Top 7 AI Certifications That Can Make You Rich In 2026

Okay, let's be honest. AI is taking over industries. We're never going back. Easy

industries. We're never going back. Easy

jobs are already asking for AI skills, and most of us aren't ready. But Lucas,

what's the best thing to do now? Well,

it's to get on the plane before it takes off, and you can head to the airport, comfortably, pick your seat, and join the ride. Or you can stay behind

the ride. Or you can stay behind watching everybody else take off where I was going. But here are the good news,

was going. But here are the good news, okay? There's still time to land a job

okay? There's still time to land a job or build a business with AI, and you don't need any experience whatsoever. I

guarantee that. And here are the top seven AI certifications after lots of digging that'll be worth more than most degrees in the future. A bold statement, but I stand by it and it's a sad truth.

So, let's begin. First up is a search for anyone. Harvard University has a

for anyone. Harvard University has a course on AI. It costs nearly $2,000, which is ridiculous, but we're not paying that. No chance. Don't worry,

paying that. No chance. Don't worry,

because you can get practically the same thing for free. Now, the University of Pennsylvania is another highly respected university in the US. They have an almost identical course. And the best

part is this one is actually free, which is pretty cool. It's called AI for Business on Corsera. Now, this course is very simple. You're not going to be

very simple. You're not going to be doing like lots of coding or hard tech stuff. It's for everyone, but you will

stuff. It's for everyone, but you will learn how to make AI useful useful for you and for your company that you work for or that you start. And it only takes

four weeks to complete at about 5 to 10 hours per week. It begins with some AI fundamentals. You know what that stuff

fundamentals. You know what that stuff actually is. And then it focuses on how

actually is. And then it focuses on how AI can be used in marketing and in finance because it really is changing the game. And also how AI is used in HR

the game. And also how AI is used in HR and management. You know, all those

and management. You know, all those recruiters sending you those automatic invites to jobs that don't even exist.

Yeah, bad stuff. And finally, overall AI strategy for companies so you know what's coming and how to make AI useful for you and for your career as well.

It's very important to know this stuff before it happens, before everything falls apart. Hopefully not, but we don't

falls apart. Hopefully not, but we don't know what's coming. And so, I like this course, but it's only a start. So, I'll

give it a 7 out of 10. Now, next up is a top rated course by IBM, our favorite on the channel with no experience or tech skills needed whatsoever. And so last night, I actually opened up Instagram on

my phone just to check something. I I

don't even remember what it was. And I

was shocked. I had already spent 30 minutes when I looked up scrolling for no reason. I didn't learn anything. I

no reason. I didn't learn anything. I

didn't like I had other things to do. It

was just a freaking waste of time. And

obviously like I didn't even notice it.

I take full responsibility, full blame.

It was my fault. But Instagram is highly addictive. It's kind of like a modern

addictive. It's kind of like a modern drug. And that's by design. It's not an

drug. And that's by design. It's not an accident that it's so hard to stop scrolling. AI is working behind the

scrolling. AI is working behind the scenes, analyzing everything that you do, learning what you like, what triggers you, what keeps you emotionally, you know, engaged, and what keeps you scrolling. It shows you

exactly that and more to keep you on the platform hooked. We can talk about the

platform hooked. We can talk about the ethics of this. It's pretty scary, but you know who's responsible? That's an AI product manager. And they make a ton of

product manager. And they make a ton of money. Um, the good or bad, you decide.

money. Um, the good or bad, you decide.

kind of a weird angle to talk about this from. And these guys, they don't code

from. And these guys, they don't code the AI, but they decide how the AI should be used. And then the tech people, they send it over to these guys and they build it. So IBM's product

manager, Cert helps you build the foundational skills for this job in just 3 months or so they claim. But when

there are so many jobs, why should you care about AI product management?

Because one, it's extremely high paying.

I don't need to tell you about it. Just

have a look yourself. Two, it's new, which means there's a gap and an opportunity. Those who get in early can

opportunity. Those who get in early can win this opportunity. And number three, it's an AI job that you can do without tech skills and without coding, which I think is pretty unique and really cool.

