Recommended Learning Path for FortiGate Beginners

I would recommend to start with NSE 4

Refer:

https://training.fortinet.com/my/

Hi galarraga,

Welcome to the Fortinet community!

As SalOn mentioned above, starting with NSE 4 is a good direction if your goal is to learn FortiGate administration.

Before getting too deep into FortiGate configuration, I would recommend being comfortable with some basic networking concepts, particularly TCP/IP, subnetting, routing, VLANs, NAT, DNS, and DHCP. Having these fundamentals will make the FortiGate training much easier to understand.

For the hands-on portion, FortiGate-VM is a very good option for a learning lab. You can build a small virtual topology and practice firewall policies, routing, NAT, VLANs, VPNs, and security profiles without affecting a production environment.

I would suggest approaching the lab progressively:

1. Basic connectivity and routing
2. Firewall policies and NAT
3. VLANs and segmentation
4. DHCP and DNS
5. VPN configuration
6. Web filtering and other security profiles
7. Troubleshooting and verification

Fortinet's Training Institute is a good starting point for the structured learning material, while the Fortinet Documentation and Fortinet Community are excellent resources to use alongside the training.

Most importantly, don't just follow the configuration steps. Build, test, break, troubleshoot, and rebuild. That's where the concepts really start to stick.

Good luck with your FortiGate journey!