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DevOps Engineer Roadmap: Tools, Skills, and Order of Learning

A practical roadmap to becoming a DevOps Engineer. Linux, scripting, Docker, CI/CD, Kubernetes, Terraform, AWS, and observability, in the right order.

·5 min read · By Yash Kesharwani
Beginner 14 min read

What you'll learn

  • ✓What this role actually does day-to-day
  • ✓The exact skills and tools to learn in order
  • ✓A realistic month-by-month plan for the first 6-12 months
  • ✓How to build a portfolio that gets interviews
  • ✓How to land the first job and what to expect

Prerequisites

  • •Basic comfort with a computer and willingness to commit ~10 hours/week

A DevOps Engineer owns the path from a developer’s commit to a customer-visible feature. Day to day this is CI pipelines, container images, infrastructure code, cloud cost reviews, and the toil reduction projects that keep the rest of engineering productive.

Follow these steps in order. DevOps is layered: every tool assumes the one below it works. Each step links to a Codeloom tutorial so you can start now and build a homelab as you go.

The Step-by-Step Path

Step 1 — Linux

Everything runs on Linux. You need confident command-line use, file and process management, and an instinct for reading log files. This is the floor.

Step 2 — Shell Scripting

Shell scripts are the duct tape of infrastructure. Half the production tooling you will touch is bash. Learn enough to read other people’s scripts without fear.

Step 3 — Git

DevOps lives in repos. Everything is GitOps now: pipelines, infra, configs. Master branching, rebasing, and PR-driven workflow before any CI tool.

Step 4 — Docker

Containers are how modern apps ship. Learn to build, run, and debug images. Compose teaches you multi-service local environments, which is what most teams use for dev.

Step 5 — CI/CD

A pipeline you wrote is the strongest signal a junior DevOps candidate can carry. GitHub Actions is the most common stack. Build one that lints, tests, builds an image, and deploys.

Step 6 — Kubernetes

Kubernetes is still the default for orchestration. Learn pods, deployments, services, and ingress. Skip the operators and service meshes for now.

Step 7 — Cloud (AWS)

AWS dominates DevOps job descriptions. Learn EC2, S3, IAM, and VPC before any managed service. Identity and networking break more often than compute.

Step 8 — Infrastructure as Code

Terraform is the default. Once your cloud lives in code, reviews and rollbacks become normal engineering work. This is the moment you stop being a sysadmin and start being a DevOps engineer.

  • (Resource hint: Terraform official Get Started guides)

Step 9 — Observability

Metrics, logs, and traces. Prometheus and Grafana for the homelab, and CloudWatch or Datadog at most jobs. Learn what a useful dashboard looks like, not just how to make one.

  • (Resource hint: Prometheus and Grafana docs)

Step 10 — Security Basics

DevSecOps is not a separate role at most companies, it is a DevOps skill. Learn secrets management, least-privilege IAM, and basic image scanning. Cloud bills and breaches both come from the same place: sloppy defaults.

What to Build (Portfolio Projects)

  • A homelab repo that uses Terraform to provision AWS infra, GitHub Actions to deploy, and Prometheus to monitor. Demonstrates the full stack.
  • A multi-service docker-compose project with a CI pipeline that builds, tests, and pushes images. Demonstrates containers and CI fluency.
  • A Kubernetes manifest set for a real public app you forked, deployed on k3s or kind. Demonstrates K8s without the cloud bill.
  • A small Helm chart or Kustomize overlay for a real app, with a writeup. Demonstrates you can think in templates.

Common Mistakes

  • Memorizing kubectl commands without understanding what a pod actually is.
  • Skipping Linux fundamentals and being stuck the first time something is not in a UI.
  • Hoarding YAML files instead of writing modules with clear inputs and outputs.
  • Treating Terraform like a one-time script instead of code that needs review.
  • Ignoring cost. Junior DevOps engineers who own the cost dashboard get promoted.
  • Avoiding code. Python or Go fluency is now expected at the senior level.

How to Get the First Job

  • Resume: lead with the homelab repo. Quantify with deploy times, image sizes, and cost reduction.
  • Portfolio: a Terraform repo and a GitHub Actions repo with green CI badges beat any cert at the junior level.
  • Networking: the HashiCorp and CNCF community Slacks are active. Lurk, then contribute.
  • Interviews: expect Linux deep dives, a CI design question, and a behavioral round about handling a broken deploy.
  • Certs help but do not lead. AWS SAA and the CKAD are the two with real signal. Build first, cert second.

Wrap up

DevOps rewards builders who can wire a real system together end-to-end. Work through the layers in order, build the homelab, and publish your config. Six months of focused effort and you can interview for junior DevOps or Platform Engineer roles.