funders often use free Elastic docs + community resources but report longer prep timelines.

Elastic's pro-tier cert. 3-hour hands-on performance-based exam against real Elasticsearch cluster. Heavy on cluster admin, indexing strategies, search optimization, security. Strong technical respect.

For ELK / observability / search-engine specialists, this is the most-respected vendor cert. 2-year validity. Particularly valued in shops running Elastic at scale (logging, SIEM, search).

Performance-based exam means you actually configure Elasticsearch — pure book study insufficient. Many candidates report needing 100+ hours hands-on with Elasticsearch / Kibana / Beats.

$200 fee, 2-year recert. PCA + PDE + PDE-Ops the pro-tier GCP infrastructure trifecta. Smaller hiring market than AWS but premium pay in SRE-mature shops.

For SOC analysts in Splunk-heavy enterprises (Fortune 500, finance, healthcare), this is the entry credential. Power User → Admin → Architect the progression for senior Splunk engineers.