In DigiCert's Certificate Management Outlook, released in September 2026, 34% of responding organizations said they had experienced a service outage due to certificate expiration in the past year. The share reporting that their most severe certificate incident cost more than $250,000 rose to 23%, up from 18.5% a year earlier. The burden may grow further. 72% of respondents expect the number of certificates they manage to increase over the next two years, and starting in 2029, the validity period of public TLS certificates will be limited to 47 days. As certificate volumes grow and lifespans shorten, certificate issuance and domain validation tasks will also become more frequent.

This article summarizes the certificate outage costs and downtime reported in the survey, and, based on Forrester Consulting's Total Economic Impact (TEI) analysis, examines the costs and benefits of adopting a certificate management solution.

☑️ Why Certificate Outages Are Classified as an Infrastructure Risk

A certificate outage is a service disruption caused by expired or poorly managed certificates. In DigiCert's 2026 survey, 57% of respondents classified certificate-related service outages as an IT infrastructure issue, while 17% classified them as a security incident. When an outage occurs, it can affect core services, productivity, revenue, customer experience, and even reputation.

Certificates are deeply embedded across applications, services, and technology environments. As a result, the impact of certificate outages does not stay within the scope of public key infrastructure (PKI) or the security team but extends across the entire business operation.

☑️ Outage Costs and Automation Status in the 2026 Certificate Management Outlook

The survey is an independent online study conducted by Propeller Insights in May 2026 on behalf of DigiCert. A total of 1,001 IT and cybersecurity decision-makers responded, including 500 in the United States, 251 in the United Kingdom, and 250 in Australia, spanning a range of industries and company sizes.

Cost of Certificate Incidents

23% of organizations said their most severe certificate incident cost more than $250,000. This is 4.5 percentage points higher than 18.5% a year earlier. Meanwhile, the rate of service outages caused by certificate expiration remained relatively similar to the previous year. This means that while the frequency of outages has not changed significantly, the cost of an outage when it occurs is increasing.

Service Downtime

In the past year, 34% of responding organizations experienced a service outage due to certificate expiration. 40% reported service downtime caused by poor certificate management. About three-quarters of organizations experienced five or more hours of certificate-related downtime in the past year, and 21% experienced 25 hours or more. Expiration remains a common cause of outages, and relying on manual certificate tracking and renewal leaves organizations directly exposed to this risk. 56% of respondents said they are very or extremely concerned about certificate expiration.

The Gap Between Priority and Actual Adoption

Against this backdrop, 46% of organizations named automated certificate lifecycle management as a priority, ranking it third among cybersecurity priorities. It followed AI-driven security operations (65%) and software threat detection and response (61%), and ranked ahead of compliance simplification, Internet of Things (IoT) security standardization, and zero trust expansion. However, actual adoption has not kept pace with this priority. When asked about barriers to adopting automation, only 10% said they "already have automation in place." The biggest barrier to automation was compatibility with legacy systems (25%), followed by budget constraints (21%). 14% cited a shortage of skilled staff.

Certificate Management Budgets and the Investment Case

Organizations are already spending a considerable budget on certificate management. 53% of respondents allocate 10% or more of their security budget to certificate management and related solutions. At the same time, 29% cited a lack of executive buy-in or an unclear return on investment (ROI) and business case as obstacles to automation. Since budget is already being invested, expanding automation requires evidence of the benefits that certificate management investment delivers, such as fewer outages, less manual work, and stronger operational resilience.

☑️ Increasing Issuance and Validation Workloads as Certificate Lifespans Shorten

Certificate management is already a recurring task. 56% of surveyed organizations manage more than 1,000 certificates, and 49% perform certificate management and related security tasks 12 or more times per year. If issuance, renewal, deployment, and remediation require human intervention, this scale translates into ongoing demand on IT staff. The number of certificates to manage is also expected to grow. 72% of respondents expect their certificate count to increase over the next two years. On top of this, certificate lifespans are shrinking. Under the phased reduction rules adopted by the CA/Browser Forum, starting in 2029, the validity period of public TLS certificates will be limited to 47 days and the reuse period for domain validation information to 10 days. The measure requires certificates and validation information to be renewed more frequently, reducing the time that outdated or potentially compromised credentials remain valid.

Once these rules apply, an organization managing 1,000 public TLS certificates may need to handle approximately 8,000 certificate issuances and 40,000 domain validations per year. The more certificates grow and the shorter their lifespans become, the heavier this workload will be. 70% of respondents are actively preparing for shorter certificate lifespans, but 22% are aware of the change and have not yet started preparing.

