Home/Career Paths/MLOps Engineer

MLOps Engineer career pathRoadmap, skills, salary and how to become a MLOps Engineer in 2026

An MLOps engineer takes machine-learning models from a notebook to production and keeps them healthy: data and training pipelines, model serving, monitoring for drift, and automated retraining.

4stages
12steps
134hours of skills
0%your progress

MLOps Engineer roadmap

Open any step to see its lessons, tools and lab, and mark it as learning or done. Your progress is saved in this browser only.

1

Foundations

3 steps · 28 hours
Python fundamentals12h

Write clean, working Python programs

What you learn

  • Syntax, variables and data types
  • Control flow and functions
  • Lists, dicts and comprehensions
  • Files, modules and packages
  • Errors and exceptions
  • Virtual environments and pip

Tools

PythonVS Code

Hands-on lab

Build a command-line tool that cleans and summarises CSV data

Learn it at SOTT

MLOps Engineering: Notebook to Production · Generative AI & RAG Engineering · AI Agents with LLMs

Git & GitHub6h

Collaborate on code with Git like a professional team

What you learn

  • Repositories, commits and history
  • Branching and merging
  • Pull requests and code review
  • Resolving merge conflicts
  • GitHub workflows for teams

Tools

GitGitHub

Hands-on lab

Run a team pull-request workflow end to end

Learn it at SOTT

MLOps Engineering: Notebook to Production · DevSecOps: Secure CI/CD & Supply Chain · Getting Started with Cloud Automation

Linux essentials10h

Work confidently on Linux servers from the command line

What you learn

  • Shell, files and the Linux filesystem
  • Users, groups and permissions
  • Processes and services with systemd
  • Package management (apt, dnf)
  • Networking commands: ip, ss, curl, dig
  • Bash scripting basics

Tools

LinuxBash

Hands-on lab

Automate a web server setup with a Bash script

Learn it at SOTT

DevSecOps: Secure CI/CD & Supply Chain · SRE & Observability · Getting Started with Cloud Automation

2

Core skills

3 steps · 36 hours
Machine learning14h

Build and evaluate machine learning models

What you learn

  • Supervised and unsupervised learning
  • Regression and classification
  • Model evaluation
  • Feature engineering
  • scikit-learn pipelines

Tools

scikit-learnpandas

Hands-on lab

Customer churn prediction model

Learn it at SOTT

MLOps Engineering: Notebook to Production · Azure MLOps Engineer (AI-300) · Data Science Fundamentals

Docker & containers10h

Package and run any app in containers

What you learn

  • Images and Dockerfiles
  • Volumes and networks
  • Docker Compose
  • Registries
  • Image hardening and Podman

Tools

DockerPodmanCompose

Hands-on lab

Containerise a three-service application

Learn it at SOTT

MLOps Engineering: Notebook to Production · DevSecOps: Secure CI/CD & Supply Chain · Forward Deployed Engineer Program

CI/CD pipelines12h

Build reliable CI/CD pipelines

What you learn

  • GitHub Actions
  • Jenkins pipelines
  • Artifacts and versioning
  • Environments and approvals
  • Rollbacks and release strategies

Tools

GitHub ActionsJenkins

Hands-on lab

Pipeline that tests, builds and deploys on every push

Learn it at SOTT

MLOps Engineering: Notebook to Production · DevSecOps: Secure CI/CD & Supply Chain · Automation Testing with AI: Playwright & API

3

Advanced

3 steps · 44 hours
MLOps14h

Take models from notebook to production

What you learn

  • Experiment tracking with MLflow
  • Training pipelines
  • Model registry
  • Model serving with FastAPI and KServe
  • Monitoring and drift

Tools

MLflowFastAPIKServeDocker

Hands-on lab

Train-to-serve pipeline with automatic retraining

Learn it at SOTT

MLOps Engineering: Notebook to Production · Azure MLOps Engineer (AI-300) · AWS AI & Machine Learning (MLA-C02)

Kubernetes core16h

Deploy and run applications on Kubernetes

What you learn

  • Cluster architecture
  • Pods, Deployments and Services
  • ConfigMaps and Secrets
  • Storage and StatefulSets
  • Ingress and networking
  • Helm charts

Tools

KuberneteskubectlHelm

Hands-on lab

Deploy a production-style app with Helm

Learn it at SOTT

MLOps Engineering: Notebook to Production · DevSecOps: Secure CI/CD & Supply Chain · Platform Engineering with Kubernetes & Terraform

Data engineering14h

Build reliable data pipelines at scale

What you learn

  • Data modelling and the lakehouse
  • Apache Spark and PySpark
  • Databricks
  • Orchestration with Airflow
  • Data quality
  • Microsoft Fabric pipelines

Tools

SparkDatabricksAirflowFabric

Hands-on lab

Batch and streaming pipeline into a lakehouse

Learn it at SOTT

Data Engineering: Spark, Databricks & Microsoft Fabric

4

Job-ready

3 steps · 26 hours
LLMOps8h

Run LLM applications reliably in production

What you learn

  • Prompt versioning
  • Evaluation suites
  • Tracing and observability
  • Guardrails
  • Cost control

