Book · 2016
The DevOps Handbook
by Gene Kim
Why a company doing 10,000 deploys a day breaks less often than one doing four a year, and what it takes to get from the second number to the first.
What does Reddit think of The DevOps Handbook?
r/devops carries 87 of the 117 recognized mentions here, more than every other subreddit combined, and its sentiment lands mixed rather than warm. r/ExperiencedDevs is where the actual enthusiasm shows up: sentiment there is positive, and the ↑84 comment says the book is ‘filling in a lot of gaps and putting words to things I’ve seen in production’, then immediately hedges on whether it counts as technical. That hedge is the whole story. Nobody in these threads treats The DevOps Handbook as a standalone text. It travels with The Phoenix Project and The Unicorn Project in list after list: the ↑131 comment files it under ‘Culture/Organization,’ the ↑72 comment calls all three ‘essential for understanding real DevOps’ while conceding the first two are slightly off topic. r/sysadmin's one appearance here is really an argument about agile coaches, not about this book. This is a reading-list entry before it's a read book.
Community feedback & reader fit
Themes
- · A reading-list fixture, always cited alongside The Phoenix Project and The Unicorn Project
- · r/ExperiencedDevs responds to it more warmly than r/devops, its home subreddit
- · Ops teams cite it while implementing CI/CD, not while debating theory
- · r/sysadmin's lone mention is really about agile coaches, not the book
Common praise
- + The ↑84 comment says it fills gaps and puts words to things you've already seen in production.
- + The ↑70 comment recommends reading it once through, then keeping it around as a reference.
- + It gets filed under Culture/Organization on the ↑131 list, right next to The Phoenix Project.
Common criticism
- − The ↑84 commenter can't decide if it counts as technical, and says so in the same breath as the praise.
- − It rarely gets discussed on its own; every substantive quote here cites at least one other book alongside it.
- − r/sysadmin's appearance in the data is an argument about agile coaches, not a review of this book specifically.
Who it's for
Go in already sold on DevOps as a discipline; nothing in these threads argues you into it from zero. Read The Phoenix Project first if you want the narrative version of the same argument — this is what people reach for next. Ops-heavy teams moving toward CI/CD get the most mileage from the case studies, per the r/devops contractor thread about implementing exactly this at client sites. Want one book instead of a stack? This isn't built to stand alone; bring The Unicorn Project with it.
Mentions over time
Which Reddit comments matter for The DevOps Handbook?
The most relevant excerpts across the subreddits where this book is mentioned — opinionated, argued takes first, then top-upvoted mentions. Click through to read the full thread.
“We should really just put together a community reading/listening list... Reading: * Clean Code / Clean Architecture / […
“First I want to just clarify, that what you’re describing is something called a book. Lucky for you, there are hundreds of great books about DevOps. And ultimately books are one of the best ways of digging into deeper knowledge on advanced topics. Video courses tend to be skin deep and not get int…
“This is the list I made for work: **Culture/Organization** * The Phoenix Project (Kim/Spafford/Behr, 2013): allegorical novel that uses fiction to teach us about the advantages of modern IT culture (agile, CI/CD, etc.) * [The U…
“As a DevOps contractor that focuses on remediation and implementation, my formula for success on every client engagement has always been: * **Executive buy-in.** Somebody needs to go to bat for you when the uncomfortable conversation of cost (or, sometimes, delays) comes up. DevOps implementation c…
“Good scrum/agile coaches bring value. Finding a good one is like finding a new cologne in a fart factory. **Disclaimer:** I lead devops/security/support - I've seen good and bad - and hate bullshit lines like your agile coaches are feeding you as a way of swaying you away from work they don't und…
“DevOps handbook is filling in a lot of gaps and putting words to things I’ve seen in production. Dunno if it’s truly “technical.”
“The Phoenix Project The Unicorn Project The DevOps Handbook First two may be slightly OT, but IMO they're essential for understanding real DevOps.
“DevOps Handbook by Gene Kim and others is good to read through and/or as a reference. Making Work Visible by Dominica Degrandis is wonderful for dealing with invisible w…
“I was reading The DevOps Handbook and they cover Valuestream mapping which seems like an exercise meant to optimize processes when they’ve fallen into this sort of deadlock slow system.
“The DevOps Handbook The Phoenix Project
“Good news for you, it's less about the technologies and more about the principles and behaviors. Even the old stuff will reasonably hold up. That said, the classics like with The Phoenix Project and the DevOps Handbook, you can't go wrong.
“I just read about this in the DevOps Handbook. OP, if you have a copy, take a look at _Chapter 19: Enable and Inject Learning into Daily Work_. It talks a lot about creating a culture of blameless postmort…
“Everyone's heard this. They know. Many DevOps Engineers have read your precious _The DevOps Handbook_ by Gene Kim. They understand your opinion. We've heard it three hundred thousand times, DevOps is a methodology not a job title. Thousands of LinkedIn job postings prove otherwise, that it is in fa…
“I like to recommend The DevOps Handbook to show what is really the job of a DevOps. It needs as well to do some consultancy, a mix between an Agile Coach and an Architect
“I think links to The Phoenix Project, the DevOps Handbook, and Google's Site Reliability Engineering would be beneficial.
Convinced? Pick up The DevOps Handbook
Readers also mention
Books that share discussion threads with The DevOps Handbook — counted from the comments, not curated.
Guides featuring The DevOps Handbook
Ranked best-of lists and editorial guides where this book's tracked mentions place it.
The DevOps Handbook — frequently asked
Is The DevOps Handbook worth reading on its own?+
Not really, judging by how Reddit treats it. Every substantive mention here (the ↑131 list, the ↑72 comment) cites it alongside The Phoenix Project and The Unicorn Project, never alone. The ↑84 r/ExperiencedDevs comment praises what it adds but can't quite confirm it counts as technical. Read the set, not the volume.
Does r/devops actually like The DevOps Handbook?+
r/ExperiencedDevs, a smaller and more positive audience, engages with it more warmly: the ↑84 comment credits it with naming things the commenter had only ever seen, never articulated.
Is The DevOps Handbook the same as The Phoenix Project?+
No. The Phoenix Project is the novel; The DevOps Handbook is the nonfiction companion. The ↑72 r/devops comment lists all three books together and calls the first two 'slightly OT' relative to this one, implying it's the one that explains the practices instead of dramatizing them.
Should I read The DevOps Handbook before or after The Phoenix Project?+
Reddit's lists generally put Phoenix first: the ↑131 comment structures its whole list around 'Culture/Organization' with Phoenix as the entry point. But nothing displayed here argues the order matters much. Read Phoenix for buy-in, this one for implementation detail.