☑️ Challenges of Certificate Management Based on Manual Work and Fragmented Tools

In the survey, the certificate management issue that the most organizations said they were very or extremely concerned about was maintaining customer trust, at 58%. This was followed by tracking certificate expiration dates (56%), complying with industry regulations (55%), managing certificates across multiple clouds and platforms (55%), and managing internal and external systems simultaneously (52%). Along with expiration, organizations are dealing with compliance, customer trust, and certificates scattered across multiple environments.

Certificate management that relies on manual work and fragmented tools faces four challenges.

First, legacy systems struggle to keep up with shorter certificate lifespans, rising security demands, and changing compliance requirements. Second, manual renewals consume IT staff time and increase the risk of certificate expiration. Third, when tools and teams are siloed, policies become inconsistent, visibility decreases, and work is duplicated. Fourth, when certificates proliferate uncontrollably, it becomes difficult to apply standards or plan for future growth.

As certificates spread across clouds, devices, and CI/CD pipelines, traditional approaches cannot keep up with management. The result is hidden risk, last-minute rushed renewals, audit burdens, and rising costs all at once.

☑️ The Impact of Adopting DigiCert ONE According to Forrester TEI

DigiCert ONE is DigiCert's PKI and DNS platform that combines certificate lifecycle management with public and private certificate services. Forrester's DigiCert ONE TEI analysis examines how costs and benefits change when the fragmented, manual certificate management described above is centralized on this platform. It also provides quantified evidence for the business case that the survey identified as an obstacle to automation.

Methodology and Assumptions

The analysis was commissioned by DigiCert, prepared by Forrester Consulting, and published in July 2025. Forrester interviewed five decision-makers from five organizations using DigiCert ONE, aggregated the results into a single hypothetical composite organization, and calculated risk-adjusted benefits and costs over three years. A discount rate of 10% per year was applied. The composite organization was defined as a large enterprise managing 200,000 certificates. It has a central certificate management team, but many certificates are managed by other departments without standard policies, so the central team does not have visibility into them. It uses a mix of vendor tools and in-house tools, manages 20% of its certificates manually, and its certificate usage grows by 20% annually due to demand from products, IoT devices, and software.

Therefore, the figures below are based on a model organization synthesized from interviews, not the actual results of a specific customer. The analysis does not assume that other organizations will achieve the same ROI and recommends that readers apply their own estimates to the framework to assess whether the investment is appropriate. Forrester does not endorse DigiCert or its products.

Benefits by Category

Total three-year risk-adjusted benefits are $13.3 million, consisting of six categories. The largest is $7.9 million in labor cost savings from renewing certificates that were already in operation when DigiCert ONE was adopted. The composite organization had been renewing 80% of its existing certificates with legacy tools and the remaining 20% manually, and this figure represents the reduction in labor costs as this renewal work moved to DigiCert ONE.

The reduction in certificate-related incident costs is $2.8 million. This was calculated on the assumption that certificate-related incidents drop from 24 to 28 per year before adoption to one per year after adoption, and that the cost per incident decreases by an average of $50,000. The revenue uplift from meeting the strict security standards of partners and customers is $1.3 million. This value attributes 50% of the revenue increase from meeting security standards to DigiCert ONE and applies a 10% net profit margin. Savings from retiring legacy tools amount to $992,500. This reflects reduced licensing, hosting, and maintenance costs from consolidating vendor tools and in-house tools.

The remaining two categories are labor cost savings related to issuing and renewing new certificates. Eliminating manual issuance and renewal saves $395,900, and eliminating the use of legacy tools saves $30,500.

There are also unquantified benefits. DigiCert ONE's single cloud-based platform provides organization-wide certificate visibility and standardizes policies and procedures, leading to time and labor cost savings, stronger security, fewer incidents, and greater adaptability to change for the composite organization.

Changes in Issuance and Renewal Time

For the composite organization, the time required per certificate was estimated to decrease as follows. New issuance dropped by 97.5%, from 120 minutes manually to 3 minutes, and by 40%, from 5 minutes with legacy tools to 3 minutes. Renewal dropped by 98.75%, from 40 minutes manually to 0.5 minutes, and by 75%, from 2 minutes with legacy tools to 0.5 minutes. After adoption, the share of manually managed certificates falls to 0%.

Investment Costs and Three-Year Financial Metrics

Total three-year risk-adjusted costs are $3.2 million. These consist of $2.1 million for DigiCert ONE licensing, premium support, and implementation; $1.1 million for the discovery, inventory, review, and issuance work required to migrate existing certificates to DigiCert ONE; and $49,500 in labor costs for configuring certificate policies and templates during adoption. Subtracting $3.2 million in costs from $13.3 million in benefits yields a net present value of $10.1 million, and the ROI, calculated by dividing net benefits by costs, is 312%. The payback period is less than six months.

