DataCamp Review - Is it the right choice for you?

Data science is one of most sought-after and highest-paid careers in the current economy. According to Indeed, the average base salary for a data scientist in the U.S. is $74.507 USD, with more senior data scientists potentially earning $200,000+ USD per year!

So it's no wonder why platforms like DataCamp have exploded in popularity, teaching people the skills to get their dream job in data science. But is the hype justified?

Let's find out in this full DataCamp review!

What is DataCamp?

DataCamp is an online learning platform dedicated to helping you learn data science & data analysis. Founded in 2013 by Martijn Theuwissen, Jonathan Cornelissen and Dieter De Mesmaeker, it has quickly become a well-known learning destination for future data scientists. With more than 9 million learners from 180+ countries, you'll definitely not be the first person to learn data science on DataCamp!

In total, they offer more 350+ courses across 50+ skill tracks, which are taught by more than 260 vetted & highly-qualified instructors.

Some of the most popular skills you can learn on the platform include:

• Python

• R

• SQL

• Excel

• Tableau

• Power BI

• Machine Learning

• ... and much more!

DataCamp tries to faciliate every aspect of learning data science through their easy-to-use platform.

Their 4-step learning methodology tries to include everything that makes for a great learning experience:

1. Assessing your skills through short tests

2. Learning new concepts through interactive courses

3. Practicing learned concepts

4. Applying what you learned to open-ended problems that challenge your thinking skills

Each of these aspects is covered in their offers, which makes DataCamp a really well-rounded product for aspiring data scientists. Let's check out some of the things they offer:

Assessments

Before diving into your learning journey, DataCamp gives you the option to your skills with their Signal Assessments. These assessments take about 10 minutes to complete and help DataCamp figure out what your current skill level is. After you've completed the assessment, you will get personalized recommendations on what to learn, so you can improve your overall knowledge.

In total, there are 14 different assessments available for all kinds of data science topics like Python, R and SQL.

DataCamp workspace

To get started with data science, you would usually have to install lots of software on your computer, like an IDE, a language like Python, packages like Jupyter Notebooks and so on. Doesn't that sound complicated? Well, that's what it is, especially if you don't have a background in IT.

That's why DataCamp created their own workspace, which is a work environment in your browser that comes with everything you need to get started learning, like all the needed software, data templates to explore and integrations with popular data sources. It's included in all DataCamp subscription plans and works without any prior setup!

DataCamp app

You're on the train and you want to get some data science practice in? No problem, as DataCamp also offers a mobile app for both iOS and Android. It makes it easy to work on your data science knowledge with bite-sized problems.

Competitions

To make learning more interesting, DataCamp also hosts regular competitions that you can take part in to win cash prizes, swag & more. These competitions challenge you to solve real-world problems with data science. Your submission will be scored based on criteria like the presentation & visualization of your data.

Career services

Besides just providing learning materials, DataCamp also helps you find a job in data science. You can get a review of your CV, networking sessions with potential employers and much more. The best part is that this is included in the standard DataCamp subscription. You just need to complete of of the DataCamp certifications to qualify. You can read more on this in the "DataCamp certification" section.

Pro & Cons

Who is DataCamp for?

As mentioned before, DataCamp focuses solely on teaching all about data science & data analysis and they're doing this pretty succesfully!

Still, if that's not the content you're looking for, you might want to check out platforms like Udemy & Skillshare instead, which offer a broader variety of topics to learn about.

But now, who is DataCamp for exactly?

I think that DataCamp is best for:

• Professionals that want to increase their market value or want to pivot their career into data science

• Students getting started with data science & analysis

• Anyone else that wants to learn about data science with easy-digestible & concise courses & projects

DataCamp pricing

DataCamp has a couple of different plans available for you to choose from:

Free plan

The free plan gives you access to the absolute basics. You get access to:

• The first chapter of all courses

• 3 Data Literacy courses

• 7 projects

• 3 sets of practice challenges

• The DataCamp workspace

• The skill assessment tests

This plan is great, if you just want to test the waters and see if data science is something you want to learn more about.

Standard Plan

The Standard plan gets you everything from Free, plus:

• 350+ courses

• 12 career tracks

• 50+ skill tracks

• Unlimited practice challenges

• Live code-alongs

• All mobile app courses and practice

• Community chat

It costs $25 USD/month billed yearly or $29 USD/month billed monthly.

This is the right plan for you, if you want to get started on your path to a data science career, or you just want to casually learn something new about data science!

Premium Plan

The Premium Plan gets you everything from Standard, plus:

• 80+ projects

• Tableau, Power BI, and Oracle content

• Priority support

It costs $33.25 USD/month billed yearly or $49 USD/month billed monthly.

If you want to go all-in on your new career in data science, this is the right plan for you! It's also a great choice, if you want to learn about some of the more "enterprise" data science & data analysis tools, like Tableau, Power BI & Oracle.

DataCamp refund policy

DataCamp currently doesn't give you the option to get a refund for your purchase. You can try out all their premium features with a 7-day free trial though. Also, you can pause your DataCamp subscription if you're on the monthly plan, meaning your subscription payments stop until you turn them back on again.

