My Experience Learning and Passing the AZ-900: What Helped, What Didn’t, and What I’d Do Differently

Vávra Tomáš — Thu, 15 May 2025 21:29:31 +0000

TL;DR: I passed the AZ-900 using Microsoft Learn, YouTube resources, and free practice tests. Here's what helped, what I'd skip, and what I wish I’d done earlier.

Hey everyone

I recently passed the AZ-900: Microsoft Azure Fundamentals certification, and I wanted to share a bit about my journey—what worked, what didn’t, and what I'd recommend if you're considering going down the same path.

Whether you're just getting into cloud, exploring Azure for the first time, or simply validating your understanding, I hope this gives you some helpful insight.

🎯 Why I Took the AZ-900

I wanted to solidify my understanding of cloud computing concepts and get familiar with Azure’s core services and offerings. This certification felt like the right starting point to gain clarity on how Azure platform works, especially in service-oriented context.

📚 My Study Strategy

I didn’t want to overcomplicate things, so I focused on four main resources:

1. Microsoft Learn (Free!)

This was my primary study material. Microsoft’s official learning paths are well-structured and beginner-friendly, while also updated based on the general exam curiculum.

I followed this course:

🔗 MS Azure Fundamentals

✅ What I liked:

Bite-sized modules
Self-paced learning
Quizzes after each section to reinforce learning

⚠️ Some parts can feel a bit high-level or repetitive, but they’re exam-relevant and cover a broad range of topics well.

2. John Savill’s YouTube Certification course (2025 update)

John Savill’s AZ-900 video series was super helpful.

He explains concepts clearly, uses diagrams, and gives real-world context to abstract ideas. This source was especially useful for deeper understanding of some Azure-specific services, so its not necessary to watch whole serie.

🔗 Watch it here

✅ Great for reviewing and reinforcing what I learned on Microsoft Learn.

⚠️ Some videos can feel a bit redundant after MS Learn, especialy those focusing on basic concepts.

3. Inside Cloud and Security YouTube AZ-900 Cram

This video was especially useful during the final days before the exam—perfect for a last-minute review.

🔗 Watch it here

Microsoft Learn AZ-900 Practice Asessment
Inside Cloud and Security AZ-900 Practice Quiz

✅ Great for last minute reviewing and refreshing.

⚠️ Use 1.5x speed if you use it just for revisiting materials to save some time.

4. Practice Tests

Testing myself was crucial. I used only free practice tests.

Microsoft Learn AZ-900 Practice Asessment
Inside Cloud and Security AZ-900 Practice Quiz

These helped me:

Identify areas I needed to revisit (MS Learn is unparalleled for this)
Practice time management under exam conditions
Inside Cloud and Security quiz is closer to real question style, since MS Learn is noticably easier than real exam

🧠 What Was Most Useful

Microsoft Learn + practice tests made a strong combo
Summarizing key concepts in my own words
Hands-on with the Azure Portal—even though not required, this made everything more tangible

🤔 What I’d Do Differently

Take practice tests earlier.

They reveal weak spots and help you study smarter, not harder.
Spend more time using the Azure portal.

Seeing how services are deployed and managed deepens understanding, even for a theory-based exam like AZ-900.

🧰 Useful Links & Resources

✅ Final Thoughts

AZ-900 is a great foundation-level certification if you're starting out with Azure or cloud in general.

It won’t dive deep into hands-on tasks, but it gives you the language, context, and confidence to explore further paths.

If you're studying or already passed—drop a comment! I’d love to hear how your experience went too 👇

DEV Community: Vávra Tomáš