☑️ Key Use Cases for Certificate Management with DigiCert ONE and TLM

Within the DigiCert ONE platform portfolio, Trust Lifecycle Manager (TLM) is a product that provides the visibility, governance, and automation needed to manage public and private certificates at scale, helping prevent outages caused by certificate management issues and respond to shorter certificate lifespans. Based on the survey results and TEI analysis above, here are four areas where it can be applied in certificate management.

Understanding the Full Certificate Inventory and Ownership

TLM provides certificate visibility. Before adoption, the TEI interviewees that adopted DigiCert ONE could not identify or control certificates centrally, so management practices varied, ownership was unclear, and there were gaps in monitoring. After adoption, they gained organization-wide certificate visibility and were able to clearly identify certificate owners and responsibilities.

Automating Issuance and Renewal

TLM provides certificate automation. As discussed above, once the 47-day certificate rule applies, the number of issuances and domain validations will increase significantly. Relying on manual work for these tasks consumes IT staff time and increases the risk of expiration. After adopting DigiCert ONE, the TEI composite organization eliminated manually managed certificates, and certificate-related incidents dropped from around 24 to 28 per year to one per year. Monitoring, alerts, and automatic renewal capabilities were cited as the reasons for the reduction in incidents.

Policy Standardization and Audit Readiness

TLM provides certificate governance. 44% of survey respondents experienced compliance issues related to certificate management in the past year. In environments where tools and teams are siloed, policies become inconsistent and the audit burden increases.

Before adoption, the TEI interviewees that adopted DigiCert ONE found it difficult to validate their environments and demonstrate compliance because of fragmented systems, and spent significant cost and time on audits. After adoption, centralized visibility, standardized policies, and built-in reports reduced audit workloads and follow-up work, and they shifted from last-minute, deadline-driven responses to predictable, documented compliance processes.

Consolidating Fragmented Tools and Legacy Systems

Organizations that adopted DigiCert ONE replaced their mix of multiple tools and manual work with a single central platform and retired outdated systems. Fragmented tools are a source of policy inconsistency and duplicated work. The TEI composite organization consolidated its vendor tools and in-house tools, reducing licensing, hosting, and maintenance costs, a benefit calculated at $992,500 over three years.

☑️ Frequently Asked Questions

How much do certificate outages cost?

In DigiCert's 2026 Certificate Management Outlook, 23% of responding organizations said their most severe certificate incident cost more than $250,000. This is 4.5 percentage points higher than 18.5% a year earlier. In terms of downtime, 21% experienced 25 hours or more of certificate-related outages in the past year.

Why is certificate automation adoption lagging?

The biggest barrier is compatibility with legacy systems (25%), followed by budget constraints (21%). Automated certificate lifecycle management ranked third among cybersecurity priorities, but only 10% said they already had automation in place when asked about barriers.

How much will the management workload increase once 47-day certificates take effect?

An organization managing 1,000 public TLS certificates may need to handle approximately 8,000 certificate issuances and 40,000 domain validations per year. This estimate assumes that, starting in 2029, public TLS certificates have a 47-day validity period and domain validation information has a 10-day reuse period.

What is the basis for the Forrester TEI figures?

The figures are risk-adjusted benefits and costs over three years for a hypothetical composite organization managing 200,000 certificates. The analysis was commissioned by DigiCert and prepared by Forrester Consulting based on interviews with five organizations using DigiCert ONE. With $13.3 million in benefits and $3.2 million in costs, it calculated an ROI of 312%, a net present value of $10.1 million, and a payback period of less than six months. Forrester does not assume that other organizations will achieve the same ROI.

What certificates does DigiCert TLM manage?

TLM covers both public and private certificates, providing the visibility, governance, and automation needed for large-scale certificate management. It is a certificate lifecycle management product within the DigiCert ONE platform portfolio.

☑️ Conclusion

Certificate outages are an infrastructure risk with a growing burden in terms of both cost and downtime. In DigiCert's 2026 survey, the share of organizations that experienced incidents costing more than $250,000 rose by 4.5 percentage points in one year, and although certificate lifecycle automation ranked third among cybersecurity priorities, actual adoption has not kept pace. As certificate counts grow and the 47-day certificate rule takes effect in 2029, issuance and validation tasks will become even more frequent. In the Forrester TEI analysis, a composite organization managing 200,000 certificates was calculated to gain $13.3 million in benefits from a $3.2 million investment over three years.

The full contents of both reports are available at the links below.

▶ DigiCert Certificate Management Outlook Get the Report 

▶ Forrester TEI Get the Report 

CloudNetworks supports customers from assessing their current certificate inventory and management practices, through reviewing the scope of visibility and automation based on DigiCert TLM, to implementation. If you are considering a certificate management solution to address certificate outages or prepare for the transition to 47-day certificates, please contact us through the link below.

▶ DigiCert TLM Learn More 

[Source : DigiCert, "DigiCert Research Finds Certificate Failures Are a