How To Become A Configuration Engineer: What It Is and Career Path

What is a configuration engineer and how to become one

Updated January 8, 2025

3 min read

Quoted experts

Brian Glas,

Christian Hansen Ph.D.

A configuration engineer develops processes and procedures for automating the implementation and configuration of products for the server. Your job involves testing and fixing hardware, software, and networking issues of a product. As a result, you must constantly be in sync with the software team to incorporate network designs into the development of the product. Your job description as a configuration engineer is to test and configure systems and support software engineering for windows and Linux-based platforms hosted on servers. You will also resolve IT-related issues, maintain computer systems and programs, and monitor adherence to Service Level Agreements (SLAs).

The minimum qualification is a major in computer science or other engineering degrees such as electrical engineering, computer engineering, and mechanical engineering. Engineers must have excellent verbal and nonverbal communication skills, analytical skills, problem-solving skills, and good teamwork skills. The average configuration engineer makes $45.44 an hour, which amounts to earning over $95,114 every year.

What general advice would you give to a configuration engineer?

Brian Glas

Assistant Professor of Computer Science, Union University

Build relationships: Different technologies will interest and challenge you, but throughout your career, you'll find that it's the relationships that are the most important. This is harder to grasp earlier in your career, but much easier to understand after 15-20 years.
Gain different perspectives: Spend time with people in other roles that your job interacts with, and gain a solid understanding of how they view things; this is most valuable for career progression and understanding of how your work fits into the big picture.

ScoreConfiguration EngineerUS Average

Salary

7.6

Avg. Salary $101,024

Avg. Salary $59,228

Stability level

4.0

Growth rate 21%

Growth rate 0.3%

Diversity

4.0

Race

American Indian and Alaska Native 0.17%

Asian 29.74%

Black or African American 4.67%

Hispanic or Latino 8.44%

Unknown 4.87%

White 52.12%

Gender

female 19.37%

male 80.63%

Age - 38

Race

American Indian and Alaska Native 3.00%

Asian 7.00%

Black or African American 14.00%

Hispanic or Latino 19.00%

White 57.00%

Gender

female 47.00%

male 53.00%

Age - 38

Stress level

4.0

Stress level is moderate

7.1 - high

Complexity level

7.9

Complexity level is challenging

7 - challenging

Work life balance

6.6

Work life balance is good

6.4 - fair

Key steps to become a configuration engineer

Explore configuration engineer education requirements

Most common configuration engineer degrees

Bachelor's

68.5 %

Associate

16.0 %

Master's

11.2 %

Start to develop specific configuration engineer skills

Skills	Percentages
Python	10.15%
Unix	8.40%
Java	7.92%
Linux	4.79%
Jenkins	4.60%

Complete relevant configuration engineer training and internships

Accountants spend an average of 3-6 months on post-employment, on-the-job training. New configuration engineers learn the skills and techniques required for their job and employer during this time. The chart below shows how long it takes to gain competency as a configuration engineer based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics data and data from real configuration engineer resumes.

Research configuration engineer duties and responsibilities

Used SharePoint application and implementing tools that help organizations manage processes and data.
Develop and maintains SVN source control and Jenkins CI automate builds and deployments.
Involve in migration of the version control systems like SVN/Git and continuous integration tools like Jenkins.
Maintain high availability cluster and standalone server environments and refine automation components with scripting and configuration management (Ansible).

Prepare your configuration engineer resume

When your background is strong enough, you can start writing your configuration engineer resume.

You can use Zippia's AI resume builder to make the resume writing process easier while also making sure that you include key information that hiring managers expect to see on a configuration engineer resume. You'll find resume tips and examples of skills, responsibilities, and summaries, all provided by Zippi, your career sidekick.

Choose from 10+ customizable configuration engineer resume templates

Build a professional configuration engineer resume in minutes. Browse through our resume examples to identify the best way to word your resume. Then choose from 10+ resume templates to create your configuration engineer resume.

Apply for configuration engineer jobs

Now it's time to start searching for a configuration engineer job. Consider the tips below for a successful job search:

Browse job boards for relevant postings
Consult your professional network
Reach out to companies you're interested in working for directly
Watch out for job scams

How do configuration engineers rate their job?

-/5

5 stars

4 stars

3 stars

2 stars

1 star

Configuration engineer reviews

A zippia user wrote a review on Sep 2020

Pros

I have always been a very organized person and have worked in customer service my entire life, first as a mechanical engineer and then in the fitness industry. As a build engineer/release engineer/DevOps engineer, I get to work between the people writing the code and the people using the code, which is the perfect balance for me. :-)

Cons

It's difficult to explain to my friends what I actually do. Even my wife isn't completely clear on where my responsibility begins and ends...