10 books for DevOps engineers to read in 2024.

Andrey Byhalenko
6 min readJun 10, 2024

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In this article, you will find a list of 10 books for DevOps engineers.

This list is based on my personal experience. I have read each of these books and found them helpful. Some of these books are technical, and some cover aspects such as behavior and soft skills.

What I learned in these books helped me a lot and continues to help me in my career.

Photo by Tom Hermans on Unsplash

The Phoenix Project

The Wall Street Journal bestseller with over half a million sales.

“Every person involved in a failed IT project should be forced to read this book.”―Tim O’Reilly, Founder and CEO of O’Reilly Media.

“The Phoenix Project is a must read for business and IT executives who are struggling with the growing complexity of IT.”―Jim Whitehurst, President and CEO, Red Hat, Inc.

From my point of view, every DevOps engineer must read this book. It will teach you to understand how the business side works and “see the big picture.”

The Phoenix Project on Amazon: https://amzn.to/3VoKn7c

The DevOps Handbook

Must-read for anyone involved in software development and IT operations.

The second edition features 15 new case studies, including stories from Adidas, American Airlines, Fannie Mae, Target, and the US Air Force. In addition, renowned researcher and coauthor of Accelerate, Dr. Nicole Forsgren, provides her insights through new and updated material and research.

With over 100 pages of new content throughout the book, this expanded edition is a must-read for anyone who works with technology.

The DevOps Handbook on Amazon: https://amzn.to/3yUsVjg

Engineers Survival Guide

This book will teach you how to survive in an industry.

Inside, you will find a summary of advice, tactics, and tricks learned the hard way through many years of working on mission-critical components, complex system designs supporting billions of users, and working with thousands of the most brilliant engineers around the world.

Have a survival guide for most situations you’ll be facing throughout your career as an engineer, and learn how to play for the long game.

Engineers Survival Guide on Amazon: https://amzn.to/4egH4Y7

The DevOps Career Handbook

This book will help you to explore the diverse DevOps career paths and prepare for each stage of the interview process with collective wisdom from DevOps experts and interviews with DevOps practitioners.

The DevOps Career Handbook is filled with hundreds of tips and tricks from experts regarding every step of the interview process, helping you save time and money by steering clear of avoidable mistakes.

The DevOps Career Handbook on Amazon: https://amzn.to/3KAIRcV

System Design Interview

In my opinion, anyone involved in software development must read this book.

This book provides a step-by-step framework for how to tackle system design questions. It includes many real-world examples to illustrate the systematic approach, with detailed steps that you can follow.

You will learn a lot about system design and architecture.

System Design Interview Volume 1 on Amazon: https://amzn.to/4ee1d14

System Design Interview Volume 2 on Amazon: https://amzn.to/3yTXzcx

Computer Networking Bible

The more you, as a DevOps engineer, know about networking, the more in demand you are.

By knowing about networking, you can ensure that the systems they manage run efficiently and securely. This book is a comprehensive crash course for both beginners and intermediate engineers.

If you are looking to understand how networking works, this book is for you.

Computer Networking Bible on Amazon: https://amzn.to/4bP4wu7

UNIX and Linux System Administration Handbook

As a DevOps engineer, you need to know Linux very well.

UNIX® and Linux® System Administration Handbook, Fifth Edition, is today’s definitive guide to installing, configuring, and maintaining any UNIX or Linux system, including systems that supply core Internet and cloud infrastructure.

It’s probably the best book on Linux system administration.

UNIX and Linux System Administration Handbook on Amazon: https://amzn.to/3Xh70g5

Site Reliability Engineering

This book explains how Google runs production systems.

In this collection of essays and articles, key members of Google’s Site Reliability Team explain how and why their commitment to the entire lifecycle has enabled the company to successfully build, deploy, monitor, and maintain some of the largest software systems in the world.

You’ll learn the principles and practices that enable Google engineers to make systems more scalable, reliable, and efficient.

Site Reliability Engineering on Amazon: https://amzn.to/45fCLrS

Infrastructure as Code

With this practical book, Kief Morris of ThoughtWorks shows you how to effectively use principles, practices, and patterns pioneered by DevOps teams to manage cloud-age infrastructure.

You’ll learn how to define everything as code and apply software design and engineering practices to build your system from small, loosely coupled pieces.

Infrastructure as Code on Amazon: https://amzn.to/3yQJr3H

Hello, Startup

If you’re thinking of entering the tech industry, you need to read this.

This book is the “Hello, World” tutorial for building products, technologies, and teams in a startup environment. It’s based on the experiences of the author, Yevgeniy (Jim) Brikman, as well as interviews with programmers from some of the most successful startups of the last decade, including Google, Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, GitHub, Stripe, Instagram, AdMob, Pinterest, and many others.

Whether you’re a programmer at the beginning of your career, a seasoned developer bored with large company politics, or a manager looking to motivate your engineers, this book is for you.

Hello, Startup on Amazon: https://amzn.to/3VerQdz

I hope you liked this 10 books for DevOps engineer, which i selected from my small library.

Enjoy!

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Disclosure:
I’m writing my free articles not for profit, but I need compensation to operate this website like any other website owner on the internet.
I may receive consideration from Amazon for affiliate links, but I’m totally unbiased and do not accept paid reviews or fake reviews. Every book I promote, it’s the book I purchased myself, read, and found useful.

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Andrey Byhalenko

I'm a DevOps Engineer, Photography Enthusiast, and Traveler. I write articles aimed at junior DevOps engineers and those aspiring to become DevOps engineers.