Microsoft Credentials roundup: February 2026 edition
February 2026 brings major updates to Microsoft Credentials—four new Microsoft Certifications and six new Microsoft Applied Skills now generally available (GA). Designed to help you keep your skills current in today’s AI-powered workplace, they demonstrate the AI abilities that employers need in not only technical but also business roles. In this roundup, we cover what’s new, what’s changing, and what’s coming up. What’s new: Certifications We’ve introduced four new AI Certifications—all now GA—that verify skills for technical and non-technical professionals. These credentials certify your ability to use AI in real-world roles, helping to ensure that you can drive innovation and productivity with this technology. Whether you’re an IT administrator, solution architect, business user, or organizational leader, there’s a new Certification to help boost your career growth. For technical professionals (IT pros, developers, architects) The Microsoft 365 Certified: Copilot and Agent Administration Fundamentals Certification (Exam AB-900) proves that you can configure, secure, and support AI-powered Microsoft 365 environments. This entry-level Certification validates your ability to manage and protect Microsoft 365 Copilot and agent services. The Microsoft Certified: Agentic AI Business Solutions Architect Certification (Exam AB-100) demonstrates your expertise in designing and leading AI-first enterprise architectures. This expert-level Certification shows that you can orchestrate multi-agent AI solutions and integrate Copilot, Foundry Tools, and Dynamics 365 to drive business transformation. For business professionals (managers, analysts, decision-makers) The Microsoft Certified: AI Business Professional Certification (Exam AB-730) validates that you can use generative AI and Copilot to streamline business workflows and improve outcomes without coding. The Microsoft Certified: AI Transformation Leader Certification (Exam AB-731) verifies that you can define the business value of AI, integrate AI solutions by using Copilot, Foundry Tools, and other tools, and drive company-wide AI adoption for transformative impact. Each Certification page on Microsoft Learn offers resources for self-paced and instructor-led training, study guides, and exam prep to help set you up for success. What’s new: Applied Skills Applied Skills are another powerful option for showcasing your expertise. These short, practical assessments let you demonstrate specific real-world skills in an interactive lab environment. They’re now even more relevant to AI-powered roles, since they help prepare you to earn role-based Certifications. We’ve expanded the portfolio with new AI scenarios across technical and business roles, and the new credentials are even faster to earn, most of their lab-based assessments lets you prove specific skills in just 45 minutes. For technical roles (developers, engineers, IT pros) Microsoft Applied Skills: Build a generative AI chat app. Demonstrate that you can create an interactive chat application using generative AI (with tools like Microsoft Foundry) and integrate large language models into real-world apps for better customer or employee experiences. Microsoft Applied Skills: Create an AI agent. Validate your skill in building and configuring agents (for example, in the Copilot ecosystem) and in orchestrating agents to automate tasks and drive business impact. Microsoft Applied Skills: Enhance agents with autonomous capabilities. Prove that you can design and deploy self-governing agents by using Microsoft Copilot Studio, enabling them to perform complex sequences of actions with minimal human intervention and empowering scalable, adaptive solutions. Microsoft Applied Skills: Secure AI solutions in the cloud. Show that you know how to safeguard AI applications in Azure and can implement security and compliance for AI workloads (for example, by using Foundry and Microsoft Defender for Cloud). For business roles Microsoft Applied Skills: Generate reports with AI research agents. Prove that you can use Researcher in Copilot to quickly gather information and produce data-driven reports and insights for smarter business decisions. Microsoft Applied Skills: Streamline business workflows with AI chat. Showcase your ability to use Copilot automation in daily work and to employ AI chat to manage meetings, draft content, and coordinate teamwork more efficiently, improving productivity. Retiring older credentials To keep things current, we’ve retired a few Certifications and Applied Skills. If you’ve already earned these, they’ll remain on the transcript in your Microsoft Learn profile. The following credentials retired on December 31, 2025: Microsoft Certified: Dynamics 365 Fundamentals (CRM) (Exam MB-910) Microsoft Certified: Dynamics 365 Fundamentals (ERP) (Exam MB-920) The following credentials retired on January 30, 2026: Microsoft Applied Skills: Build an Azure AI Vision solution Microsoft Applied Skills: Deploy and manage Azure Arc–enabled servers Microsoft Applied Skills: Develop an ASP.NET Core web app that consumes an API Microsoft Applied Skills: Implement a data science and machine learning solution with Microsoft Fabric Microsoft Applied Skills: Implement a Lakehouse in Microsoft Fabric Looking ahead These updates are just the beginning. We continuously evolve our credentials portfolio to align with the skills needed for AI-driven jobs, and a new wave of AI-focused Certification updates is scheduled for March 2026 and beyond. Expect even more opportunities to learn and to earn credentials in AI and cloud technologies. We look forward to carrying this momentum forward and to supporting you on your learning journey.Per certification designed badges
Hi First Microsoft opted out from awesome Credly (awesome, as learners collected “all” personal certifications in one place, no matter the vendor - easy to share the Credly profile link for various reasons) And now you have quit creating “per certification branded badge”s, and only provide standard “Associate” & “Expert” badges with a “Learn diploma) showing the name of the certification “in text” (the new Fabric exam as example) For us globally in roles like “Alliance Managers”, “Partner Managers”, driving and summarizing partners excellence in the area of Microsoft + pushing with marketing us and Microsoft- this is bad! Example on how we earlier are using the per certification badges Is it just by mistake you have taken this path? Or is it just me and my learners that have missed where they can download per exam branded badges for newer certifications now? Regards GabrielPlease clarify the numbering system in Microsoft exams
I am trying to make sense of exam numbers in Microsoft Certification poster. https://arch-center.azureedge.net/Credentials/Certification-Poster_en-us.pdf. For example I notice most azure exam numbers start with 1xx. That gives me the impression that 1xx could be related to Infrastructure. But I am not sure if that is the correct understanding. For example all fundamental exams are numbered 9xx. So are exams numbered differently in role based certifications? What is the numbering pattern and practice in role based certifications? Again one might assume that all architect exams may have the same number pattern but they don’t. Some patterns emerge when it comes to Windows certification - 8xx. Collaboration and communication - 7xx except MB 700. So it appears even under role based certifications the numbering pattern may be different depending on the technology or platform or product. I have not found any authoritative material on the internet form anyone in Microsoft or an MVP on this topic. Some clarification on this topic will help to put at rest years of curiosity and confusion in the community. Thank you.