DataCamp for businesses

DataCamp has two dedicated business plans available. There's the Professional and the Enterprise plan, which both come with additional capabilities that allow companies to manage their employees learning experience.

Professional

The Professional plan gives you access to all the features of the regular Premium plan, plus:

• Admin roles and permissions

• Assignments

• Admin dashboard

• Live chat for admins

With $25 USD/month/user, it also costs the same as the regular Premium plan.

Please note that as it's similar to the Premium plan, it doesn't include access to Tableau, Power BI & Oracle content.

Enterprise

The Professional plan gives you access to all the features of the regular Professional plan, plus:

• Dedicated Customer Success Manager or Learning Solutions Architect (available for 20+ users)

• Single sign-on (SSO)

• LMS integrations

• Advanced reporting

• Data export

• Custom learning tracks

• Tableau, Power BI, and Oracle content

• Priority support

As the name suggest, this plan is meant for enterprise customers. Pricing for this plan is not available publicly.

DataCamp for students

If you're a student, you can get access 360+ courses and 1,500+ hours of DataCamp content at a deep discount through the Premium Student Plan. You only pay $149 USD for the yearly membership, compared to the normal price of $399 USD, which is a 62% discount!

DataCamp for classrooms

If you’re an educator, you can request to completely free access to DataCamp for you and your students through DataCamp for classrooms. You just have to fill out the registration form and if you're eligible, you will receive free access to all DataCamp products.

Learning & customer support

DataCamp offers various forms of support. For questions about your account, you can check out their self-service knowledge base. They also give you the option to contact them directly, if you are having problems with your account.

For learning support, you can join their student Slack channel, which is one of the biggest Slack groups for data science. This is where you can ask questions if you're stuck on a project, or you don't understand how something works.

If you're on a business or academic plan, you can also join groups within your organisation, where you can learn together with others.

Lastly, DataCamp supports you in landing your dream job in data science through their career services. These are included in any of the premium subscriptions and you can qualify for them by completing your DataCamp certification. More on that in the next section :)

DataCamp certification

Once you've built up your data skills, DataCamp gives you the option to get your skills certified. These certifications are like exams that you can take to prove what you've learned and their included in your premium DataCamp subscription. They are built by experienced professional to determine if you're ready to take on a job as a data scientist. All certifications consist of:

• A timed assessment

• Coding challenges

• A recorded case study

These challenges will take you a couple of hours to complete, but it's worth it! Once you've passed the test, you will get access to DataCamp's career services, which include:

• Reviews of your CV, LinkedIn profile & portfolio

• Access to workshops on interviewing, networking, etc.

• Networking sessions with potential employers

• Job-matching with companies

This is huge, as it can help you find your dream job in data science much faster.

You will also receive a statement of accomplishment, which you can add to your LinkedIn profile to showcase your newly acquired skills.

But still: Be aware that this certificate is by no means an officical document. DataCamp courses are not accredited, so they won't be recognized by universities.

If that's what you want, check out platforms like Coursera or edX.

Create a DataCamp account

To create a DataCamp account, all you need to do is to enter in your email address and passwort on their homepage and click "Start Learning For Free".

Alternatively, you can sign up with Google, Facebook or LinkedIn.

Popular courses on DataCamp

Let's go over some of the most popular courses on DataCamp, so that you can get a feel for the things you can learn on the platform.

Introduction to Python

Learn the basics of Python in 4 hours with this entry-level course that has been taken by more than 4 million students on DataCamp. Your instructor will be Hugo Bowne-Anderson, a data scientist formerly employed at DataCamp, where he also hosted the DataCamp podcast.

Check out the course

Introduction to R

Get started with R and data science with this course held by co-founder and former DataCamp CEO Jonathan Cornelissen. With a PhD in financial econometrics, he has helped 2.2 million learners understand the R language.

Check out the course

Introduction to SQL

Learn about relational databases with SQL with help from Nick Carchedi. He's a product manager at DataCamp with a Master's degree in Biostatistics. He's also worked as a data scientist for McKinsey in the past. Join more than 1,25 million students and get started on your data science journey.

Check out the course

DataCamp instructors

Overall, instructors on DataCamp are subject-matter experts that either work at DataCamp, or went through the process of becoming a recognized DataCamp instructor. In total, there are 260+ vetted & highly-qualified instructors on the platform. This means that you can expect the quality of the content to be high throughout all of DataCamp's courses & skill paths.

One of these instructors is David Robinson. He's the Principal Data Scientist at Heap, at startup valued at almost $1 billion USD. He has work experience as a data scientist from DataCamp and StackOverflow and received his PhD in Quantitative and Computational Biology from Princeton University.

Now that's what I would call an expert data science instructor!

Summary: Is DataCamp worth it?

Absolutely! If you want to learn data science & data analysis, I'd say that DataCamp is one of the best platforms out there for you. It offers lots of great tools that make learning data science an absolute breeze.

You'll love DataCamp for their:

• Easily-digestable courses

• Real-life projects

• Great career services

• Awesome & intuitive user interface

• Built-in data science workspace

That being said: If data science is not your jam, you will have to look elsewhere, as DataCamp focuses on this topic exclusively.