No matter what kind of nurse you are, certifications are an important part of the job. From the basics required to land almost any position to specialty-specific options, here’s a rundown of the best nursing certifications for your career.
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How Do Nursing Certifications Help Your Career?
There are some pretty good reasons why more than a million RNs have specialty certifications. Even though they’re not always necessary to land a job, they can boost your career in the long term by helping you stand out when applying for competitive jobs, and by showing that you have the skills employers are seeking.
Earning certifications can also open the door to new job offers that you might not otherwise get, including opportunities in different — and potentially higher-paying — specialties and settings.
- Did you know? 90% of nurse managers say they prefer to hire certified nurses
What Are the Best Nursing Certifications for RNs?
The bottom line? Certifications are essential to land employment for a lot of RN jobs, especially the competitive ones! In general, and the more certifications you have, the more likely you’ll be to stand out against a crowded playing field.
But with more than 150 available certifications (and counting), sometimes the toughest part is knowing where to start. As always, we’re here to help with a rundown of the best nursing certifications for your RN career in 2025.
The Best Nursing Certifications: Basic Care
With the exception of some roles like case management, basic life-saving certifications are all but required for any nursing job. The most prominent are:
- Basic Life Support (BLS) from the American Heart Association (AHA), which offers training in recognizing and treating life-threatening emergencies in classroom and blended learning courses that combine hands-on with online courses. Some courses offer CE credits; you can learn more here.
> Who needs it? Most RN jobs require BLS certification. - Advanced Cardiovascular Life Support (ACLS), the next step up from the BLS, covering cardiopulmonary arrest and cardiovascular emergencies. Offered in classroom or blended settings with CE credits available for some courses. Get more info here.
> Who needs it? Most RN jobs require BLS certification. - Pediatric Advanced Life Support (PALS) from the AHA, which focuses on BLS for infants and children in blended and classroom settings. Learn more here.
> Who needs it? RNs working in pediatric settings. - Wound Care Certification (WCC®) and Advanced Wound Care Certification (AWCC®) from the National Alliance of Wound Care and Ostomy (NAWCO) focuses on skin and wound management. Learn more here.
> Who needs it? Helpful for all settings, WCC and AWCC are particularly useful in emergency and pediatric acute care (PICU) settings. - Crisis Prevention Institute (CPI) certification, a training program on crisis management and de-escalation with options that include verbal intervention and nonviolent training, usually available as a CE credit. See your options here.
> Who needs it? In addition to ER nurses, as the Institute points out, “there’s a good chance that if you haven’t had CPI training yet, you will at some point." - NIH Stroke Scale (NIHSS) certification, awarded by passing an online course on stroke response, usually available as a CE credit. Learn more here.
> Who needs it? NIHSS certification is often required for ER, critical care/ICU, intermediate care/PCU, Medical ICU (MICU), and telemetry nursing jobs.
The Best Nursing Certifications: Advanced/Specialty
You really can’t go wrong with any certification, any of which can help support your career in different ways. Even if they're not directly related to your day-to-day life, they might still help you get new jobs or even move into management.
That said, the best nursing certifications according to the current level of demand from healthcare employers (according to the HealthTrust jobsite) include:
- Critical Care RN (CCRN) certifications from the American Association of Critical-Care Nurses (AACN), which include a variety of options to match your preferred career path, including adult, pediatric, and neonatal care in direct, knowledge professional, and tele-critical pathways. Get more details here.
> Who needs it? RNs working in acute and critical care. - Cardiac Medicine Certification (CMC) and Cardiac Surgery Certification (CSC), also from the AACN, both of which focus on a different aspect of cardiovascular acute care. Learn more here.
> Who needs it? RNs working in the CVICU or CVOR. - Certified Surgical First Assistants (CSFA) certification, which focuses on supporting OR surgical teams, and requires passing the CSFA-ERC exam and then earning CE credits on a two-year circuit for renewal. Learn more here.
> Who needs it? OR First Assist RNs. - Neonatal Resuscitation Program® (NRP®) certification, which provides blended learning training for emergency care of newborns at birth. Learn more here.
> Often required for: L&D and neonatal ICU (NICU) nursing jobs. - AWHONN Certification, also known as Fetal Heart Monitoring certification from the Association of Women’s Health, Obstetric and Neonatal Nurses (AWHONN), is available in intermediate and advanced levels. Get more info here.
> Who needs it? AWHONN is often required for L&D nursing jobs.
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