A cloud engineer is responsible for the development and maintenance of cloud infrastructure. Over the years, the vitality and demand for this role have grown exponentially as it finds its use in our everyday lives. From enabling you to stream your favorite music to checking your email, cloud technology is integral to everything.
So if you want to become a cloud engineer, there’s no time like the present to start. As a cloud engineer, you’ll help the company store and manage data, roll out software updates, and basically do everything to support the cloud infrastructure and keep it running.
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To help you decode the ‘how to become a cloud engineer’ question, in this article, we’ll cover:
- What Is a Cloud Engineer?
- What Does a Cloud Engineer Do?
- How to Become a Cloud Engineer?
- Skills Required to Become a Cloud Engineer
- Cloud Engineer’s Salary in the US
- FAQs on How to Become a Cloud Engineer
What Is a Cloud Engineer?
Cloud computing has transitioned from a luxury to an integral part of engineering in the past decade. The demand for cloud engineers has snowballed as they must look after the migration process and carry out cloud-related tasks. Both of these are the foundational tasks of the cloud engineer job role.
A cloud engineer is a tech professional who looks after every part of the technical workload associated with cloud computing. Usually, this workload refers to the management, planning, development, and monitoring of cloud systems.
It further refers to the knowledge and implementation of the best practices when deploying an application on the cloud. All of these are the general responsibilities of a cloud engineer.
Some other job roles that come under cloud engineering:
- Solutions Architect
- Cloud Developer
- SysOps Engineer
All three are cloud engineers with validated certifications from companies such as Azure, AWS, or GCP.
What Does a Cloud Engineer Do?
Based on the job roles specified above, we have segregated the responsibilities of cloud engineers.
Cloud Engineers as Solutions Architects
- Develop and deploy applications on the cloud
- Find and use the necessary cloud services to manage applications on the cloud
- Migrate on-premises applications of the company to the cloud
- Maintain the usage of cloud services using cost-effective strategies
For more information about what a solutions architect does, read AWS solutions architect roles and responsibilities.
Cloud Engineers as Cloud Developers
- Narrow down the best cloud architecture practices to support applications
- Use programming languages to code for server-less applications
- Automate various parts of the development process
- Learn the application life cycle and make use of APIs
Cloud Engineers as SysOps Engineers
- Figure out potential issues that might arise in applications’ performance
- Plan a recovery strategy to make up for any unforeseen downtime or any other issues
- Maintain data integrity by having proper access control for cloud services
- Take care of network-specific workloads, including DNS and firewalls
How to Become a Cloud Engineer?
As you have already seen, cloud engineering encompasses various job roles. Therefore, clearly understanding what you want to pursue is vital. However, to become a cloud engineer, you’ll require the following:
Educational Qualifications
To become a cloud engineer, you’ll need a bachelor’s degree in Computer Science or a related field to have the required technical knowledge. Further, having a master’s degree in the specified technology will only open more and better opportunities.
Programming Languages
The next step in your path to becoming a cloud engineer is the knowledge of programming languages such as Java, Python, Ruby, and so on because they will help you do the job well. In addition, you should familiarize yourself with cloud services such as AWS, Azure, and Hadoop.
Developing Required Skills
You’ll need to acquire the right skills to become a cloud engineer. These are cloud security, machine learning, cloud deployment and migration, and so on.
Get Practical Experience
Nothing beats practical knowledge when it comes to becoming a cloud engineer. So get the required hands-on experience in the field using open-source internships or projects. This will help you in getting a much better understanding of what to expect from those kinds of job roles.
Acquire the Certification
To become a cloud engineer, getting a certification in the job profile of your choice from cloud providers such as Amazon, Google, or Microsoft will relay that you have the needed skillset and experience in the field.
To prepare better for your upcoming Cloud engineer interview, you can check out:
Skills Required to Become a Cloud Engineer
The following skills will help you become a cloud engineer:
- Storage skills: Good understanding of different kinds of storage such as personal cloud, hybrid cloud, and private cloud.
- Database skills: Practical experience dealing with cloud database management, MySQL, and Hadoop.
- Linux: Basic comprehension of the Linux operating system is good as many companies use it for cloud development.
- Programming skills: Knowledge of a few programming languages such as .NET, Python, Golang, etc.
- Networking: Understanding how virtual networks and network management work.
- DevOps: Familiarity with the popular cloud engineering framework will only improve the chances of getting hired, especially by Amazon Web Services (AWS).
- Web Services and Application Programming Interfaces (API): Knowledge of Open Standards such as SOAP, WSDL, and so on is required for tagging, moving, and describing the data for these standards.
If you’re having trouble figuring out how to include these skills in your resume, you can learn How to List Skills on Your Software Engineer Resume.
Cloud Engineer’s Salary In the US
As per Indeed.com, the average salary of a cloud engineer in the US is $121,465 per year with an $11,000 cash bonus. This figure is expected to grow in the coming years since the cloud computing industry is expanding rapidly.
So if you are an aspiring cloud engineer, get started immediately since it is an exciting field that is constantly in demand. Develop the required skills, get certified, and start applying for jobs as soon as you can to become a part of the technological revolution.
You can also check the AWS cloud support engineer salary in the US and know the compensation details.
FAQs on How to Become a Cloud Engineer
Q1. How long does it take to become a cloud engineer?
For most people, it takes a minimum of four years to become a cloud engineer. But getting a degree isn’t the only to become one. You can also start your career in cloud engineering by attending a boot camp program or with the help of some online and learning the required skills.
Q2. Is it hard to become a cloud engineer?
As per our research, it isn’t easy to become a cloud engineer. But then, worthwhile careers hardly ever are easy to maneuver. When it comes to cloud engineering, unforeseen cloud complexities can add pressure to the newly developed cloud groups, making it hard to carry out day-to-day operations.
Q3. Is cloud engineering a good career?
As cloud engineers are involved in solving real-life issues affecting people in their everyday lives globally, it’s safe to say that it's a pretty important job profile and, therefore, in high demand.
Q4. Which degree is best for cloud engineering?
To become a cloud engineer, you’ll need a bachelor’s degree in computer science, information systems, technology, or a related field.
Q5. What’s the average salary of a cloud engineer?
According to Indeed.com, a cloud engineer in the US makes $121,465 per year, on average.
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