The Best Hadoop Certifications in 2019 [Updated]

With the Big Data adoption, the importance of Hadoop is increasing day by day. In the coming few years, more than 50% of the world’s data will be processed by Hadoop. Hence, the demand for Hadoop talent is rising high. On the other hand, companies are struggling to hire the right talent in the industry.

Here right talent signifies the professional with experience in handling data and its proper processing using the Hadoop ecosystem. In this scenario what could be the better answer than a resource with market-recognized Hadoop certification?

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It is a proven fact that someone with the best Hadoop and Spark certification from a market-leading vendor takes an edge over others in lucrative career opportunities. Hence, a big data certification from popular vendors like IBM, Cloudera, HortonWorks, and MapR bestows a professional with the most demanding and recognized job in Big Data industry. Moreover, a Hadoop certification proves that you are familiar with the best practices in the big data industry, have working knowledge in the field, and required knowledge.

How does a Hadoop Certification Help in Your Career?

A Hadoop certification is a confident measure of capable and qualified big data experts in the industry. However, the average cost of Hadoop certification is high, it portrays and proves your skill in Hadoop without any doubt. Once you achieve a Hadoop certification, it helps you to highlight your skills to your employer, clients, and peers. Furthermore, it boosts up your customer’s confidence in hiring a certified resource for Big data project. Not only customers, a certification in Hadoop definitely helps you to deal the technical aspects of Hadoop more efficiently than non-certified professionals.

Moreover, Hadoop certifications enhance your practical knowledge of Hadoop ecosystem components. In addition to that, qualifying the best Hadoop certification exam is a tough exercise that demands a lot of dedication which is extremely valued by employers. There is a huge demand for Hadoop certified professionals in IT and non-IT sector. According to a study, “The certified Hadoop developers are offered an annual salary of $101,000, whereas the administrators’ average salary is about $128,500 that is comparatively high to the non-certified Hadoop professionals.

Also Read: Top 50 Big Data Interview Questions and Answers

Advantages of Hadoop Certification

At present, IT professionals from different fields want to move into high paid jobs, and the Big data is the growing domain that is gaining popularity for providing high paid jobs. To get big data jobs, people are looking for available Hadoop certifications in the market to find the best Hadoop certification. This is because the certified Hadoop professional has some exceptional skills as compared to the non-certified Hadoop professionals. The Hadoop certification offers a number of advantages to the professionals such as better job opportunities, higher salary, and many others. Followings are the advantages that a Hadoop certified professional get –

Qualifying a Hadoop certification makes the professionals represent their expertise and skills to the employers, peers, and customers.
Hadoop certified professionals are recognized in the industry due to their advanced big data skills and thus they get better job opportunities.
If you get certified by the renowned vendor like Hortonworks, Cloudera, and MapR, it adds an extra credential in your resume and thus will be liable to receive more offers from the top companies.
Being Hadoop certified will make you technically strong, that will, in turn, make you more confident about your conceptual knowledge and skills as compared to the non-certified professionals.

Market Leaders in Hadoop Certification

The main advantage of Hadoop comes with its open source feature. Hence, several vendors have stepped into the world of Hadoop with their own distribution. Each distribution can be personalized with a blend of features as per the need of users. Hence, choosing the right distribution is purely business specific. Furthermore, each distribution brings their specific certification in the market. Among them, Cloudera, MapR, and HortonWorks are the market leaders for Hadoop certifications in the market for 2017-18. However, which one you should choose that solely depends on your personal needs, organizational requirements, Hadoop certification cost, and its validity for a specific vendor.

1. Cloudera Hadoop Certification – Cloudera is the well-known name, one of the most popular vendors that offer Hadoop certification. It offers a number of big data certifications and thus provides top companies big data talents. The Hadoop certifications offered by Cloudera are:

Cloudera Certified Professional – Data Scientist (CCP DS)
Cloudera Certified Administrator for Hadoop (CCAH)
Cloudera Certified Hadoop Developer (CCDH)

2. Hortonworks Hadoop Certification – Hortonworks is also one of the top Hadoop certification providing vendors. Hortonworks Hadoop certification proves an individual’s Hadoop skills for the relevant job. Hence, it brings more opportunities for the professionals in Hadoop network. The Hortonworks Hadoop certifications are –

Hortonworks Certified Apache Hadoop Developer (HCAHD)
Hortonwoks Certified Apache Hadoop Administrator (HCAHA)

3. MapR Hadoop Certification – MapR Hadoop certification recognizes Hadoop professionals in the industry with advanced Hadoop cluster knowledge and skills. It makes you big data expert and provides a competitive edge. Following are the top three MapR Hadoop certifications –

MapR Certified Hadoop Developer (MCHD)
MapR Certified Hadoop Administrator (MCHA)
MapR Certified HBase Developer (MCHBD)

4. IBM Hadoop Certification – IBM Hadoop Certification is one of the Hadoop certifications known for providing quick practical knowledge and experience on the working of Hadoop framework. IBM Hadoop certification comes with associated Hadoop training and real-time industry project. IBM Certified Hadoop program is to train the professionals in importing data in Hadoop cluster. It also makes the professional expertise in processing data with big data tools such as Hive, Pig etc. After passing this Hadoop certification, one becomes able to understand which one is the best Hadoop tool and which tool should be used in a particular situation.

