DevOps Engineer vs Cloud Engineer: What’s The Difference?

DevOps and Cloud Engineers bring critical infrastructure skills to your business. Sharing expertise in cloud systems, security, monitoring, and automation, the roles work together to build, manage, and maximise your digital environment.

So, when comparing DevOps Engineer vs Cloud Engineer, which one should you recruit? There can sometimes be confusion among hiring decision-makers about the crossover between DevOps and cloud capabilities. Both positions play a vital role in creating secure, reliable, and scalable technology platforms. Both are essential in creating and supporting modern cloud environments. But adding the wrong skillset to your team can create costly knowledge gaps, bottlenecks, and user experience issues.

Despite the obvious overlap in DevOps vs Cloud Engineering, these specialists solve very different problems. Broadly speaking:

• A Cloud Engineer designs, builds, secures, and manages your cloud infrastructure.
• A DevOps Engineer automates and improves the processes used to build, test, deploy, and operate software.

In this article, we take a deeper dive into the differences between DevOps Engineers and Cloud Engineers – and the reasons to recruit each one. Understanding these distinctions – and how each expert contributes to your digital environment – can help you make more informed hiring decisions.

What does a Cloud Engineer do?

A Cloud Engineer designs, builds, and maintains the foundation of your cloud infrastructure. They create a resilient, secure cloud environment that enables your applications to run without the need for bulky, costly physical servers.

Using cloud platforms like Amazon Web Services (AWS), Google Cloud Platform, and Microsoft Azure, Cloud Engineers ensure your servers, networks, databases, and other resources are robust, scalable, and available whenever your business needs them.

A Cloud Engineer’s core responsibilities include:

• Designing, building, and maintaining cloud infrastructure, including servers, networks, storage, and databases.
• Monitoring system performance, troubleshooting issues, and optimising cloud resources.
• Assessing security risks and implementing protocols to safeguard data, systems, and user access.
• Managing backups, updates, and disaster recovery to maximise service availability.
• Collaborating with development and operations teams to make sure your cloud infrastructure supports your business and application requirements.

Day to day, Cloud Engineers solve infrastructure challenges to ensure your cloud systems perform reliably, stay protected against security risks, and scale with your business.

What does a DevOps Engineer do?

While a Cloud Engineer sets the foundation of your cloud infrastructure, a DevOps Engineer creates and automates the processes that run on it. DevOps focuses on the processes and automation that help teams build, test, release, and operate software efficiently.

Businesses rely on DevOps Engineers to tackle software delivery challenges, speeding up software updates and new features, while boosting reliability and reducing the risk of faults and downtime. They also work closely with development and operations teams to streamline and accelerate the software delivery process across the wider IT landscape – not just within cloud environments.

A DevOps Engineer’s role typically covers:

• Creating and maintaining continuous integration and continuous delivery (CI/CD) pipelines to automate software delivery.
• Automating repetitive tasks, testing, and deployment processes to enhance efficiency.
• Monitoring applications and systems to identify security, availability, and reliability issues.
• Recommending workflow refinements to increase performance, efficiency, and user experience.
• Working across development and operations teams to improve software development and fast-track releases.
• Maintaining cloud environments on platforms such as AWS, Microsoft Azure, and Google Cloud Platform.

Ultimately, DevOps Engineers are the vital link between development and operations, using automation and integration to make software releases more effective, reliable, and secure.

Infrastructure vs CI/CD: Comparing Cloud and DevOps Engineer skills

Because Cloud and DevOps Engineers use much of the same tools, comparing CVs side-by-side can sometimes be challenging. Skills lists often look similar, featuring multipurpose technologies like Docker, Kubernetes, monitoring tools, scripting languages, and cloud platforms.

The key contrast is how candidates apply their expertise. Cloud Engineers work with infrastructure technologies to build and support your underlying cloud architecture, while DevOps Engineers use them to streamline and optimise software delivery.

Here’s a high-level overview of cloud vs DevOps skills:

Several tools and focus areas fall into both camps:

• Infrastructure as Code
• Terraform – An Infrastructure as Code (IaC) tool for creating, changing, and versioning infrastructure.
• Docker – A platform for building, sharing, and running containers.
• Kubernetes – A platform for deploying, scaling, and managing containerised applications.
• Linux – A widely used operating system for servers, virtual machines, containers, and cloud infrastructure.
• Monitoring tools, scripting languages, and cloud platforms – Including Prometheus, Python, AWS, Azure, and Google Cloud.

Should you hire a Cloud Engineer or a DevOps Engineer?

When considering a DevOps Engineer vs Cloud Engineer hireit’s important to understand your needs, challenges, and desired outcomes. Is your cloud infrastructure becoming difficult to manage or scale? Are manual deployments slowing down your software releases? Do you want to improve reliability, performance, and customer experience?

Recognising your pressures and pain points helps you select the right specialist to solve them. In the simplest terms, Cloud Engineering tends to focus more deeply on infrastructure, while DevOps typically spans a broader range of software delivery and operational processes. When hiring, that often means:

• If you need to design, build, secure, and maintain your cloud infrastructure, recruit a Cloud Engineer.
• If you want to automate and maximise software delivery and operational efficiency,

As with most IT roles, the boundaries are blurred. Many experienced infrastructure professionals have worked across both disciplines, and smaller businesses often opt for an engineer who can perform a dual function. The ideal choice depends on where your challenges lie – and the knowledge you need to tackle them.

What to look for when hiring a DevOps Engineer

The skills overlap between Cloud and DevOps Engineers can make it challenging to spot genuine DevOps expertise. Once you’ve identified the need for a DevOps Engineer to help you build, release, and run applications efficiently, you’re still likely to receive a stack of cloud-focused CVs.

AWS, Azure, Docker, Kubernetes, and Terraform will pop up on countless IT professionals’ resumes. The critical question is how they put those in-demand DevOps skills into practice. To pinpoint quality talent, seek out clear evidence of DevOps experience: hands-on software delivery and automation knowledge, a solid track record of working across development and operations, and breadth of expertise beyond cloud infrastructure.

When assessing a DevOps Engineer, look for:

• CI/CD expertise. Hands-on experience building and maintaining pipelines to automate software testing and deployment.
• Automation skills. Strong examples of replacing manual, repetitive processes with reliable automation.
• Software delivery knowledge. A history of improving how applications are built, tested, released, and operated.
• Cross-functional experience. Evidence of working with development and operations teams to enhance workflows and delivery.
• Operational awareness. Experience of monitoring applications and systems and responding to reliability or performance issues.
• Broader technical capability. Proof that their knowledge reaches further than cloud infrastructure, extending into software delivery and operational processes.

The key takeaway is to look beyond technology lists to assess what each candidate actually delivers. When reviewing CVs, interviewing and assessing DevOps candidates, expertise is demonstrated by automating, integrating, and improving software delivery wherever enhancements are needed – in the cloud, on-premises, and across hybrid environments.

Considering whether to hire a DevOps Engineer or Cloud Engineer?

Working with a specialist IT recruitment partner can help you avoid common DevOps hiring mistakes. At VIQU IT, we help you identify skills gaps, define your recruitment needs, and source proven cloud and DevOps professionals.

To discuss the next steps for your DevOps hiring requirements, send us a message or speak to an experienced member of the VIQU IT team on 0121 227 8200.