Some degrees are a combination of many courses. Data science comprises knowledge from math, statistics, computer science, and business put together. Every company needs a data scientist to make sound and reasonable decisions. 

A data scientist’s job is to interpret the data and make rational decisions. It is a huge responsibility because everyone relies on you and your decisions. A data scientist’s salary is much better than a data analyst. Both the terms are alike yet people prefer data scientists. You can earn $95,000 to $250,000 per year. I would say it is a good career, right? 

How can you be a data scientist?

To be a data scientist, you need to take either a degree or a certification. Which one you prefer is totally up to you. In the following lines, I will compare different courses to help you find your perfect one.

Coursera: IBM Data Science for professional certificate

This is a beginner-level course so it doesn’t require high-level knowledge. This course will teach you different skills like programming, data analysis, data visualization, and SQL. The course will take 11 months to complete. You will gain professional-level skills once you complete this course.

Course pros:

• You will receive a professional data science certification after course completion.
• You can share the certificate on LinkedIn.
• It is affiliated with IBM.
• You can directly start your career after this course.
• It is up to the standard of 2021.

Course cons:

• Paid course.
• It takes 11 months for completion.

Harvard University: Principles, Statistical and Computational Tools for Reproducible Data Science

This is an online data science course. This is an intermediate-level course therefore, the student should have background knowledge of computers, math, and data handling. The course will teach you everything from new methods to applying them. You will also learn about different tools and their uses.

Course pros:

• This is a free course.
• It is self-paced.
• The course duration is eight weeks.
• It is up to the standards of 2021.

Course cons:

• Intermediate level course so beginners cannot apply.
• Mainly covers research and research-related work only.

Udemy: The Data Science Course 2021: Complete Data Science Bootcamp

This course is a best seller by Udemy. It has an excellent rating of 4.5 stars and has more than 400,000 students. This is a complete data science course. It covers everything. It will teach you statistics, mathematics, python language, and advanced statistics. The course is 28 hours long and has many articles and resources.

Course pros:

• It is self-paced.
• It teaches machine learning – many courses skip this one.
• Complete data science Bootcamp – covers everything regarding data science.
• Available at a small price of $15.
• It is up to the standards of 2021.
• Available in 6 languages.

Course cons:

• It’s not free.

Future Learn: Data Science: Data-Driven Decision Making

This course is a postgraduate-level course. This course focuses on decision-making power using data. It also involves understanding and interpreting data so you can use it to the maximum. The course duration is 12 weeks. This course is specifically for people who already have a bachelor’s or a master’s level degree. This course will increase your chances for a promotion, a better salary or a better job.

Course pros:

• Affiliated with Monash University.
• It focuses on the necessary decision-making ability

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• It is up to the standards of 2021.

Course cons:

• Costly, you have to pay $1484 for this course.
• Only for experts to enhance their skills.

Udacity: Data science for business leaders

This course is for business leaders. It only takes 4-8 weeks and you only need to work 5 hours per week. You must have a basic knowledge of stats, probability, and business. You will start from the introduction and learn many things like human capital and the infrastructure of data science. You will also learn effective planning strategies.

Course pros:

• Easy to complete.
• Mentor-based learning.
• It provides career services and opportunities.

Course cons:

• Paid course, almost $300 per month. 

Summary:

If I consider the best among these 5 courses, it will be the third one. Udemy is a well-known and reputable platform. Thousands of students benefit from its courses. This course is a complete beginner’s guide about data science. It is cheap therefore, anyone can afford it. Moreover, you will get many different resources and articles. It is also up to the requirements of 2021. You will gain maximum knowledge from this course.