DevOps Engineer Resume Keywords: CI/CD & Cloud Skills (2026)

DevOps is one of the most keyword-dense fields in tech. Between cloud providers, CI/CD tools, monitoring stacks, and infrastructure as code—there's a lot to cover.

Most DevOps resumes list tools without context. The keywords below are organized by category so you can match the exact terms ATS systems scan for.

This guide gives you the complete keyword list by tool category and seniority level. For the system on turning these keywords into quantified impact bullets, see our Professional Impact Dictionary.

CI/CD Keywords

CI/CD Tools

Jenkins
GitHub Actions
GitLab CI/CD
CircleCI
Travis CI
Azure DevOps
Bamboo
TeamCity
ArgoCD
Spinnaker
Tekton

CI/CD Concepts

Continuous Integration
Continuous Delivery
Continuous Deployment
Pipeline as Code
Build automation
Automated testing
Deployment automation
Release management
Blue-green deployment
Canary deployment
Rolling updates
Feature flags

Pipeline Skills

Pipeline design
Pipeline optimization
Build optimization
Parallel builds
Caching strategies
Artifact management
Environment management

Containerization Keywords

Container Technologies

Docker
Docker Compose
Podman
containerd
CRI-O

Kubernetes

Kubernetes (K8s)
kubectl
Helm
Kustomize
K8s operators
Pod management
Deployments
Services
Ingress
ConfigMaps
Secrets
Namespaces
RBAC

Kubernetes Ecosystem

EKS (AWS)
GKE (Google)
AKS (Azure)
OpenShift
Rancher
K3s
Kind
Minikube

Service Mesh

Istio
Linkerd
Consul Connect
Traffic management
Service discovery
mTLS

Cloud Platform Keywords

AWS Services

EC2
ECS
EKS
Lambda
S3
RDS
DynamoDB
CloudFormation
IAM
VPC
Route 53
CloudWatch
CloudTrail
API Gateway
SNS/SQS
Elastic Load Balancer
Auto Scaling

Google Cloud Services

Compute Engine
GKE
Cloud Run
Cloud Functions
Cloud Storage
Cloud SQL
BigQuery
Pub/Sub
Cloud Build
Cloud Monitoring

Azure Services

Azure VMs
AKS
Azure Functions
Azure DevOps
Blob Storage
Azure SQL
Cosmos DB
Azure Monitor
App Service

Multi-Cloud

Multi-cloud strategy
Cloud agnostic
Hybrid cloud
Cloud migration
Cloud cost optimization
FinOps

Infrastructure as Code

IaC Tools

Terraform
AWS CloudFormation
Pulumi
AWS CDK
Crossplane
Ansible
Chef
Puppet
SaltStack

Terraform Specific

Terraform modules
Terraform state
Terraform workspaces
HCL
Provider management
Remote backends
Terraform Cloud

Configuration Management

Ansible playbooks
Ansible roles
Ansible Galaxy
Inventory management
Idempotency
Configuration drift

Monitoring & Observability

Metrics

Prometheus
Grafana
Datadog
New Relic
CloudWatch
Azure Monitor
InfluxDB
Telegraf

Logging

ELK Stack (Elasticsearch, Logstash, Kibana)
Splunk
Fluentd
Fluent Bit
Loki
CloudWatch Logs
Structured logging

Tracing

Jaeger
Zipkin
OpenTelemetry
AWS X-Ray
Distributed tracing
Trace correlation

Alerting

PagerDuty
Opsgenie
VictorOps
Alert management
On-call rotation
Incident response
Runbooks

Security Keywords

Security Tools

HashiCorp Vault
AWS Secrets Manager
SOPS
SealedSecrets
Trivy
Snyk
Aqua Security
Falco

Security Concepts

DevSecOps
Shift-left security
Container security
Image scanning
Vulnerability scanning
Secret management
IAM policies
Least privilege
Network security
Compliance automation

Compliance

SOC 2
HIPAA
PCI-DSS
GDPR
Security audits
Policy as Code
OPA (Open Policy Agent)

Scripting & Automation

Languages

Python
Bash
Go
PowerShell
Ruby
Perl

Automation Concepts

Infrastructure automation
Deployment automation
Task automation
Cron jobs
Scheduled tasks
Event-driven automation
Self-healing systems
Auto-remediation

