DataCamp Review: Is It The Right Platform For You?

Who Is DataCamp For?

You may be a little unsure if DataCamp is the right platform for you?

Well, let me explain a little about what to expect from DataCamp. It’s an online learning platform that focuses on learning data skills at your own pace. Its learning methodology is broken into a 4 part process: Assess, Learn, Practice and Apply, that helps to give learners a well-rounded learning experience.

Datacamp Learning Methodology

DataCamp Courses

Its 380+ courses are bite sized and digestible for learners, combining videos with interactive exercises to create an engaging learning experience. Its courses fall into 3 main areas, including learning a new technology, launching your career and mastering a specific skill:

• Learn a new technology: By following short videos that are led by expert instructors, and then practice what you have learned with interactive exercises. Its most popular Technology courses include Python, R and SQL.
• Career Tracks: A collection of courses that are curated by industry experts to help you grow your data skills and advance your career. Its most popular Career Track courses include Data Analyst, Data Scientist and Data Analyst.
• Skill Tracks: Gain specific expertises with learning a skill track, that is a collection, of course, curated by industry experts to grow your data skills. Its most popular Skill Track courses include R Programming, Importing & Cleaning Data and Data Visualization.

Datacamp Certification Programs

Datacamp has recently added a couple of certifications to its platform. The certifications have been built in partnership with industry leaders that prove you have the skills available for a career in the particular field. Currently, it offers certifications as a Data Scientist and a Data Analyst. The best part about these certifications are that they are included in your paid Premium plan.

Datacamp Certification Programs

When you successfully complete one of its professional certifications you will receive a certificate to prove you now have the knowledge for the job role in your chosen certification.

DataCamp for Business

DataCamp for businesses is flexible online training for every role, from non-coding essentials to data science and machine learning. It has worked with 2,500+ companies like Google and ebay to help upskill their employees. DataCamp for business focuses on upskilling your team to make better data-driven decisions.

Datacamp for Business

It offers a couple of different plans, Teams and Enterprise which you can try out with a free trial or a free demo. The Teams plan is designed for 2 users+ and is billed annually. Whereas the Enterprise is for larger organizations and is custom priced.

Datacamp for The Classroom

Datacamp generously offers free access for educators, all you need to do is to apply to get access to your free, 1200+ hours of data science courses.

Datacamp For The Classroom

Datacamp believes in empowering students with data skills for the future, by providing free access to educators. As an educator, you can create assignments for your students and can track your student’s growth and progress. After you have submitted your application, it can take a few days for it to be approved.

Doesn’t sound bad does it?

If you’re an educator in data science and data concepts and think your students will benefit from the interactive courses Datacamp offers, then check it out here.

How Much Are DataCamp Courses?

DataCamp works on a subscription model offering 2 different plans for individual learners. Users can choose from the Basic Plan (the free account) or the Premium Plan. The Premium plan can be paid for on a monthly or yearly basis, if you do decide to go for the annual plan you will be saving a few dollars. There is a handy currency-converter in the top-right corner above the pricing plans for all our global learners (see image below).

DataCamp plans & pricing

> Check out Datacamp subscription plans

DataCamp for Business

DataCamp for Business offers 2 different plans either the Teams or the Enterprise. The Team Plan ($12.42 per user a month) with a minimum of 2 users or more. Then there is the Enterprise Plan which is custom priced depending on your business needs, you can contact sales for pricing and a demo.

DataCamp Business Plans

DataCamp has worked with 2,500+ successful companies like Google, Microsoft and ebay to upskill its employees to empower them with knowledge to make them the best at their job. Here are just some of the reasons you will love Datacamp for Business:

• Create tailored learning content
• Measure the impact of online training
• Receive expert guidance
• Provide hands-on skill building

DataCamp Professional and Enterprise Plans

How To Open A DataCamp Account?

The registration process for DataCamp is really intuitive. I still thought it would be helpful to give you a step by step of how to join.

DataCamp Start Learning For Free

1. Open a browser and visit datacamp.com
2. You can Create Your Free Account
3. Either sign up with Linkedin, Facebook or Google
4. Or enter your email and password and click Get Started

Once you are signed up you will complete a basic profile and then be taken to My Progress where you can begin to check out various options in the left side bar like Career Tracks, Skill Tracks, Courses, Projects and more.

DataCamp My Progress

You can then begin to browse different courses. A great feature is the filter courses (see image below) where you can pick the Technologies, Topics or sort by Most Relevant and Newest. All its courses combine short expert videos with immediate hands-on exercises.

DataCamp Filter Courses

Examples Of The Most Popular DataCamp Course

I thought it would be helpful to look at the 5 most popular courses at Datacamp as it will give you good indication of what other learners are enjoying.

1. Data Scientist with Python – A career track that will help you gain python skills you need to succeed as a data scientist. No prior coding experience is required. In this track, you’ll learn how versatile language allows you to import, clean, manipulate and visualize data. It has a 4.5 out of 5 rating and will take 88 hours to complete.
2. Python Programming – A skill track to gain the foundational skills to become a Python programmer. In this track, you’ll learn the Python basics you need to start on your programming journey. The course instructor Hugo is a highly experienced data scientist, educator, writer and podcaster at Datacamp. It has a 4.5 out of 5 rating and will take 15 hours to complete.
3. Data Scientist with R – A career track that will help you gain the career-building R skills you need to succeed as a data scientist. No prior coding experience is required. In this track, you’ll get hands-on with some of the most popular R packages and work on real-world datasets. It has a 4.5 out of 5 rating and will take 76 hours to complete.
4. Machine Learning Fundamentals with Python – A skill track where you will learn the fundamental concepts in Machine Learning. If you are a beginner, this is a great place to start. It has a 4.5 out of 5 rating and will take 20 hours to complete 5 courses.
5. Data Analyst with Python – A career track where you will gain the career-building Python skills you need to succeed as a data analyst. Through interactive exercises, you’ll get hands-on experience with some of the most popular Python libraries. It consists of 16 courses that will take 62 hours.

