The GH-100: GitHub Administration Exam is designed to validate your skills in managing and administering GitHub at an organizational and enterprise level. As GitHub continues to power modern software development worldwide, certified administrators are becoming essential for teams that need secure, scalable, and well-governed development environments.
This certification demonstrates your ability to handle critical tasks, including repository and organization management, user provisioning, permission control, security policies, and enterprise-level governance. It is especially valuable for professionals aiming to advance their careers in DevOps, system administration, or development team leadership.
In this blog, we will walk through a clear and structured plan to prepare for the GH-100 exam—covering what the exam includes, the skills you need to build, the best resources to use, and practical strategies to boost your chances of success.
Who should take the GH-100 Exam?
The GH-100: GitHub Administration Exam is ideal for professionals responsible for managing and securing GitHub environments within their organizations. It is designed to validate the skills needed to handle administrative tasks at scale and ensure smooth collaboration for development teams.
This exam is best suited for:
- System Administrators – Professionals who manage user accounts, permissions, and repository structures across teams.
- DevOps Engineers – Those who integrate GitHub into CI/CD pipelines and maintain secure, automated workflows.
- Release Managers and Build Engineers – Individuals who oversee software delivery processes and need to enforce governance policies in GitHub.
- Developers Moving into Admin Roles – Developers transitioning into roles involving security, configuration, and platform governance.
- Team Leads or Tech Leads – Leaders responsible for managing multiple repositories, users, and enforcing best practices across projects.
By earning this certification, these professionals can demonstrate that they have the technical and operational expertise needed to administer GitHub effectively at an enterprise level.
Understanding the GH-100 Exam
Before starting your preparation, it is important to understand the structure and expectations of the GH-100: GitHub Administration Exam. This will help you plan your study approach effectively.
Exam Details
- Exam Name: GitHub Administration
- Exam Code: GH-100
- Duration: 100 minutes
- Language: English
Exam Format
The exam consists of multiple-choice objective questions and scenario-based tasks. The scenario questions test your ability to apply GitHub administration concepts in real-world situations, such as configuring repositories, managing users and permissions, and setting up enterprise security policies.
Passing Score and Experience
Although GitHub does not specify an official passing score publicly, candidates are generally expected to demonstrate solid understanding across all domains to succeed. It is recommended to have at least 6–12 months of experience managing GitHub organizations or enterprise accounts, along with a strong grasp of Git and DevOps practices.
Let’s look at the course outline in detail –
GH-100: GitHub Administration Course Outline
The exam covers the following topics:
Domain 1: Supporting GitHub Enterprise for users and key stakeholders (15%)
Supporting GitHub Enterprise for users and key stakeholders
- Distinguishing problems that can be solved by an administrator from those that need GitHub Support
- Describing how to generate support bundles and diagnostics
- Describing how GitHub’s products and services are used within the enterprise to identify underutilized features, integrations in use, most active teams, and repositories
- Recommending standards for developer workflows, including code collaboration (fork-and-pull versus branching), branching, branch protection rules, code owners, the code review process, automation, and release strategy
- Explaining the tooling ecosystem at the enterprise
- Explaining the enterprise’s CI/CD strategy
- Discuss how to recommend tooling and workflows to teams within an enterprise
- Explain how GitHub APIs can be used to extend the capabilities of the administrator from the user interface, such as querying or storing the audit log
- Locate an asset from the GitHub Marketplace for a specific need (i.e., find the Azure Pipelines GitHub App in the Marketplace, install it, and configure it to deploy your code)
- Contrasting a GitHub App and an action (i.e., their permissions, how they’re built, how they’re consumed)
- List the benefits and risks of using apps and actions from the GitHub Marketplace
Domain 2: Managing user identities and GitHub authentication (20%)
Managing user identities and GitHub authentication
- Listing the implications of enabling SAML single sign-on (SSO) for an individual organization versus all organizations in an enterprise account
