Certified Cloud Native Platform Engineer (CNPE)

Elevate your career by demonstrating deep expertise in architecting, securing, and optimizing cloud native platforms to create scalable self-service infrastructure and step into senior platform engineer roles.

This certification lets you showcase your advanced, highly sought-after technical skills amid enterprise-wide scaling of cloud native systems, verifies your capability to design, secure and optimize complex self-service platforms, and unlocks access to senior positions including Principal Platform Engineer, Platform Architect and Senior Platform Engineer.

The CNPE certification validates your expertise for senior, high-impact platform engineering and architecture roles, demonstrates your ability to design, secure, and scale complex cloud native platforms to meet enterprise requirements, and helps you make significant progress toward senior platform positions including Senior Architect and Senior Platform Engineer.

Platform Architecture and Infrastructure- 15%

Applying Platform Architecture Best Practices for Networking, Storage, and Compute

Using Cost Management Solutions for Right-Sizing and Scaling

Optimizing Multi-Tenancy Resource Usage

GitOps and Continuous Delivery- 25%

Implementing GitOps Workflows for Application and Infrastructure Deployment

Building and Configuring CI/CD Pipelines Integrated with Kubernetes

Deploying Applications Using Progressive Delivery Strategies (e.g., Blue/Green or Canary)

Platform APIs and Self-Service Capabilities - 25%

Designing and Creating Custom Resource Definitions (CRDs) for Platform Services

Implementing Workflows for Self-Service Provisioning Using Platform APIs

Using Kubernetes Operators for Platform Automation and Integration

Using Automation Frameworks for Self-Service Provisioning

Observability and Operations - 20%

Implementing Monitoring, Alerting, Logging, and Tracing Solutions

Measuring and Improving Platform Efficiency Using Deployment Metrics and Performance Indicators

Diagnosing and Remediating Platform Issue and Incident Scenarios

Security and Policy Enforcement - 15%

Configuring Secure Service-to-Service Communication

Applying RBAC and Security Controls Across Platform Resources

Generating Audit Trails and Enforcing Policy Compliance (SBOM, Compliance Reports, etc.)

Using Policy Engines and Admission Controllers for Governance

Integrating Security Scanning and Compliance Checks into Deployment Pipelines

CNPE pairs well with other credentials that can help with preparation or deepen your expertise. You can consider: CKA, CNPA, CGOA, OTCA and CBA.

Frequently Asked QuestionsCandidate HandbookLinux Foundation Certification PoliciesImportant InstructionsCurriculum

How to register & take exam: TBC (Link to FAQ pages of the website)

Candidate Handbook: https://docs.linuxfoundation.org/tc-docs/certification/lf-handbook2

LF Certification Policy: https://training.linuxfoundation.org/about/policies/

Frequently Asked Questions: https://docs.linuxfoundation.org/tc-docs/certification/frequently-asked-questions-cnpe

Important instruction: https://docs.linuxfoundation.org/tc-docs/certification/important-instructions-cnpe

Cirriculum: https://github.com/cncf/curriculum

What tools are featured in the CNPE exam? https://docs.linuxfoundation.org/tc-docs/certification/important-instructions-cnpe#cnpe-exam-tools