Opportunities for Students

Microsoft offers a lot of resources to get students into the cloud, here are some opportunities that Microsoft offers.

Azure for Students

Azure for Students - Similar to the Free Azure Account but better. If you have an email address from your school, you should be eligible for this offer. Credit card isn’t needed. You get:

• 100$ in azure credits for 12 months (renewable if you are still a student)
• Various free Azure services for 12 months
• Product Keys for various Microsoft products. To access these keys, go to Azure, search Education in to search bar on top. In the Education resource, go to Software and just hit Claim Key on the products. I recommend copying those keys over so you don’t lose them (If you get an error after claiming a lot of them, wait 24h)

Note

The Product Keys might not be available if your school isn’t a customer of Microsoft.

University credits for certifications - If your university allows it, you can gain credits for your certifications. There are also credits for fundamental exams which are really easy to obtain.

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GitHub Student Developer Pack

The GitHub Student Developer Pack gives free access to the best developer tools and services. You just need to verify your student status through GitHub. Some offers that are relevant for preparation of Microsoft certifications include:

Microsoft Azure - $100 in Azure credits and 25+ free services for 12 months. Perfect for hands-on lab practice for any Azure, AI, data, or security exam.

GitHub Copilot - Free AI-powered code completion while you’re a student. Great for building certification prep projects and exploring cloud SDKs.

GitHub Codespaces - Free Pro-level cloud dev environments. Spin up a browser-based VS Code instance to run labs without any local setup.

DataCamp - 3 months of free access to data and AI courses. Relevant for AI-900, AI-102, DP-100, DP-300, DP-600 and other data/AI certifications.

Microsoft Visual Studio Dev Essentials - VS Community, plus $200 Azure credit for the first month and free Pluralsight training.

MongoDB - $50 Atlas credits plus free MongoDB certification valued at $150. Relevant for DP-420 and data engineering certs.

Visual Studio Code - Free IDE with coding packs for Java, Python, and .NET — all useful for development tasks during your learning.

GitHub Pro - Free while you’re a student. Includes advanced collaboration tools, required actions minutes, and more.

Note

Your school email alone won’t always grant you GitHub Student access — you may also need to provide proof of enrollment (student ID, transcript, or enrollment letter).