Networking Keywords

Networking Concepts

TCP/IP
DNS
Load balancing
Reverse proxy
SSL/TLS
Firewalls
VPN
CDN
Network security groups

Tools

Nginx
HAProxy
Traefik
Envoy
CloudFlare

Version Control & Collaboration

Git

Git
GitHub
GitLab
Bitbucket
Git workflows
GitFlow
Trunk-based development
Code review
Pull requests
Branch protection

Action Verbs for DevOps

For Infrastructure

Automated
Provisioned
Deployed
Configured
Managed
Maintained
Scaled
Migrated

For Reliability

Improved
Optimized
Reduced (downtime, costs)
Increased (uptime, reliability)
Monitored
Troubleshot
Resolved
Stabilized

For Process

Implemented
Designed
Established
Standardized
Streamlined
Documented
Trained
Led

Keywords by Experience Level

Junior DevOps (0-2 years)

Linux basics
Git
Docker
Basic CI/CD
Cloud fundamentals
Scripting basics
Monitoring basics

Mid-Level DevOps (3-5 years)

Kubernetes
Terraform
Advanced CI/CD
Multiple cloud platforms
IaC best practices
Observability stack
Security basics

Senior DevOps (6+ years)

Architecture design
Platform engineering
Multi-cloud strategy
Cost optimization
Team leadership
Incident management
Compliance
DevSecOps

Quick Reference: Top 50 DevOps Keywords

Kubernetes
Docker
Terraform
AWS
CI/CD
Jenkins
GitHub Actions
Python
Bash
Linux
Ansible
Prometheus
Grafana
ELK Stack
Helm
GitLab CI
CloudFormation
Infrastructure as Code
Microservices
Containerization
GCP
Azure
EC2
S3
Lambda
RDS
VPC
IAM
Security
Monitoring
Logging
Alerting
Automation
Scripting
Deployment
Pipeline
ArgoCD
Git
Agile
Incident response
On-call
Troubleshooting
Performance
Scalability
High availability
Disaster recovery
Backup
Cost optimization
Documentation
Cross-functional

Build your ATS-optimized DevOps engineer resume with the right keywords

Keyword Strategy

Lead with Core Tools

Put your strongest, most relevant tools first:

Strong opening: "DevOps Engineer with expertise in Kubernetes, Terraform, and AWS, building CI/CD pipelines with GitHub Actions"

Quantify Operational Impact

Deployment frequency
Lead time
MTTR (Mean Time to Recovery)
Uptime percentage
Cost savings
Infrastructure scale

Example: "Reduced deployment time from 2 hours to 15 minutes through automated CI/CD pipelines"

Show the Full Stack

DevOps spans many areas. Show breadth:

CI/CD
Containerization
Cloud
IaC
Monitoring
Security

Match Tool Names Exactly

ATS systems are literal. If the job description says "GitHub Actions," don't write "GH Actions." If they want "Terraform," don't write "IaC tools." Mirror the exact tool names from the posting.

Context Beats Lists

A skills section gets you past ATS. Context in your bullet points gets you the interview. For every tool listed in your skills, include at least one bullet proving you used it at scale.

Example: Instead of listing "Kubernetes" in skills, write "Managed 50-node Kubernetes cluster across 3 environments, supporting 200+ microservices with 99.99% uptime."

Common DevOps Keyword Mistakes

The biggest mistake is listing tools without operational context. Every recruiter has seen "Docker, Kubernetes, Terraform" — but few resumes explain what was containerized, how many services were orchestrated, or what infrastructure was provisioned.

Another common error is omitting soft operational skills like incident management, runbook creation, and cross-team collaboration. Senior DevOps roles increasingly value communication and documentation alongside technical depth.

Certification Keywords

DevOps certifications carry real weight in ATS matching. Include the full certification name exactly as issued: "AWS Certified DevOps Engineer – Professional," "Certified Kubernetes Administrator (CKA)," or "HashiCorp Certified: Terraform Associate." Abbreviated versions may not match ATS filters.

Keyword Density Guidelines

Aim for 20-30 relevant keywords spread across your resume. DevOps is tool-heavy, so your skills section will naturally be dense. Reinforce your top 5-8 tools with contextual bullets in your experience section showing operational scale and measurable impact.

For full formatting tips and examples, see our DevOps Engineer Resume Guide.

DevOps Engineer Resume Keywords: CI/CD, Cloud & Automation