- Listing the steps to enable and enforce SAML SSO for a single organization and multiple organizations using enterprise accounts
- Explaining how to require two-factor authentication (2FA) for an organization
- Explain how to choose supported identity providers
- Describing how identity management and authorization works on GitHub
- List the consequences of a user’s membership in the instance, an organization, or multiple organizations
- Describing the authentication and authorization model (specifically, how users get to the system, and how they’re granted access to specific things within GitHub)
- List the supported SCIM providers (Azure, Okta, self-created)
- Describe how the SCIM protocol works and how GitHub supports it
- Describing how Team synchronization works
- Contrast team synchronization and SCIM
Domain 3: Describing how GitHub is deployed, distributed, and licensed (5%)
Contrasting the capabilities of GitHub Enterprise Server (GHES), GitHub Enterprise Cloud (GHEC), and GitHub AE (GHAE)
- Describe GitHub Enterprise Cloud (GHEC)
- Describing GitHub Enterprise Server (GHES)
- Describing GitHub AE
Differentiating how products are billed, including seat licenses, GitHub Actions, and GitHub Packages
- Describing pricing for GitHub Actions
- Describe pricing and support options for organizations
- Describing how to find statistics of license usage for a specific organization
- Describe how to find statistics of license usage for machine accounts and peripheral services
- Explaining the consumption of metered products given a report (i.e., GitHub Actions minutes or storage for GitHub Packages)
Domain 4: Managing access and permissions based on membership (20%)
Defining a GitHub organization
- Explaining the benefits and costs of deploying a single organization versus multiple organizations
- Describe how to set default read permissions versus default write permissions across organizations
- Describing Team sync through AD
- Explain maintainability; writing scripts against multiple orgs and multiple access rights
- Describing how to adjust enterprise policies and organization permissions in alignment with a company’s trust and control position
Describing enterprise permissions and policies
- Defining a GitHub organization
- List the possible roles of an organization member
- Contrasting permissions for organization members, owners, and billing managers
- Describe the difference between being an organization member and an outside collaborator
- Listing the consequences of a user’s membership in an instance or organization
- Explaining how to give a user the minimum required permissions for repository, organization, or team access.
- List the benefits and the drawbacks of creating a new organization
- Define Teams in a GitHub organization
- Listing the possible roles of a team member
- Describing the different permission models
- Explaining the actions of a user given a list of their permissions, such as repository role, team membership, or organization membership
- Listing the repository membership options
- Explain audit access to a repository
Domain 5: Enabling secure software development and ensure compliance (15%)
Enabling secure software development and ensure compliance
- Explaining how GitHub supports the enterprise’s security posture
- Describe scrubbing sensitive data from a Git repository (filter-branch/BFG)
- Describing scrubbing sensitive data from GitHub (contacting support)
- Explaining how to choose a policy based on how much control is required
- Explaining the impacts of choosing a specific set of policies
- Define organization policies
- Defining enterprise policies
Describing how to use the audit log APIs (Rest and GraphQL) to explain a missing asset
- Defining the use case for audit logs
- Describe security and compliance concepts with GitHub
- Explaining how to provide reports for auditing
Defining and explaining the importance of the security features of a GitHub repository
- Explaining the importance of a security policy
- Define a vulnerability
- Describe a vulnerable dependency
- Explaining the importance of secret scanning
- Explain the importance of code scanning
- Describing automated code scanning (CodeQL)
- Explain the dependency graph
- Explain the importance of a security advisory
- Describing Dependabot
- Detect and fix outdated dependencies with security vulnerabilities
- Describing security vulnerability alerts
- Create and implement a security response plan that addresses sensitive data on a GitHub repository
- Describing how to use SSH keys and Deploy keys to access repository data
- Listing supported access tokens (e.g. PAT, Installation Tokens, OAuth and GitHub app OAuth tokens, Device Tokens, Refresh tokens)
- Explain how to find a token’s rate limits
- Describing GitHub Apps, their repository permissions, user permissions, and event subscriptions
- Describe OAuth Apps, their permissions, and event subscriptions
