Top Tech Podcasts Covering Performance and DevOps

To continue the theme of professional development in 2020, we took a look at the hundreds of tech podcasts out there to create a list of those geared to the DevOps community. Our round-up is by no means an exhaustive list; we’ve compiled a list of podcasts publishing at a regular cadence and with a defined focus. We kept an eye out for shows that go beyond friendly chatter to deep dive into the nuts and bolts of how IT and DevOps teams work. These podcasts feature use cases, tips, tricks, best practices, and interviews with leaders in their fields.

Arrested DevOps

The team behind the Arrested DevOps podcast which aims to help you “achieve understanding, develop good practices, and operate your team and organization for maximum DevOps awesomeness” posts new episodes a few times a month. Arrested DevOps features a rotating list of five hosts including Joe Laha (Devopsdays), Bridget Kromhout (Microsoft), Matty Stratton (PagerDuty), Trevor Hess (Chef), and Jessica Kerr (Atomist). Episodes usually feature other DevOps professionals as guests tackling an industry trend or discussion of industry challenges. Get started with the 2019 year in review episode.

Chasing Waterfalls

Chasing Waterfalls, launched from web performance consultant Tim Kadlec, is probably the newest podcast on our list. New episodes have been released every few weeks and centered on web performance. Each episode features Tim Kadlec discussing a new topic with an engineer or leader in the field. Malek Hakim, Performance Engineer at Priceline, is featured in the episode, “Scaling a Culture of Performance with Malek Hakim.” Together, Tim and Malek attempt to tackle the million-dollar question, “how do you establish a culture of performance across a large organization?” Malek has also been a presenter on this topic for a webinar hosted by Catchpoint.

DevOps Chat

Devops Chat is the podcast arm of DevOps.com and features interviews with leading DevOps industry vendors and solution providers. Don’t worry, the sessions aren’t just vendors pitching products. Host Mitchel Ashley, VP of Information Technologies at CableLabs, interview guests about how they’re tackling major DevOps issues at their company. Finally, feel like you are living in the future with the episode, The Future of Farming with Aerobotics.

DevOps Radio

DevOps Radio is sponsored by CloudBees and hosted by Brian Dawson, DevOps Evangelist, this tech podcast covers “all things related to software delivery.” In 2019, the podcast took the show to the road to record episodes at DevOps World, where they were able to interview engineers from Fortune 100 companies. Topics include the potential impact of DevOps transformation, the meaning of DevSecOps, and the state of the DevOps industry. Episode 42, featuring Accenture’s Keith Pleas and Stas Zvinyatskovsky covers why DevOps transformations are never complete and is a great place to start with this podcast.

PerfBytes

PerfBytes is our only bi-lingual tech podcast to make this list. Available in both English and Spanish (hosted by Leandro Melendez, performance and load testing expert). The English edition is hosted by Brian Wilson, James Pulley, and Mark Tomlinson, all seasoned performance engineering experts with previous roles at organizations like MTV and Microsoft. Episodes are conversational and feature guests with expertise in the field. Get started with PerfBytes by listening to their Black Friday episode, “Black Friday News of the Damned Live Podcast.” This episode is a five-hour extravaganza of performance insights, featuring Scott Moore who also made this list, and Catchpoint’s Nithyanand Mehta.

Scott Moore PerfTour USA

Although not technically a podcast, the Scott Moore PerfTour is a video series from Performance Engineer Scott Moore. Scott will be traveling the USA to discuss performance engineering at meetups held at BBQ restaurants. Mostly stopping at cities across the south and southwest USA (BBQ hotspots), he’ll be posting videos from Atlanta, Mobile, Dallas, Albuquerque, Denver, Kansas City, and St. Louis, just to name a few stops. Watch his first video explaining the tour to learn more.

SEI Podcast

SEI Podcast comes from the Software Engineering Institute at Carnegie Mellon University. This tech podcast covers a wide software engineering topics, including cybersecurity, AI, and future technologies. Look for new episodes coming out every couple of weeks hosted by SEI members and industry thought leaders.

Looking for topics like measurement and analysis, incident handling, and risk management? Check out the episode “Benchmarking Organizational Incident Management Practices“.

If you are looking on tips to avoid common DevOps problems, check out the ebook on proactive monitoring and incident management co-authored with Splunk + VictorOps.