CKA vs CKAD vs CKS 2026: Which Kubernetes Cert to Take

CKA, CKAD, and CKS are live terminal exams from the Linux Foundation / CNCF. They are not multiple-choice vendor associates. Pick by job function, then practice under a timer with the Kubernetes docs open.

Default for platform / SRE: CKA practice →. App developers: CKAD. Security after CKA: CKS.

Full CKA plan: CKA study guide.

Side-by-side

Passing scores and prices change — confirm on cncf.io before you buy.

Which first?

You run clusters (nodes, etcd, RBAC, networking): CKA.

You write Deployments, Services, Jobs, and debug CrashLoopBackOff but do not kubeadm a control plane: CKAD.

You already hold CKA (or equivalent admin skill) and own Kubernetes security: CKS. Do not sit CKS as exam one.

CKA and CKAD overlap on workloads. CKA adds cluster install, troubleshooting nodes, and storage admin. CKAD goes deeper on application design (multi-container, probes, jobs) and lighter on etcd.

Study reality

Video-only prep fails these exams. You need:

1. A local cluster (kind, k3d, or kubeadm).
2. Speed with

   kubectl

   , YAML, and docs search.
3. At least one 2-hour mock (killer.sh or equivalent) before test day.
4. Concept drills on CertStud for RBAC, probes, NetworkPolicies, and storage classes.

After Kubernetes certs

Pair CKA with a cloud associate if your job is EKS/AKS/GKE: AWS SAA, AZ-104, or GCP ACE.

Linux Foundation hub →