Struggling with Microsoft Applied Skills: Create agents in Microsoft Copilot Studio
Hi all, I'm struggling trying to pass the https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/credentials/applied-skills/create-agents-in-microsoft-copilot-studio that was released recently. I keep getting around 50% percent, with the performance by task failing for: Manage variables and entities Configure nodes but the others as pass. I've done the test twice and not sure what I am doing wrong to be honest. I've gone through the learning path on the certification page as well. I have a feeling I maybe tackling this task wrong but not sure. You need to ensure that when a user interacts with agents, the user receives the following message: This is the agent! Then, the user must be prompted with the following question: What is your employee number? The user must be able to enter their employee number into a text field, and the employee number must be saved to a variable named employeeNumber. The employeeNumber variable must be available for topic switching. Next, you must confirm employeeNumber by asking the following yes/no question by using the Multiple choice options entity: Can you confirm that your employee number is {employeeNumber}? If the user selects No, the conversation must end. If the user selects Yes, the User. Language system variable must be set to English. Here is what logic I'm applying: Go to Topics: System -> Conversation Start -> Edit (Assumed this is the correct way due to the scenario asking for "when a user interacts with agents" rather then creating a new topic for this) Clear out the original node and replace with a message node saying "This is the agent!" Create a question node following on asking "What is your employee number?" in the text message box. Put the entity as Number (In my first attempt I did this as a text string which was set to gather user's response) Update Save User response box to Variable Number renamed to employeeNumber and updating that variable to be global, so overall name is Global.employeeNumber Create a question node following on asking Can you confirm that your employee number is {Global.employeeNumber}? in the text box. Setting the Entity field to be Multiple choice options and updating options for user to be No & Yes Save user response as Var1 (choice) Create two condition nodes to follow: For No Var1 is equal to No Follow on Node is End Conversation For Yes Var1 is equal to Yes Follow on Node is Set a variable Value -> Set Variable field configure to System.User.Language , To Value configure to English from the drop down list that appear. *End of Task* Is anyone able to advise further what I am doing wrong?Developing in Agentic AI Systems Blueprint Survey Opportunity
GitHub is considering creating a credential for Developing in Agentic AI Systems, and we need your input through our exam blueprinting survey. The blueprint determines how many questions each skill in the exam will be assigned. Please complete the online survey by March 3, 2026. Please also feel free to forward the survey to any colleagues you consider subject matter experts for this certification. If you have any questions, feel free to contact Alicia Gorriaran at aliciagorriaran@github.com. Developing in Agentic AI Systems blueprint survey link: https://microsoftlearning.co1.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_0pUo8ELHf3FI4uO
Renew Az-305
My AZ-305 certification recently expired because I missed the renewal window. I did not receive any renewal notification emails before the expiration, which is why I was unable to complete the renewal assessment in time. I would like to kindly request whether any additional time or an exception could be granted in my case. If this is not possible, I completely understand, but I would appreciate it if you could review my situation and advise on any available options.Developing AI solutions on Microsoft Azure blueprint survey opportunity
Greetings! Microsoft is considering a credential for Developing AI solutions on Microsoft Azure, and we need your input through our exam blueprinting survey. The blueprint determines how many questions each skill in the exam will be assigned. Please complete the online survey by February 23, 2026. Please also feel free to forward the survey to any colleagues you consider subject matter experts for this certification. If you have any questions, feel free to contact John Sowles at josowles@microsoft.com or Don Tanedo at dtanedo@microsoft.com. Developing AI solutions on Microsoft Azure blueprint survey link: https://microsoftlearning.co1.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_easBwCCKSwxGyZ8
Seeking Guidance & Partners for Promoting Microsoft TSP Training
Hello everyone, I’m exploring effective ways to market our Microsoft TSP (Training Services Partner) courses and would really appreciate insights from the community. If you have experience promoting Microsoft training offerings, I’d love to learn about recommended approaches, or useful resources that have worked for you. I’m also open to connecting with individuals or partners who support course marketing on a commission basis. If you have suggestions, guidance, or services you’d like to offer, please feel free to share. Your expertise would be greatly appreciated. Thank you in advance for your support. vk2Microsoft Cloud and AI Security Engineer Blueprint Survey Opportunity
Microsoft is considering a credential for Microsoft Cloud and AI Security Engineer, and we need your input through our exam blueprinting survey. The blueprint determines how many questions each skill in the exam will be assigned. Please complete the online survey by February 20, 2026. Please also feel free to forward the survey to any colleagues you consider subject matter experts for this certification. If you have any questions, feel free to contact John Sowles at josowles@microsoft.com or Don Tanedo at dtanedo@microsoft.com. Microsoft Cloud and AI Security Engineer blueprint survey link: https://microsoftlearning.co1.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_5w049vncCEqEDJQ