Tools

LangSmithLangfuse

Hands-on lab

Evaluation harness that scores every release

Learn it at SOTT

MLOps Engineering: Notebook to Production · LLMOps & AI Observability · Azure MLOps Engineer (AI-300)

Observability & SRE12h

Run reliable systems with SRE practices

What you learn

  • Metrics, logs and traces
  • Prometheus and Grafana
  • OpenTelemetry
  • SLOs and error budgets
  • Incident response and postmortems

Tools

PrometheusGrafanaOpenTelemetry

Hands-on lab

SLO dashboard with burn-rate alerts

Learn it at SOTT

LLMOps & AI Observability · DevSecOps: Secure CI/CD & Supply Chain · Platform Engineering with Kubernetes & Terraform

Career launch6h

Present your skills confidently to employers

What you learn

  • Resume and LinkedIn that get shortlisted
  • Building your project portfolio
  • Interview preparation and mock rounds
  • Job search strategy

Tools

LinkedIn

Hands-on lab

Mock technical + HR interview with feedback

Learn it at SOTT

MLOps Engineering: Notebook to Production · Generative AI & RAG Engineering · DevSecOps: Secure CI/CD & Supply Chain

How to become a MLOps Engineer

A practical, step-by-step plan. Skip any step you already know.

  1. 1
    Start with the foundations: Python fundamentals, Git & GitHub and Linux essentials

    3 steps · about 28 hours

  2. 2
    Build the core skills: Machine learning, Docker & containers and CI/CD pipelines

    3 steps · about 36 hours

  3. 3
    Go deeper: MLOps, Kubernetes core and Data engineering

    3 steps · about 44 hours

  4. 4
    Get job-ready: LLMOps, Observability & SRE and Career launch

    3 steps · about 26 hours

  5. 5
    Build two or three portfolio projects

    Use the hands-on labs in each step, publish your work on GitHub and write a short README for each project. Projects are what interviewers ask about first.

  6. 6
    Prepare for interviews

    Practise the questions asked for this role, do mock interviews and polish your resume and LinkedIn profile. Practise MLOps Engineer interview questions →

  7. 7
    Apply for MLOps Engineer roles

    Start with roles that match your current level, keep learning on the job, and grow towards the senior skills in this path.

MLOps Engineer salary in India (2026)

Indicative yearly pay, in lakh rupees (LPA). Pay varies with city, company, skills and certifications, so use these as a guide, not a promise.

Entry level0–2 years
₹6–12 LPA
Mid level3–5 years
₹12–25 LPA
Senior / lead6+ years
₹25–40 LPA

Rounded ranges from public salary surveys (AmbitionBox, Glassdoor and PayScale India), checked November 2026. Bangalore, Hyderabad and Pune often pay above these ranges, and product companies and global capability centres pay more than service companies.

Read next

Courses that take you there

How it compares

MLOps vs DevOps

DevOps ships application code. MLOps also has to version data and models, track experiments, and watch model quality after release.

MLOps vs LLMOps

LLMOps applies MLOps ideas to large language model apps: prompt and model versioning, evaluation, guardrails, cost and latency monitoring.

MLOps Engineer career path FAQ

How long does it take to become a MLOps Engineer?+
This path covers about 134 hours of hands-on learning across 12 modules. How quickly you finish depends on your starting point and weekly time; our advisors can plan a timeline that fits you.
How do I become a MLOps Engineer?+
Follow the stages in order: foundations, core skills, advanced and job-ready, then build two or three portfolio projects, prepare for interviews and apply. If you already know a topic, mark it done and skip ahead.
What is the MLOps Engineer salary in India?+
As an indicative guide from public salary surveys, about ₹6–12 lakh a year at entry level, ₹12–25 lakh with 3–5 years and ₹25–40 lakh for senior roles. Pay varies a lot with city, company, skills and certifications.
Where should I start?+
With the Foundations stage: Python fundamentals, Git & GitHub and Linux essentials. If you already know a topic, mark it as done and move to the next one.
What is the difference: MLOps vs DevOps?+
DevOps ships application code. MLOps also has to version data and models, track experiments, and watch model quality after release.
What is the difference: MLOps vs LLMOps?+
LLMOps applies MLOps ideas to large language model apps: prompt and model versioning, evaluation, guardrails, cost and latency monitoring.
Which SOTT courses cover this path?+
MLOps Engineering: Notebook to Production, LLMOps & AI Observability and Azure MLOps Engineer (AI-300). Each one is taught live, in our Chennai classroom or online, with hands-on labs and placement assistance.
I have another question. Who can I ask?+
Our advisors are happy to help. Call or WhatsApp us, or send a message from the Contact page, and we will get back to you within one working day.

More role paths

Learn it with a mentor

Want to follow a path with live classes, labs and placement assistance?

Our advisors will match the path to the right SOTT course for your background.