> More information at Datacamp

6 Tips To Find The Perfect DataCamp Course

If you are undecided about which course is right for you. I have put together 6 tips to help you pick the best course for you.

Skill & Career Tracks

DataCamp Curriculum Team has designed learning programs called ‘Tracks’ there are two different types Skill Tracks and Career Tracks. Each track contains a series of courses to follow and complete for you to gain the skills and knowledge to your chosen path.

DataCamp Skill Tracks

Skill Tracks range from 3-7 courses, focusing on specific complementary skills in various programming languages. Its courses have been curated for intermediate to advanced learners.

DataCamp Career Tracks

Career Tracks range from 12-30 courses, that begin with introductory courses in Python, R and SQL and cover basic skills and move through to more focused and advanced topics.

Statement of Accomplishment

Once you have completed a Track you will be provided with a Statement of Accomplishment free of charge. As long as you have successfully completed the course you are able to download it which means you then have the possibility to manually share it on your LinkedIn profile.

DataCamp Statement of Accomplishment

Note: DataCamp Statement of Accomplishment is not an accredited certificate, but it does show you have successfully completed a course and learnt new skills.

Free courses

With a free DataCamp account, you can access the first chapter of most courses. This is the great way to try and test out a course and decide whether you want to financially subscribe to one of its subscription plans.

DataCamp Start Course For Free

DataCamp Instructor Profile

When you view a course or a track you will see on the right side of the screen the instructor and collaborators for the course. You are able to click onto their profile and read a small bio about them.

Some of the DataCamp Instructors are staff based at DataCamp who are experts in their fields and others are from Universities like Oregon State and Washington State.

DataCamp Instructor

I want to add here that compared to other elearning platforms that I have reviewed the instructor profile feels a little sparse and limited. If you are looking for a more detailed instructor profile and links to their social media then it’s maybe worth checking out Coursera or edX.

DataCamp Assessments

DataCamp offers taking an assessment for free. You can filter by Technology (see image below) and choose your topic. You won’t need to register or enter any credit card details to do this. This can be really helpful if you aren’t sure on where to start or if you have some knowledge in a technology but are lacking in some areas.

DataCamp Take The Assessment

Each assessment is designed to test your knowledge in your chosen technology and will take between 5-10 minutes. After completing the assessment, you will need to sign into DataCamp to receive your results. You will then be given your results (a percentage) which are mapped on a graph of Novice, Intermediate and Advanced. A series of personalized recommendations (courses) are given to you. This is a great place to start for DataCamp newbies, you can check out your free assessment here.

DataCamp Test Your Skills 

DataCamp Community

DataCamp has an active community full of news threads, a resource center, tutorials, cheat sheets, chats and a podcast. Not only is it resource rich but a great way to stay connected with other learners.

DataCamp Community

As well as a thriving community, DataCamp also has a slack community page (see image above). Some of the channels include #introduction, #jobs, #feedback which is an ideal way to engage with other learners for any doubts or questions you may have.

Will DataCamp Help Me With My Career?

DataCamp courses are ideal for someone who is new to data science or someone that already has some knowledge and is looking to improve skills or even a career change.

The Skill or Career Track feature is pretty appealing if you are looking to be guided in the right direction to learn a skill or gain the knowledge for a career path in data science. The fact that these courses are put together by experts in their fields means you can be rest assured that everything you are learning is relevant.

Even though DataCamp doesn’t offer accredited certificates it still provides you with a Statement of Accomplishment for free which you can share manually via your LinkedIn profile. These certificates are still recognised by industry experts working in the world of data science.

DataCamp prides itself on keeping its courses updated and relevant. Therefore it is constantly expanding its curriculum so learners can keep up with the latest in data science and analytics.

Is DataCamp Legit?

Something which most of us ask when considering an elearning platform: Is this platform legit? Will it be worth my money?

It’s completely normal to have that moment of doubt as you are typing in your card details and there is no turning back. Well let me reassure you.

DataCamp was founded in 2013 as a start up company in Belgium.  The company was founded by Dieter De Mesmaeker, Martijn Theuwissen and Jonathan Cornelissen. Its headquarters are based in New York and they have offices in Belgium and London.

So, DataCamp is legit and it’s safe to use, you won’t be scammed.

Datacamp Vs Codecademy

Datacamp and Codecademy are two popular online learning platforms that offer courses in various data science and programming languages. Some of the key differences in the categories each platform offers is that Datacamp focuses on data science topics whereas Codecademy is geared towards learning different programming languages. Each platform has a slightly different teaching style, Datacamp follows learning by doing approach, whereas Codecademy offers more interactive tutorials and exercises to help learners understand programming concepts. Both platforms offer free and paid plans which are similarly priced. Datacamp has recently introduced certification programs which have been built in partnership with industry leaders and are designed to prepare you for a specific job role. If you are still undecided, then check out our detailed Datacamp Vs Codecademy article.