Google Cloud Digital Leader
Prepare for the Google Cloud Digital Leader certification. Covers all 6 exam domains: digital transformation, data, AI/ML, infrastructure modernization, security, and cloud operations.
About This Course
Prepare for the Google Cloud Digital Leader certification exam with this comprehensive course aligned to the official study guide. Covering all six exam domains digital transformation, data transformation, artificial intelligence, infrastructure and application modernization, trust and security, and cloud operations this course gives tech-adjacent professionals the knowledge and confidence to demonstrate broad Google Cloud competency. Each lesson is taught by an AI instructor and includes assessment questions mapped directly to exam objectives.
Course Curriculum
21 Lessons
Why Cloud Technology is Transforming Business
Explores the innovations and paradigm shifts that led to cloud technology, defines key terms, describes the benefits of cloud adoption for digital transformation, and examines real-world examples and challenges organizations face.
Fundamental Cloud Concepts
Explains fundamental cloud concepts including public, private, and hybrid cloud, how migrating to the cloud affects flexibility, agility, reliability, and TCO, the Google Cloud network structure, and how performance is measured.
Cloud Computing Models and Shared Responsibility
Explains IaaS, PaaS, and SaaS cloud computing models with benefits and tradeoffs of each, how to choose the right model for a business need, and the shared responsibility model between Google Cloud and its customers.
The Value of Data
Explore how data is a critical business asset: types of data (structured/unstructured/semi-structured), the data lifecycle, and why data-driven decision-making gives organizations a competitive advantage.
Tour the Google Cloud Console
See the abstract concepts from the lesson in action. Sign in to Google Cloud, navigate the resource hierarchy (project → folder → organization), open IAM, review the billing dashboard, and explore the Organization Policy screen. Read-only walk-through — no resources are created. Reinforces §1.2 (fundamental cloud concepts) and §6.1 (resource hierarchy) with concrete, in-console reference points you'll recognize on the exam.
Google Cloud Data Management Solutions
Survey Google Cloud's portfolio of data storage and management products: Cloud SQL, Cloud Spanner, Firestore, Bigtable, BigQuery, Cloud Storage — and how to choose the right one for each workload.
Making Data Useful and Accessible
Understand how organizations unlock value from data using Looker and Looker Studio for business intelligence, data pipelines for ETL/ELT, and Google's Smart Analytics approach for democratizing data access.
AI and ML Fundamentals
Demystify artificial intelligence and machine learning: how models are trained, types of ML (supervised/unsupervised/reinforcement), neural networks, and how AI is transforming industries — aligned to Cloud Digital Leader exam objectives.
Google Cloud's AI and ML Solutions
Survey Google Cloud's AI and ML product portfolio: Vertex AI platform, AutoML, pre-built ML APIs (Vision AI, Natural Language API, Translation API, Speech-to-Text), and Google's generative AI offerings including Gemini.
Query a BigQuery Public Dataset
Run your first SQL query in BigQuery Studio against a Google-hosted public dataset. See the query editor, results panel, and per-query cost estimate — the same UI a business analyst uses every day. Reinforces §2.2 (data management: recognizing BigQuery) and §2.3 (analytics + BI) with hands-on time in a real data warehouse.
Important Cloud Migration Terms
Learn the essential vocabulary and frameworks for cloud migration: the 6 Rs migration strategies, total cost of ownership, on-premises vs cloud tradeoffs, migration phases, and Google Cloud Adoption Framework.
Modernizing Infrastructure in the Cloud
Explore GCP compute options from VMs to containers to serverless: Compute Engine, Google Kubernetes Engine (GKE), Cloud Run, App Engine, and Cloud Functions — and how to choose the right infrastructure for each workload type.
Modernizing Applications in the Cloud
Learn application modernization patterns: microservices vs monoliths, APIs and API management with Apigee, DevOps and CI/CD pipelines, Site Reliability Engineering (SRE) principles, and how Google Cloud accelerates software delivery.
Chat with Gemini in Agent Studio
Open Agent Studio on the Gemini Enterprise Agent Platform and use the prompt UI to talk to Gemini directly. Tune temperature and top-P, ground a response with Google Search, and see safety filters fire. Reinforces §3.1 + §3.2 (Google Cloud AI offerings) with concrete hands-on time in the model you've been reading about.
Trust and Security in the Cloud
Understand the foundation of cloud security: the shared responsibility model, cloud security concepts (CIA triad, defense in depth, zero trust), IAM fundamentals, network security, and how organizations build a security-first cloud culture.
Google's Trusted Infrastructure
Explore how Google secures its infrastructure from silicon to software: Titan security chips, secure boot, BeyondCorp enterprise access, encryption by default, and Google's layered security approach that protects all GCP customers.
Google Cloud's Trust Principles and Compliance
Understand Google Cloud's trust commitments to customers: data privacy principles, major compliance certifications (ISO 27001, SOC 2, PCI DSS, HIPAA, FedRAMP), data residency and sovereignty controls, and how to verify GCP's compliance posture.
Financial Governance and Managing Cloud Costs
Master cloud financial management: GCP billing hierarchy (organization/billing accounts/projects), budgets and alerts, committed use discounts, sustained use discounts, FinOps practices, and tools like Cost Management, Recommender, and Active Assist.
Operational Excellence and Reliability at Scale
Learn how organizations achieve operational excellence on GCP: monitoring and observability (Cloud Monitoring, Cloud Logging, Cloud Trace), disaster recovery design (RTO/RPO), high availability patterns, incident management, and how Google designs systems for reliability at global scale.
Apigee API Management and API Monetization
Master how organizations govern and monetize APIs at scale with Apigee — Google Cloud's native API management platform. Covers what API management solves (security drift, developer friction, visibility, monetization), Apigee deployment choices (Apigee on Google Cloud vs Apigee hybrid + data residency), core governance building blocks (API proxies, policies, developer portals, analytics), API monetization mechanics (API products, rate plans, prepaid vs postpaid, revenue sharing), and how to right-size Apigee vs. lighter Google Cloud API-gateway options. Aligned to CDL exam Section 4.3.
Estimate Cloud Costs with the Pricing Calculator
Use the Google Cloud Pricing Calculator to estimate two real scenarios (always-on VMs vs autoscaling Cloud Run), then open the in-console billing dashboard to see how spend attribution actually works. Reinforces §6.1 (financial governance) with the tools every FinOps conversation starts with.