Introduction
Microsoft’s exams allow you to prove your skills in important technologies, skills and apps. If you pass an exam, you may get a certification, which you can then upload to LinkedIn, or add to your CV/resume.
In March 2026, Microsoft announced its new new exam, the DP-800 “SQL AI Developer Associate Certification”. In this article, we’ll have a look at this exam, including its target audience and what information you will need.
What is the Microsoft DP-800 exam?
Microsoft’s DP-800 exam will focus on the design and development of AI-enabled database solutions.
It should require students to demonstrate understanding on Integrating Azure OpenAI and AI capabilities with databases – including T-SQL AI functions (such as generating and searching vector embeddings), implementing semantic searches and RAG (Retrieval-Augmented Generation) workflows, and building intelligent data solutions in SQL.
When will it be announced?
It was announced on Microsoft’s Skills Hub Blog on 3 March 2026. This blog had hinted about it previously, when it said “a new wave of AI-focused Certification updates is scheduled for March 2026 and beyond. Expect even more opportunities to learn and to earn credentials in AI and cloud technologies.”
More details are expected during SQLCon 2026, which is March 16-20, 2026. The conference agenda explicitly mentions “building AI-powered apps with SQL” as a theme – exactly the use-case that DP-800 aims to certify.
It will be offered in a Beta form in March 2026, before being made Generally Available in May 2026.
The DP-800 learning path is slated for release by 30 March 2026. However, this date might slip – the learning path for the AB-100 exam has currently slipped by a month.
The Microsoft Learning GitHub repository for the DP-800 has been created, but not populated in public yet.
Note: there has been a previous April’s Fool joke about the DP-800 by Skool. This, however, is not an April’s Fool joke.
What will the DP-800 requirements be?
The first question is consider is whether it will focus on Microsoft Azure or Fabric. Microsoft has confirmed that, unlike the DP-600 and DP-700 exams, which are entirely based on Microsoft Fabric, the DP-800 exam will require knowledge of SQL across Microsoft’s SQL platforms. This includes SQL Server, Azure SQL, and SQL databases in Microsoft Fabric. This will require both integration of structured and semi-structured data into highly scalable enterprise applications.
Based on updates from Microsoft, including the new abilities in SQL Server 2025 and the content of a recent Applied Skills Lab (APL-3019) for Microsoft Azure Database for PostgreSQL, we can outline several key topic areas:
- Setting Up AI-Integrated Databases
- Working with Vector Data and Embeddings, including
- Generate embeddings from text data using T-SQL
- Build and query vector indexes
- Perform semantic (vector) searches
- Implementing Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG)
- Using AI for Advanced Data Analysis within SQL
- Application Development (AI-Powered Data Apps):
- Foundational Database Skills in an AI Context
How do the Microsoft DP-800 exam compare with the DP-600 and DP-700 exams?
What are the differences between the DP-600, DP-700 and DP-800 exams?
- The DP-600 is for Fabric Analytics Engineers. It builds end-to-end analytics solutions: data prep, semantic models, BI reports.
- The DP-700 is for Fabric Data Engineers. It focuses on data ingestion, transformation, and optimization at scale. There is approximately at 30% overlap between the DP-600 and DP-700 exams.
- The DP-800 is for SQL AI Engineers. It will focus on embedding AI capabilities (ML models, OpenAI) into not just Fabric’s SQL databases but also SQL Server and Azure SQL to build intelligent apps.
Conclusion
In conclusion, Microsoft’s DP‑800 will mark an important addition to the certification landscape, validating expertise in the fusion of AI and database development on the Fabric platform, SQL Server and Azure SQL. It should be announced in mid-March 2026 with an early summer General Availability, and to cover skills that until recently were on the fringe of data engineering – such as calling AI models from within SQL queries and handling vector data for machine learning tasks.
For professionals and organizations, this certification will be a way to demonstrate capability in building the next generation of data solutions: intelligent applications where databases not only store and retrieve data, but also actively contribute to AI-driven insights. Those who are already certified in Fabric (DP-600/700) and those with existing SQL knowledge will find DP-800 a valuable specialization, while newcomers interested in AI’s intersection with data engineering will see DP-800 as a direct path to proving those skills.
With the certification’s release on the horizon and training content (both official and third-party like I Do Data’s course) in the pipeline, now is the perfect time to start exploring Microsoft Fabric’s AI features. Get hands-on with preview features like T-SQL AI_* functions and vector search. The era of AI-integrated databases is here, and DP-800 will be your credential to show you’re at the forefront of this exciting convergence of data and AI.
