Most people only find out after they’ve already quit.
September 05, 2026
Are you sitting on a 15% raise?
Every September the same advice does the rounds: the only way to get a real raise is to leave. Update the résumé, take the recruiter’s call, let a competing offer do your negotiating for you. For most of the last five years that advice worked, mostly because the market was forgiving. If the move didn’t pan out, there was another one behind it.
That’s no longer the case, and two weeks of data explain why.
On August 1 the Bureau of Labor Statistics revised May and June payrolls down by a combined 103,000. On August 28 its preliminary benchmark revision took a further 79,000 off March. Tech layoffs in 2026 passed last year’s total on August 6, 125,759 roles against 122,606 for all of 2025, with four months of the year still to run. So the candidate pool you’d be jumping into is bigger than it was in spring, and a lot of the people in it hold the same certifications you do.
None of this means you shouldn’t move. It means a move now costs more than it did, so it has to pay more. You give up your tenure, you go to the back of the line if the new employer cuts, and you forfeit whatever raise you could have negotiated where you are. We’ve spent a long time on the hiring side of this, and our view is simple: in this market, don’t move for less than 15%. Under that, the risk isn’t worth it. At 15% or more, it usually is.
Which raises the obvious question. Is that gap there for you right now?
Most people can’t say, because they’ve never seen the number. They know what they earn. They don’t know what the market pays for their particular combination of certifications, in their state, this quarter. So they guess, or they take a recruiter’s word for it, or they hand in their notice and find out afterwards.
Run the number first. The free benchmark at certbueno.com/#checker takes your current certifications and where you work and shows you what that stack is worth today against what you earn now. You see the result on screen before you confirm anything. If the gap is 15% or more, take it to your manager before you take it to a recruiter. Proof of what the market pays for what you already hold is a stronger opening than a competing offer, and it doesn’t burn the relationship if they say no. If they do say no, move, and take the number with you.
If the gap isn’t there, that’s useful too. It means your current stack is fairly paid and the raise you want isn’t sitting with another employer. It’s in whatever you add next. Our research this week is fairly blunt about where. Across more than 5,000 US employers, the cash premiums paid on top of base salary for certifications rose 1.8% in the latest quarter, the biggest quarterly rise in roughly a decade. Premiums for skills with no certification behind them fell 2.2%, the sharpest drop since 2002. Formal AI certifications average 9 to 11% of base salary as a category, and the strongest single credential we track reaches 18%.
The complication is that an AI certification doesn’t add the same amount to every stack. The one that pays on top of a security-heavy background isn’t the one that pays on top of cloud architecture, and picking wrong costs $300 to $1,000 in exam fees and three months of evenings. Working out which credential fits what you already hold is what the stacking data in the index exists for, and it’s what the bespoke AI Certification Stacking report does: it starts from your benchmark and tells you which AI certifications complement your existing certs, in what order, and what the index says each one adds.
Either way you go into October with a number. Most of the people you’re up against won’t have one.
THIS WEEK IN THE INDEX
AWS moved a deadline and almost nobody noticed
Since July, AWS networking specialists have been told to sit the Advanced Networking – Specialty exam before August 25 or miss out for good. On August 24, AWS’s own certification page quietly changed the last exam date to December 31, 2026. There was no announcement, and most prep sites and LinkedIn posts are still showing the old date.
The exam still costs $300. Anything you earn before it retires stays valid for the usual three years. After that no new ones are issued, and there is no ANS-C02 coming. AWS is pointing people to Skill Builder and a micro-credential instead, so this is a retirement, not a new version.
On the CertBueno Top 100 it sits at #15, $187,600 top of band, with a DIVERSIFY verdict. That means it still pays today, but the ceiling is fixed and demand is fading. If you’re close to ready, book before December 31, pass once and bank the three years. If you haven’t started, four months isn’t enough to be worth spending on a credential with no future. The index has the money moving to AWS Certified Solutions Architect – Professional (#1, INVEST, $221,069 top of band) and AWS Certified Security – Specialty (#5, INVEST), and that’s where we’d put the study time.
Sources: AWS Certified Advanced Networking – Specialty certification page, updated Aug 24, 2026. CertBueno Top 100 Q3 2026 index, published Aug 9, 2026.
IN BRIEF
Microsoft is folding two Windows Server exams into one. AZ-800 and AZ-801 both retire September 30, 2026 and are replaced by a single AZ-802 for the same Windows Server Hybrid Administrator credential, so one exam fee instead of two. AI-102 already retired June 30, 2026, replaced by AI-103 (Azure AI Engineer, #21, INVEST, $159,000). Source: Microsoft Learn certification retirement notices, 2026.
PMI raised the PMP fee on August 6. Members now pay $445, up from $405; non-members $675. PMP sits at #63 (STABLE, $122,000). If you’re not a member, join before you register, because the membership costs less than the difference. Source: PMI fee schedule via authorized training partners, Aug 2026; verify current pricing at pmi.org.
NVIDIA has added an agentic AI exam. The 2026 portfolio now includes NCP-AAI at the professional level. Associate exams are $125; professional exams $200–$500. NVIDIA’s entry AI credential (NCA Generative AI/LLMs) sits at #55 (INVEST, $137,500). Source: NVIDIA certification pages, 2026.
Going to Dreamforce? The pass includes a free exam. The September 15–17 conference pass covers one certification exam worth up to $400, Agentforce Specialist among them. Source: Salesforce Help, 2026.
ISACA’s CISM exam changes on November 3. The content outline is being revised, with updated prep material expected this month. If you’re mid-study on the current outline, book before the switch. CISM sits at #31. Source: ISACA exam update notices, 2026.
NUMBER OF THE WEEK
514,359
US cybersecurity job openings in the twelve months to March 2026, up 12% on the year before, with the available workforce covering only 74% of demand. Roughly one cyber role in four is going unfilled. It sits oddly next to the layoff numbers above, but both are true. The market isn’t slowing evenly. It’s slowing hardest for people who can’t document what they can do, and holding up for people who can.
Source: CyberSeek, a NIST-supported program, data for the twelve months ending March 2026.
Your move
A few minutes at certbueno.com/#checker will tell you whether the 15% is already there. It’s free, the result shows before you confirm anything, and it makes you a CertBueno Member, which puts every Top 100 registration page in one place for when you decide.
If the gap isn’t there, the bespoke AI Certification Stacking report tells you which AI certifications complement the ones you already hold, and in what order, built from your benchmark rather than a template.
SEE WHAT YOU’RE REALLY WORTH →
See you next Saturday.
@MrCertBueno
US market data. All figures USD.
CertBueno Top 100 salary figures are top-of-band, Q3 2026 index (published Aug 9, 2026). Verdicts (INVEST / UPGRADE / DIVERSIFY / STABLE) are index labels, not financial advice.
US market data. All figures USD.