Now, I'm not going to bore you to death with all the details about the course and, you know, everything it covers, but it talks about managing products with AI. It's pretty simple and the goal is

AI. It's pretty simple and the goal is to build products with AI because AI plus product management apparently equals success. And I give this one an 8

equals success. And I give this one an 8 out of 10. Next up is Data Camp. They've

been around for over a decade and I've personally been using Data Camp for years. With over 18 million learners,

years. With over 18 million learners, it's a platform you just cannot miss.

Experts at Google, Microsoft, and other top companies teach the courses. And

what I love the most is how handson and practical their learning is. For

beginners, I recommend the AI fundamentals certification. It's only

fundamentals certification. It's only about 10 hours, but it's the perfect way to jump right into AI. It comes with several courses starting from the basics, so you don't need to be some

tech genius to get started. It covers

everything from machine learning basics to generative AI like SHA GPT, large language models, and even the ethical side of AI. You'll get to practice with real projects and test your knowledge

with a timed exam. When you finish, you can get a certification that you can add to your LinkedIn profile to impress recruiters or print out and display proudly on your wall at home. They also

offer a wide range of detailed AI courses for more advanced learners. If

you're a developer, how to use AI. If

you're a data analyst, how to use AI. If

you're just a cool person, how to use AI. You can go all the way with data

AI. You can go all the way with data camp from beginner to intermediate to advanced. For example, for developers or

advanced. For example, for developers or tech professionals aiming to specialize the AI engineer for developers, associate certification is a gamecher.

You'll go deeper into prompt engineering, LLM, chatbot building, and integrating AI into real software. But

nothing is perfect for everyone. Let's

be real. If you want practical skills and to work on projects, data camp is the perfect fit for you because their motto is learning by doing whereas other programs tend to be more theoretical.

Data camp is an affordable option compared to others and learners can even start for free. I'll leave a link in the description for you to use my referral code to receive a discount and support the channel in the process. Thank you. N

out of 10. So, next up is for those looking to earn an honest, serious paycheck from AI jobs by learning the techy stuff. But here you still don't

techy stuff. But here you still don't need any experience. It's just that anybody can learn it and cash in on the AI wave or AI opportunity. And that's

going to be deeplearning.ai, which is a site with over 7 million learners. And now you're thinking, okay,

learners. And now you're thinking, okay, Lucas, how much am I going to have to pay? No, the best part is it's

pay? No, the best part is it's completely free. Their courses are so

completely free. Their courses are so good that you can find them partnering with Microsoft, Stanford, Google, etc. to educate their employees. And here's

how you can earn with it. Of course,

nothing is guaranteed and it takes real work. So, head over to their site, click

work. So, head over to their site, click on courses, pick your level. I'm going

to choose beginner level because I'm a beginner. And you can pick short

beginner. And you can pick short courses, but in an hour or two, you're not going to learn that much. So, what I would do is I would go and pick the courses and specializations. They take a little bit more time, but they give you

way more in return as well. And as you can see, all of these courses are free.

But what AI skills do you actually need?

That's a good thing to determine before you start learning and taking courses and doing all that crap. So these are my top four things. Number one is going to be recognizing potential. You can't do

anything with AI if you don't know its potential. You need to understand what

potential. You need to understand what you can do with it. Number two is assessing risks because before you do anything, you need to consider the risks. They can be pretty severe and

risks. They can be pretty severe and more and more risks are appearing every day with AI. And number three is going to be understanding the technology, learning what tech is necessary and what's right for your AI project. And so

number four is going to be using the tools. For example, having the tech

tools. For example, having the tech skills to, let's say, build an AI. And

everybody doesn't need this. Only the

tech people need to, you know, use the tools and build some AI stuff. People

who really want to get into that. And so

these courses on deep learning AI can help you with all four of these parts.

Whatever you want to do, if you're a beginner, if you're more intermediate, if you're advanced, they can help you do so completely for free. So my score is easily a 9 out of 10 for this opportunity. And so next up is going to

opportunity. And so next up is going to be another AI course from Harvard University, but in this case it's free and that's going to be CS50 introduction to AI with Python. That's a long name.

