Cloud Essentials+ retires on September 25, 2025

[Gregory Childers]

Another cert I’ve never heard of. Same thing will probably happen with the AI Essentials — I used the TestOut material to build a course on new trends in technology, hoping it would cover the full 8 weeks. In the end, I had to split it: 4 weeks of AI and 4 weeks of cyber psychology. Everyone who beta tested the class said the second half was great; the first half… not so much. Once again, it's a solid study resource, but as a certification, I see little value. They still haven’t announced when the cert will officially go live, but I was told — yet again — that you’ll need to take it if you want to teach the course.

If I understand it correctly, the AI Fundamentals will not be a certification program. It will offer a certificate after taking an online, unproctored quiz.

 

[Jose A Ruiz Marquez]

If I understand it correctly, the AI Fundamentals will not be a certification program. It will offer a certificate after taking an online, unproctored quiz.

Thank you Gregg, you made my day! This means it will be easier to get the certificate and not worry about extra CEU's

 

[Gregory Childers]

Thank you Gregg, you made my day! This means it will be easier to get the certificate and not worry about extra CEU's

I don't believe this certificate will require any CEUs.

Quite honestly, I'm surprised CompTIA didn't create an AI+ full certification program. A few of the other certification bodies have AI training and some have certs.

 

[Jose A Ruiz Marquez]

I don't believe this certificate will require any CEUs.

Quite honestly, I'm surprised CompTIA didn't create an AI+ full certification program. A few of the other certification bodies have AI training and some have certs.

I think one of the challenges with creating a full AI+ cert is that AI evolves so fast that by the time a curriculum is finalized and the cert launched, parts of it may already be obsolete. One of the most valuable skill right now is knowing how to interact with AI tools effectively—especially for tasks like scripting in Bash and Python, which is where I use it most. In that context, prompt engineering is more valuable than certifications. We already have a lot of free and community-driven resources on effective prompting for IT tasks. So a technical AI+ cert might not have strong commercial traction—at least not compared to something like AI Essentials, which is not a cert and targets a broader, non-technical audience. That kind of educational material may have more mass-market appeal and probably generates better ROI for CompTIA.