- Contrasting the use of a personal access token (PAT) or a GitHub App for authenticating a machine account
- Describe the use of machine accounts versus GitHub apps
- Explaining how to approve or deny user-created GitHub Apps and OAuth apps based on a security policy
- Define an enterprise managed user (EMU)
Domain 6: Managing GitHub Actions (20%)
Distributing actions and workflows to the enterprise
- Identifying reuse templates for actions and workflows
- Define an approach for managing and leveraging reusable components (i.e., repos for storage, naming conventions for files/folders, plans for ongoing maintenance)
- Defining how to distribute actions for an enterprise
- Explaining how to control access to actions within the enterprise
- Configuring organizational use policies for GitHub Actions
Managing runners for the enterprise
- Describing the effects of configuring IP allow lists on GitHub-hosted and self-hosted runners
- Configure IP allow lists on internal applications and systems to allow interaction with GitHub-hosted runners
- Listing the effects and potential abuse vectors of enabling self-hosted runners on public repositories
- Selecting appropriate runners to support workloads (i.e., using a self-hosted versus GitHub-hosted runner, choosing supported operating systems)
- Contrast GitHub-hosted and self-hosted runners
- Configuring self-hosted runners for enterprise use (i.e., including proxies, labels, networking)
- Managing self-hosted runners using groups (i.e., managing access, moving runners into and between groups)
- Monitor, troubleshoot, and update self-hosted runners
Managing encrypted secrets in the enterprise
- Identify the scope of encrypted secrets
- Explaining how to access encrypted secrets within actions and workflows
- Explaining how to manage organization-level encrypted secrets
- Describe how to manage repository-level encrypted secrets
- Describing how to use third-party vaults
Domain 7: Managing GitHub Packages (5%)
- Describing which GitHub Packages are supported
- Describe how to access, write, and share GitHub Packages
- Describing how to use GitHub Packages in workflows (i.e., with GitHub Actions or other CI/CD tools)
- Explaining the differences and use cases between GitHub Packages and releases
GH-100: GitHub Administration Preparation Guide
Success in the GH-100: GitHub Administration Exam comes from a mix of clear strategy, consistent effort, and real-world practice. Instead of rushing through the topics, approach your preparation as a gradual build-up of skills. Here is a step-by-step plan to guide you:
Step 1: Understand the Exam Blueprint
Begin with the official exam guide. Study the domains covered, the skills measured, and the approximate weight each topic carries. Knowing exactly what is expected will help you create a focused study plan instead of trying to learn everything at once.
Step 2: Build a Strong Foundation
Revisit Git fundamentals and core GitHub concepts. Make sure you are confident with repositories, branching, pull requests, and basic workflows. A solid foundation will make it much easier to understand advanced administration tasks later on.
Step 3: Master Key Administration Areas
Move on to the heart of the GH-100 exam — administration skills. Focus on the core domains, including:
- Managing repositories and organisations
- Controlling user accounts, roles, and permissions
- Enforcing security policies, branch protections, and code scanning
- Administering GitHub Actions and workflow automation
- Handling billing, licensing, and audit logs within GitHub Enterprise
Step 4: Practise Through Real Scenarios
Theory alone is not enough. Set up a personal GitHub organisation or sandbox environment and simulate real administrative tasks. Practise adding users, setting permissions, configuring repository policies, and troubleshooting issues as if you were running a live production environment.
Step 5: Use High-Quality Study Resources
Use multiple reliable resources to build depth and variety in your preparation. Combine official GitHub Docs, Learning Lab modules, video courses, and instructor-led training fom Skilr. Supplement these with blogs, technical articles, and mock tests to reinforce your learning.
Step 6: Revise and Test Yourself
As your exam date approaches, shift your focus to revision and practice. Create quick notes and flashcards for important concepts, attempt full-length practice exams, and time yourself to build exam-day stamina. Analyse your mistakes, revisit weak topics, and refine your approach until you feel confident.
Following this structured path will not only prepare you to pass the GH-100 exam but also help you develop the practical skills needed to manage GitHub environments effectively in real-world settings.
Tips to Stay On Track
Preparing for a professional certification can feel overwhelming, but staying organised and motivated will make the process much smoother. Small, consistent efforts often lead to the best results.
