Issued by Quantum Academy · Professional Certification
The Post-Quantum Certified program

Post-Quantum Certified

The first dedicated professional certification program for post-quantum cryptography migration. Five credentials covering the full lifecycle, from cryptographic assessment through to verified deployment.

Explore the certifications → All on quantumacademy.com
Why this program exists

Credentials for the migration that has already started

NIST has finalized post-quantum standards. Regulatory deadlines are live. The harvest-now-decrypt-later threat is active today. Organizations across every sector need professionals who can assess cryptographic exposure, plan and govern migration programs, design post-quantum architectures, and verify implementations.

Post-Quantum Certified is the first and currently the only professional certification program specifically for post-quantum cryptography migration. Built on the open-source Applied Quantum PQC Migration Framework and developed by practitioners who have led real migrations, it offers five role-aligned credentials, each independent of any vendor. Four are earned by proctored exam, and the fifth is awarded automatically to anyone holding all three specializations.

The certification path

How the credentials fit together

Start with the foundational Specialist credential, then pursue any of the three specialized certifications. Hold all three and the Expert capstone is awarded automatically.

Post-Quantum Foundation  (half-day course · certificate of attendance)
         │
         ▼
       PQCS — Post-Quantum Certified Specialist   (foundational)
        ╱      │      ╲
       ╱       │       ╲
      ▼        ▼        ▼
   PQCM      PQCA      PQCV     (three specialized certifications)
   Manager   Architect Validator
      ╲        │        ╱
       ╲       │       ╱
        ▼      ▼      ▼
       PQCX — Post-Quantum Certified Expert   (auto-awarded capstone)
Five credentials

The Post-Quantum Certified credentials

Each credential maps to a specific professional role in PQC migration. Click through to its dedicated page for full details.

Post-Quantum Track

Cryptographic migration and security

One foundational credential, three specializations for the people who manage, design, and verify the work, and a capstone that recognizes holding all three at once.

PQCS — Post-Quantum Certified Specialist badge
PQCS

Post-Quantum Certified Specialist

Foundational

Where every migration starts. Cryptographic discovery across an estate nobody has fully inventoried, algorithm assessment against the finalized standards, and the plan that follows from both. Required before any specialization.

Learn more →
PQCM — Post-Quantum Certified Manager badge
PQCM

Post-Quantum Certified Manager

Specialized

For the person accountable for the program. Governance that survives a budget cycle, regulatory mapping, sequencing across multiple years, and the reporting that keeps executives committed after the first approval.

Learn more →
PQCA — Post-Quantum Certified Architect badge
PQCA

Post-Quantum Certified Architect

Specialized

For the person who designs the target state. Algorithm selection under real performance constraints, hybrid deployments that coexist with what is already running, and migration patterns for systems that cannot go offline.

Learn more →
PQCV — Post-Quantum Certified Validator badge
PQCV

Post-Quantum Certified Validator

Specialized

For the person who proves it worked. Test design, interoperability validation across vendors and versions, and evidence packages built to satisfy an auditor rather than a checklist.

Learn more →
PQCX — Post-Quantum Certified Expert badge
PQCX

Post-Quantum Certified Expert

Capstone · auto-awarded

Held automatically by anyone carrying PQCM, PQCA, and PQCV at the same time. It recognizes coverage of the whole migration lifecycle, and it costs nothing extra because there is nothing extra to sit.

Learn more →

The sponsor's side of the same work. A migration program needs an executive above the program manager to fund it, govern it, and answer for it to a board. That role is certified separately, by the Certified Chief Quantum Officer credential in the Quantum Leadership Track. It carries no prerequisite and is assessed by capstone rather than exam, and it is the natural counterpart to the credentials above rather than a step within them.

Credential verification

Verify a credential holder

Employers and auditors can confirm a Post-Quantum Certified credential directly with the issuer. Email the holder's full name, the credential in question, and any certificate serial number, and current status comes back by return email.

Each of the five credentials also maintains a verification page on its own .pro domain; email remains the authoritative check.