IT certification pay surges as noncertified skills slump

Cash pay premiums for 663 IT certifications jumped sharply, posting their strongest quarterly jump in roughly a decade, according to new data from Foote Partners’ IT Skills and Certifications Pay Index. Conversely pay for 746 noncertified IT skills dropped 2.2% in Q1 2026, representing the steepest single-quarter decline since 2002, the data revealed.

“The upheaval we’ve been seeing in bonuses for noncertified IT skills is evidence that employers are reassessing which skills they believe are the most critical going forward,” said David Foote, chief analyst and research officer at Foote Partners, in a statement. The report pulls compensation data from 5,112 U.S. and Canadian employers covering nearly 501,000 tech professionals.

Certifications make a comeback

For much of the past four years, noncertified skills outpaced certifications by nearly 3% of base salary on average, but that gap is narrowing.

Average cash pay premiums for IT certifications rose 1.8% in Q1, reversing a 0.8% decline in the prior quarter, the firm found. Gains were led by infrastructure, security, and architecture credentials as AI-driven change accelerates across systems and networks, according to the latest Foote Partners data.

The highest-paying certifications, per the index, include the Certified Artificial Intelligence Scientist (CAIS), with premiums of 18% of base salary, and the MIT CSAIL Professional Certificate in AI and Machine Learning, up 45.5% in market value over six months.

“We are anticipating a surge in AI-related certifications in the next few years, and vendors will be spending a lot of money marketing their products in what is an increasingly competitive marketplace for AI technologies,” Foote said in the statement.

Noncertified skills: winners and losers

Foote Partners found that even as overall premiums fall, a subset of high-paying noncertified skills continues to command outsized pay, with bonuses ranging from 15% to 24% of base salary.

Risk analytics and assessment leads at a 24% premium, followed by smart contracts and AIOps at 23%. Apache Flink has climbed 15.8% in market value, while cryptography has surged 33.3%. Network Architecture, IT Governance, Threat Detection, and Scaled Agile Framework (SAFe) are each delivering 20% premiums and rising.

At the same time, more traditional areas are losing ground. Web and e-commerce development skills declined 9.7% year over year, database and data management fell 10.9%, and systems and networking dropped 7.6%, Foote Partners reported.

AI reshapes how IT work is valued

The bigger story behind the numbers, according to Foote, isn’t just which skills are up or down; it’s a fundamental shift in how organizations think about the work itself.

“With AI having shifted from experimental to operational, paying IT talent is becoming a new ballgame,” Foote said. “Employers are thinking about jobs more as tasks, not titles: tasks that can be done entirely by an AI agent/robot, tasks that will be done with a human working with an AI agent/robot, and finally, tasks that are uniquely human.”

Foote Partners now tracks about 136 certified and noncertified AI-related skills, up from 57 two years ago. AI certifications are outperforming noncertified AI skills on market value growth, increasing by nearly 4% over the past year versus a 4% decline. But noncertified AI skills still command higher bonuses, averaging 14% of base salary compared to 8.5% for certifications.

What this means for networking and security pros

For network and security professionals, the Foote Partners data offers a clear signal: skills at the intersection of infrastructure, security, and AI are commanding the highest premiums.

Network Architecture continues to deliver a 20% premium, while cloud security, cryptography, and threat detection remain strong. Security-focused certifications, including certifications such as GIAC credentials and CISSP, are appreciating. And widely adopted certifications are losing value. Certifications, including CompTIA Security+, CompTIA CySA+, VMware security credentials, and several Microsoft Azure certifications, have dropped 30% to 55% in market value over the past two years as supply has outpaced demand, according to Foote Partners data.

“Our data is showing this new resilience in IT certifications being driven primarily by infrastructure and security certifications, and by certifications in architecture and process areas. The emergence of AI is forcing huge changes in systems, networks, and especially in cybersecurity disciplines,” Foote said.