Throughline

Technology

Computer Network Architect in the United States

161 postings read · sampled 2026-10-01 · source ats · 45 employers · largest 19% of it

What employers actually ask for

Credentials named in the 161 postings we read, ranked by how many mentioned each one.

What it costs

Exam and application fees plus typical self-study hours. Almost nobody needs every credential on this list — start with the top line.

Most-asked-for, on its own
$700CCNP · ~300 hrs
asked for in 38 of 161 postings — 24%
If you earned all 3 of them
$3,050
fees checked 2026-08
1450 hrs
1450 hours — over a year at 10 hrs/wk

Not in the total: Bachelor's Degree — cost varies by institution; Secret Security Clearance — sponsored by an employer, not purchasable; TS/SCI — sponsored by an employer, not purchasable.

Lower signal for this role

Credentials that barely appeared in this sample. That is not a claim they are worthless — plenty are valuable for a different job, a different city, or a promotion later. It is a claim that employers here mostly did not ask.

What the official taxonomy says

O*NET surveys people already doing this job. That describes who got hired over a long window, not what employers are asking for now — where it disagrees with the counts above, the counts are the more current answer.

Education reported by people doing this job
55%reported bachelor’s degree
  • Bachelor’s degree55%
  • Associate’s degree or other 2-year degree15%
  • Post-secondary certificate15%

Job Zone Four: Considerable Preparation Needed. Most of these occupations require a four-year bachelor's degree, but some do not.

O*NET 15-1241.00 · pulled 2026-10-01 · percentages are of surveyed workers, each rounded separately, so they need not total 100

What it pays

BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, May 2025. A different survey from the postings above, so the two do not share a sample.

$79,900
10th percentile
$134,050
median
$202,680
90th percentile

Every credential above costs $3,050 — about 6 days' pay at the median.

Who was hiring

Employers with at least one matching posting in this sample.

SpaceX · Cloudflare · Ask IT Consulting · vTech Solution · Artech Information System · C3EL · 360 IT Professionals · OpenAI · Stem Xpert · Anduril Industries · Collabera · Rocket Lab · Astranis · IonQ · Roblox · System Canada Technologies · USM · Zoox · ASSYST Inc · Bosch · Coinbase · Deegit Inc · 1X · Agility Robotics · Atlas Energy Solutions · Attentive · Blink Health · Braze · Cognition · Convene · Databricks · Elastic · Etched · Freenome · Intuitive Surgical · MongoDB · Peloton · Samsara · Saronic · SBT Global · Skydio · Sonsoft Inc · Twilio · Wealthfront · Zum Services

Next

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