Top Microsoft Certifications

Microsoft, a pioneer in the IT industry, is playing a crucial role in filling out the existing skill gap in the IT industry with its content-rich, updated, and industry-focused certifications. Regardless of the type of the certificate, it will be proved as a game-changer for your career. Because a Microsoft certified professional is known as a master of a certain domain, the recruiter headhunts for such IT professionals and prefers them over others. Hence, time, money, and effort invested in earning any Microsoft designation will pay an IT enthusiast in the long run.

What Is It to Be Microsoft Certified?

Microsoft offers a wide range of certifications helping IT professionals and developers to validate inherited skills and hone them a little further. Each designation, however, can be earned via passing the linked exams. Whether you’re a beginner or a pro, this certification vendor has something to offer and empower you. All in all, getting any Microsoft certificate allows an aspirant to gain mastery of the related Microsoft skills and stand out from the crowd. When earned at the career beginning, a Microsoft certification will help you have smooth career commencement. In-service professionals can use it to come out from the mid-career crisis, climb up the career ladder, and obtain updated skills. As Microsoft products have deeper market penetration and have gained a presence in almost every big IT firm, earning a corresponding designation allows a candidate to aim higher, which will not only turn him/her into an asset but also increases his/her market worth. A certified specialist can earn as much as double in the same job role when compared with a non-certified individual.

Thus, currently, the certifications from Microsoft are divided into the following ones:

• Fundamentals: for those candidates who want to test waters of IT or are ready to start their way in the chosen area but have no experience and necessary skills.
• Role-based: for those who have some or profound experience in the chosen domain. This group includes professional and expert-level certifications.
• Additional certifications: Specialty, Microsoft Office technical, Microsoft Certified Educator.

Which Are Top Microsoft Certifications?

As mentioned above, there is no dearth of options when one thinks of becoming a Microsoft certified specialist. From the beginner to the advanced level, you will have career-enhancing choices. Out of all these, there are some which are extra worthy and render more than average benefits. Thus, earning any from the below-mentioned options will place the aspirant on the front line when it comes to employment and annual pay. By the way, note that all the salaries mentioned here are as stated by ZipRecruiter, a leading job-posting website with a huge remuneration database.

• Microsoft Certified: Dynamics 365 Customer Service Functional Consultant Associate

  Functional consultants bearing the responsibility for Dynamics 365 solutions can take the help of this validation to shine and perform day-to-day jobs with perfection. Being an associated-level certification, it imparts an industry-specific understanding of Dynamics 365 Customer Service implementation. All in all, this certificate can be obtained by passing two exams, PL-200 and MB-230. Both these tests follow the same format, viz., including 40-60 questions to be attempted in 150 minutes if the labs are included in the tests. If not, then the exam time allotted for the completion is 130 minutes. Also, these two exams are available in the English language globally, where online and offline proctoring delivery is adopted for both of them. Finally, the annual average salary of a Microsoft Dynamics 365 Functional Consultant ranges from $85,000 to $149,000.

• Microsoft Certified: Windows Virtual Desktop Specialty

  This one is a recently launched certification. As the need for virtual desktops has swelled by more than twice in the past years, the vendor launched it to fill the existing skill gap. As a rule, earners of this designation are known as the expert in planning, managing, and delivery of virtual desktops using Azure. To claim this certification, however, one has to pass AZ-140 exam. The focus of such a test, in particular, is imparting the best-of-breed Windows Virtual Desktop architecture cognizance along with its access and security management principles. As for the test details, AZ-140 will contain 40-60 questions. As the number of questions varies, the passing score also fluctuates. However, securing 70% of the total score is mandatory to come up with flying colors in the official testing. The average salary for Virtual Desktop skills is $86,286 per year and goes up with earned perfection. Thus, experienced professionals can even make as much as $180,000 per annum.

• Microsoft 365 Certified: Security Administrator Associate

  One can turn into a Microsoft 365 skilled specialist with this certificate that tries to infuse verified understanding related to Microsoft 365 enterprise and hybrid environments, data governance policies, implementation & managing security compliance solutions, and threat response. So, take up MS-500 exam, attempt 40-60 questions in 130-150 minutes, secure anything above 70%, and this certification is all yours. To add more, this test is globally available and can be taken up via online and offline proctoring facilities. The average salary of a certified Security Administrator handling the Microsoft Enterprise domain is $85,379 yearly.

• Microsoft Certified: Security Operations Analyst Associate

  Candidates willing to get recognized as Security Engineers can go for this certification and jump higher on the career ladder. This is an associate-level validation creating a skilled workforce in the security domain by giving adequate exposure to threat management, monitoring, and security solution management concepts. Such expertise can then be implemented on products like Azure Defender, Azure Sentinel, and Microsoft 365 Defender. The certification earning process, however, starts with preparing for the Microsoft SC-200 exam and ends with securing passing grades of 70%. This evaluation lasts for 130-150 minutes, depending on whether labs are included in it or not, and contains nearly 40-60 questions to solve. Admittedly, jobs in security domains are known for lucrative and high remuneration. You will be shocked to know that the annual salary of a Security Engineer can go as high as $154,000 while the lowest is $48,000.

• Microsoft Certified: Power Platform Solution Architect Expert

  Developers or senior consultants willing to become experts should aim at this certificate. By infusing established and cut-above understanding related to Microsoft cloud solutions, Power Platform, and Dynamics 365 customer engagement apps, it allows a candidate to get placed in pivotal job roles. PL-600 is the very exam that any Microsoft Certified: Power Platform Solution Architect Expert aspirant has to pass to relish over the certification benefits. This evaluation is 130-150-minute long and assesses your competency using 40-60 multi-formatted questions. Securing 70% will help you come up with flying colors in such an exam. Generally, the earners of this certification can easily make $105,000-$216,000 in their job sphere.