And this one is going to be more technical, but it's still totally fine for beginners. Now this one is going to

for beginners. Now this one is going to be 7 weeks long, but it is self-paced.

So if you want to do it in one week, you can do so. If you want to do it in 65 years, you can do so as well. And here's

what you're going to learn. So if you don't understand what I'm saying now, don't worry. That's what you have the

don't worry. That's what you have the course for. And um don't worry about it.

course for. And um don't worry about it.

It's going to be graph search algorithms, reinforcement learning, machine learning, AI principles, how to design intelligent systems, how to use AI and Python programs. Wo, a lot of

techy stuff. But what I like about this

techy stuff. But what I like about this course is going to be the depth. So a

lot of people just learn the new skill without really understanding what's behind it. But this is a real university

behind it. But this is a real university course giving you both the like theoretical stuff but also the deep understanding that you need to be able to do lots of things with AI no matter what happens in the future because the

tech itself is going to change like we're not going to have chat GPT forever it's going to become something new everything's going to change but having these foundations allow you to do anything and you can take the course

through edex and it's free so yeah pretty good stuff nine out of 10 next up is going to be an AI course from Microsoft And it's for beginners, but surprisingly nobody knows about it. And

the best part is it's completely free, too. So, all I got to do is head over to

too. So, all I got to do is head over to the Microsoft site because they created a completely free course to learn artificial intelligence. Microsoft is

artificial intelligence. Microsoft is basically curating and putting together the best content available like books, videos, and projects, and just handing it to you for free. Imagine going back a

hundred years and telling somebody that you could get the best information on the best topic completely for free without even leaving your house. It's

that good. So, you can just go and learn this whenever you have some spare time.

Now, I do have to be honest. It's not

all perfect because personally, I couldn't study like this. No chance. I

don't have the patience. I need to sign up for something that's going to hold me accountable like tracking my progress or counting the weeks. I find it extremely difficult to focus over a long time if I

don't have a clear plan and some accountability. And I know a lot of

accountability. And I know a lot of people feel the same. I mean that's why we sign up for courses. We sign up for you know schedules and to get a schedule and you know have some accountability

and actually have a plan. So if you are self-studying and you're taking like a course like the Microsoft one and you're a bit like me then be very careful.

create a system, create a routine, create a schedule, or you could just take the next course, which puts everything together for you nicely in one course. And so, I'm going to give

one course. And so, I'm going to give this one a 6 out of 10, but it's free, so that's nice. Now, next up is going to be the hardest course on the list, and it's the IBM AI engineering. I'm not

saying this to scare you, because it's a good thing that it's hard, because yes, it's going to be difficult, but AI engineering also pays really well. You

could be swimming in money as an AI engineer. And I mean it. Of course,

engineer. And I mean it. Of course,

nothing is guaranteed. You could also drown if you swim in money, too.

But to reach that point, you have to do some hard stuff. And that's what I'm going to show you. In this program, there are 13 different courses. And

yeah, it's going to take you a while to finish these. But they claim to only

finish these. But they claim to only take 4 months part-time, which isn't too bad. I'm not sure if you can really do

bad. I'm not sure if you can really do that realistically if you do it part-time if you're completely new.

might have to look into that and you're going to learn all about the technical stuff of AI. So you can build the AI yourself. You can tune these models and

yourself. You can tune these models and you can make AI really powerful and it comes with different projects and helps building a little portfolio as well. Now

the only thing here is you know it's going to be pretty hard and you do need some experience and you do also need to understand basic high school math. You

need some basic programming skills in Python and a couple of other things. And

if you lack these skills, you could just take a Python course that we talked about before. You can find them down

about before. You can find them down below in the description. And so it really depends on who you are, but I would say for most people, they should start with one of the beginner searchs I mentioned earlier in this video. I also

found over five more AI searchs for beginners that lead to high salaries.

Click right here and check them out. And

goodbye, my friend.