Microsoft has just announced the end of some long standing certifications. The following Microsoft certifications are set to retire in 2020.

• Microsoft Certified Solutions Associate (MCSA)
• Microsoft Certified Solutions Expert (MCSE)
• Microsoft Certified Solutions Developer (MCSD)

In addition to the certifications going away, the related exams will also be retired. In total, this marks the end for:

• 15 Certifications
• 43 Exams

June 30, 2020 is the scheduled end date, so people are encouraged to pass the exams before that date. For those previously passing the exams and certifications, they will remain active on your transcript for two years. At that point, the retired exams and certifications will go into an inactive status. Microsoft partners can still use the certifications as competency for up to 12 months. More details and questions and answers can be found at the bottom of the Microsoft retires certifications blog post.

What to do now?

Since late 2018, Microsoft has been pushing more role-based certifications. This marks a transition from Microsoft to focus more on specific jobs rather than technologies. In my opinion, that was a smart tranisition.

Microsoft Certification Recommendations

Microsoft has provides some recommendations for people moving from the old certifications to the new ones. The diagram above show some of the recommendations. Specifically, for the former MCSE – Data Management & Analytics certification, Microsoft now recommends the following role-based certifications.

• Database Administrator Associate
• Data Analyst Associate
• Data Engineer Associate
• AI Engineer Associate
• Data Scientist Associate

Microsoft has been working hard to keep the data science role-based certification up-to-date.

Now you know what Microsoft Certifications are to retire in 2020. It is time to start focusing on roles if you want to earn Microsoft certifications.