- Set Clear Goals and Milestones
Break your preparation into weekly targets. Completing small goals will give you a sense of progress and keep your momentum high. - Create a Realistic Study Schedule
Reserve fixed study hours each day and treat them like non-negotiable appointments. Consistency matters more than long, irregular study sessions. - Track Your Progress Visually
Use a simple checklist or study tracker to mark off completed topics. Seeing your progress can boost your motivation during tough phases. - Join a Study Community
Engage in forums, Discord groups, or LinkedIn communities where other GH-100 candidates share resources and experiences. Collaborative learning helps you stay accountable and inspired. - Balance Study and Breaks
Avoid burnout by scheduling short breaks during study sessions. A refreshed mind retains information far better than a tired one.
Staying consistent is more important than studying for long hours at once. Building steady habits will keep your motivation strong all the way to exam day.
Common Mistakes to Avoid
Even well-prepared candidates can lose marks by overlooking key aspects of their preparation. Avoiding these common mistakes will help you stay on track and improve your chances of passing the GH-100 exam on your first attempt.
- Skipping Hands-On Practice
Relying only on theory is one of the biggest mistakes. The GH-100 exam tests real-world administration skills, so make sure you practise tasks like user provisioning, repository configuration, and permissions management in a sandbox environment. - Ignoring Enterprise-Level Features
Many candidates focus only on basic GitHub usage. Do not neglect topics like audit logs, billing management, SSO configuration, and enterprise security settings, which often carry significant weight. - Not Reviewing the Exam Blueprint
Jumping into study materials without understanding the exam domains leads to scattered preparation. Always start with the official exam guide to focus your efforts. - Underestimating Time Management
Running out of time during the exam can lower your score even if you know the content. Practise full-length tests in timed conditions to build speed and accuracy. - Cramming at the Last Minute
Trying to learn everything right before the exam can increase stress and reduce retention. Instead, spread your study sessions over several weeks for better understanding and long-term memory.
By planning well and avoiding these pitfalls, you will be able to approach the exam with confidence and clarity.
Career Opportunities and Salary Expectations
Earning the GH-100: GitHub Administration certification can open the door to several high-value roles in modern software development environments. As more organisations adopt GitHub for collaborative development, they need skilled administrators to maintain secure, efficient, and well-governed platforms.
Career Opportunities
Certified professionals can work in a variety of roles, including:
- GitHub Administrator / Platform Administrator – Managing users, repositories, permissions, and governance across teams.
- DevOps Engineer – Integrating GitHub with CI/CD pipelines, automating workflows, and maintaining build systems.
- Release Manager / Build Engineer – Overseeing software delivery processes and enforcing version control policies.
- Security and Compliance Specialist – Setting up branch protections, code scanning, and audit trails for enterprise-grade compliance.
- Technical Team Lead – Leading development teams while ensuring platform reliability and security.
These roles are in demand in industries such as software development, fintech, healthcare technology, and large-scale enterprise IT.
Salary Expectations
Salaries vary based on region, experience, and organisation size, but GH-100-certified professionals typically earn higher than their non-certified peers.
| Role | Avg. Salary (India) | Avg. Salary (Global) |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub Administrator | ₹8–12 LPA | USD 80,000–100,000 |
| DevOps Engineer | ₹10–18 LPA | USD 100,000–130,000 |
| Release Manager / Build Engineer | ₹12–20 LPA | USD 110,000–140,000 |
| Security & Compliance Specialist | ₹15–25 LPA | USD 120,000–150,000 |
| Technical Team Lead | ₹20–30 LPA | USD 130,000–160,000 |
The GH-100 certification not only boosts your technical credibility but also places you in a stronger position for promotions, leadership roles, and higher salary negotiations within the DevOps and platform engineering space.
Conclusion
The GH-100: GitHub Administration Exam is a valuable credential for professionals looking to advance their careers in DevOps, platform administration, and enterprise software development. It validates your ability to manage GitHub environments securely and efficiently—skills that are increasingly vital as more organisations rely on GitHub for large-scale collaboration.
By understanding the exam structure, following a structured preparation plan, practising real-world administration tasks, and avoiding common mistakes, you can approach the exam with confidence. Achieving this certification not only strengthens your technical credibility but also opens the door to high-demand roles and competitive salaries across industries.
Earning the GH-100 certification is an investment in your professional future—one that can accelerate your growth and position you as a trusted expert in GitHub administration.
