I'm Andrew Brown and I'm known for my free AWS Certification courses I publish on freeCodeCamp. I appreciate the community support but, I am not the only one working hard to help you change careers into the cloud. ☁️
I have 9 channels and I want to tell you Why I recommend them. Just so you know I have numbered them from 1-9 below but, it's to help you follow along and does not indicate a ranking.
Some of these channels deserve more subscribers then they currently have, so make a cloud content creator's day and hit that subscribe button.
So let us get to it:
1. Bart Castle 🇺🇸 (CloudBart)
Bart Castle is an AWS Instructor at CBT Nuggets. CBT Nuggets is generally known for Networking Certification training but they do have AWS Certification training. They run a monthly AWS free study group that is led by Bart.
If I only had three words to describe Bart it is:
- ⛺ Yurt
- 🦖 Dinos
- 🎷 Free-Style-Flute
To make sense of that you have to watch his channel.
Bart is great at face-to-face instruction. What I mean by that is that he can captivate and communicate Cloud information with no visual tools whatsoever. It's like he paints a picture in your head with just his face and words.
He does have props, draws on the screen like an interactive whiteboard, and has some visual effects to polish the learning experience but even if he didn't, he's still worth a watch.
A good place to start is with his AWS Identity And Access Management playlist which is essential knowledge for all AWS Certifications.
2. Gwyneth Peña S 🇺🇸
Gwyneth is a new up and coming channel that focuses on Microsoft Azure and so far has had an emphasis on Serverless and Azure Functions.
Her style of teaching is learn by doing, and you can see that since she jumps straight into Visual Studio Code editor.
She has one video in Spanish and one video about Cloud Engineering career advice. It will be interesting to see how her channel evolves the channel.
Her format is very well suited for Twitch live coding so it would not surprise me if we see live-streaming in the future and then posting on youtube, but we'll just have to wait and find out.
3. Neal Davis 🇦🇺 (Digital Cloud Training)
Neal creates full AWS certification courses and practice exams like myself. His teaching style format is similar to mine where he does lecture, labs and practice exam question walkthroughs
The key difference is pacing and depth. I am fast and shallow, Neal goes slow and deep. (Please no jokes).
If there is something that I don't cover in-depth, I point them to Neal's content.
If you like using Facebook he has a Facebook Study Group
Neal has more practice exam questions than me. I don't know what his secret is to produce so many but, if he wants to tell I'll be happy to listen 🙃
Here's an example of Neal going in greater depth than me in a topic. The Shared Responsibility Model is essential for all AWS Certifications.
4. Chirag Nayyar 🇸🇬
Chirag is ☁️ ⚡ the master of cross-cloud ⚡ ☁️. He has 20+ Cloud Certifications from AWS to Azure to GCP to Alibaba.
He is the best person to tell you how to study and to eliminate any blind spots in your cloud knowledge and, he has many videos on study habits and study strategy.
I had never considered going cross-cloud until Chirag. Although I focus on AWS going cross-cloud it made me better at AWS like using Active Directory.
He also has free lecture videos like me, and in fact, he has a full course on the AZ-900. You can pass the AZ-900 as Chirag has a 7-day course starting with this video here:
5. Sandip Das 🇮🇳
There's a new wave of hot, young and creative content creators that in a few years will make me look like I'm teaching QBasic in 1987. And yes, I know QBasic came out in 1991.
Sandip is an AWS Container Hero but he should really be called an AWS DevOps Hero. He is already blazing forward with modern teaching techniques with real-time engagement you'd only expect to find in gaming streams.
DevOps is one of the easiest entries in the Cloud industry, and Sandip is young enough to bridge that knowledge gap but old enough to get you in the industry knowledge to get the job.
If you're looking for a cloud mentor he has a pateron.
6. AWS Simplified 🇨🇦
AWS Simplified is a channel that produces deep-dives on very specific AWS topics in the context of practical application.
I said Neal's content goes deep, but AWS Simplified goes even deeper with a twist. That being said they only have around 100 videos at this time because lots of research has to go into contextualizing practical knowledge and into lecture content.
Also if you wondering who is AWS Simplified, well they are based in Toronto and that's all I can tell you.
I don't know why they are semi-anonymous and there could be a good reason. I do feel that this hinders the channel's growth.
The kind of content they make is very valuable but because it's not "packaged" as AWS Certification and Youtube it does not reward byte-size content in the first format. I bet the content creator doesn't make a lot of money.
So I urge you to donate to their pateron
7. Alejandra Quetzalli 🇺🇸 🇲🇽
Alejandra is a Cloud Developer Advocate for AWS who specializes in Robots, Newbies and Inclusion. She is the ideal role model in my opinion and is the future of cloud developer advocacy.
She has started her own personal project called "What The Cloud?" A youtube channel design to teach cloud concepts with inclusion and is the friendliest in mind.
Ale's co-instructor is the infamous Jonathan Dion, who is well known here in Canada for his live-instructions on hard topics like Amazon SageMaker.
Ale's videos take longer to produce because of careful consideration of how to best engineer them for the newbie market. She also is making efforts to make her content accessible by offering them in Spanish and French.
If you ever have any Cloud Fan Art I'm sure she'd love to receive some.
8. Namrata H Shah 🇺🇸
Namrata is an AWS Community and a Microsoft MVP. She has lots of videos on Cloud Computing. What I like about her content is that it's personal, practical and gets to the point.
She is not on Twitter 😱 and I think if she was present there you'd see her overall channel and she would have greater popularity.
You'll notice in my videos that I bold, highlight and mark things in red, Namrata was my inspiration for this because I realized doing this helps information stick.
Even though she is not on Twitter you can find her on LinkedIn
9. Marcia Villalba 🇫🇮 🇺🇾
Marcia was an AWS Serverless Hero turned AWS Developer Advocate which is an incredible achievement and shows her love and dedication to AWS and the cloud.
Her channel is FooBar Serverless. Though it has Serverless in the name, Marcia is one of those peoples that are good at everything.
When I need to implement something on the ExamPro platform I will be looking through her videos to find a how-to.
- I used her videos to implement Cognito on ExamPro
- I used her videos to use DynamoDB single-table design on ExamPro
- I used her videos to implement API Gateway on ExamPro
Marcia has done a few videos on AWS Certification and I hope she continues to produce more because they were excellent.
P.S.
For future FREE Cloud Youtube Channel recommendations, I will keep them up-to-date on my ExamPro Channel Homepage
P.S.S.
If you believe in free cloud content and need help getting visibility or traction as a cloud content creator, my email is always open at andrew@exampro.co
Top comments (3)
Your words really got to my soul, so to speak! Thank you for the kind words, they mean a lot!! you know how it goes... one works hard and tries to do a good job but we often focus only on what we haven't yet accomplished or what we need to improve.. and we can be too hard on ourselves at times. Thank you for the encouragement 💜🤖🤟🏽
Your welcome. I really want to see people submit cloud fan art
Nice list, Thank you. 😄