For IBM Hadoop certifications, the professional is required to prepare through a high-level Hadoop training program with a Hadoop expert. This certification requires the candidate to have a good knowledge of all the Hadoop tools and concepts. An engineer or a developer with basic programming knowledge and experience, go for IBM Hadoop training. Once, the candidate completes the Hadoop training with successful completion of the real-time project, he or she is liable to get certified with the IBM Hadoop certification. So, if you are looking for a quick Hadoop training course to gain practical knowledge, you should consider this certification without thinking much.

Validity – The IBM Hadoop certification comes with the unlimited i.e. lifetime validity with no expiry.

Comparison of Top Hadoop Certifications

Out of the above mentioned available Hadoop certifications providers, Cloudera, Hortonworks, and MapR are the most popular in the industry. Here is a comprehensive overview of these most popular Hadoop certifications in the market. If you compare the three distributions then definitely you will shortlist the two – Cloudera and HortonWorks Hadoop certification. Yes, that’s the choice for almost all the professionals who are looking for the best Hadoop certification. Let’s have a comparative analysis of the different Hadoop certifications for data scientists, developers, and administrators provided by Cloudera, Hortonworks, and MapR:

Criteria	Cloudera Hadoop Certification	HortonWorks Hadoop Certification	MapR Hadoop Certification
Hadoop Certifications Available for Data Scientists	Cloudera Certified Professional – Data Scientist (CCP DS) – Justifies the skill of a data scientist and his ability to implement data science algorithms and solutions. This certification includes three exams: DS700: Descriptive and Inferential Statistics on Big Data DS701: Advanced Analytical Techniques on Big Data DS702: Machine Learning at Scale CCP DS Certification Cost – $200 Validity- This certification comes with lifetime validity.	NA	NA
Hadoop Administrator Certification	Cloudera Certified Administrator for Hadoop (CCAH) – Proves one’s expertise in administrative activities in enterprise purpose. This includes jobs like configuration, deployment, maintenance, and security of Hadoop clusters in an enterprise environment. It comes for two versions CDH4 and CDH5. CDH4(CCAH) – $295 CDH5 – $125 (upgradation excluding previous Hadoop certification cost) Validity – this certification has no expiry but is valid for the specific version only.	Hortonwoks Certified Apache Hadoop Administrator (HCAHA) – Proves one’s hands-on experience in deploying and managing Hadoop clusters in the enterprise. HCAHA – $250	MapR Certified Hadoop Administrator (MCHA) – Proves one’s expertise in MapR and Hadoop cluster administration. MCHA – $250
Hadoop Developer Certification	Cloudera Certified Hadoop Developer (CCDH) – This certification is for one who proves expertise in development aspects of coding, maintenance, and optimization of Hadoop clusters for enterprise projects. CCDH4 – $295 CCDH5 – $125 (for upgradation) Validity – This certification has no expiry but need to upgrade/renew every 2 years	Hortonworks Certified Apache Hadoop Developer (HCAHD) – Proves one’s hands-on experience with other components of Hadoop ecosystem like Pig, Hive, Sqoop, Flume etc HCAHD – $250	MapR Certified Hadoop Developer (MCHD) – Proves one’s expertise in YARN and MapReduce programming development. MCHD – $250 MapR Certified HBase Developer (MCHBD) – Proves one’s expertise in HBase development MCHBD – $250
Advantages	These certifications focus on the fundamental components of Hadoop and spark ecosystem. The Cloudera certification exam is not distribution specific and demonstrates your Hadoop skills in general.	Hortonworks data platform (HDP) is 100% open source. HortonWorks Hadoop certification has potential market demand in enterprise applications because of its easy integration. Hence, it’s a worth to invest in HortonWorks certifications.	It doesn’t cover all the spectrum of Hadoop. However, if you want to establish as a MapReduce programmer these certifications give you a deeper level of knowledge.

Note: If you are preparing for a Hadoop interview, we recommend you to go through the top Hadoop interview questions and get ready for the interview.

What would be the Best Hadoop Certification for You?

It is not the Hadoop certification providing vendor that makes the certification best but the knowledge and experience that you gain through the certification. What you learn while qualifying the Hadoop certification during Hadoop certification training is the most important thing that matters. Cloudera and Hortonworks Hadoop certifications, both test the practical knowledge of data analysis, data ingestion, and data transformation. IBM Hadoop certification is the one that provides quick practical experience in Hadoop framework and Hadoop ecosystem.

Now if you want to conclude for the best certification then Cloudera is far-and-away the leading Hadoop certifications on the market. This is in terms of market share and mindshare. However, there is not much variation in terms of Hadoop certification cost among them. Furthermore, when it comes to certification support Cloudera and HortonWorks Hadoop certification do a good job with exam objectives, paid practice tests and instructor-led training.

The Cloudera Hadoop Certification provides knowledge in both the Hadoop and Spark in a single certification. While Hortonworks offers two different certifications to test the Hadoop and Spark knowledge. In terms of costing, this is definitely worth to take when you are going to invest for a Hadoop certification cost of minimum $200! However, if you think from the job perspective, more than 1,000 positions pop up in job portals for Cloudera certified professionals. In addition to that pay hike for a Cloudera certified professional is 3 times higher than other similar profiles.

Conclusion

Finally, follow the industry trends to pave the way for your career and select the best Hadoop certification in the market accordingly. Getting hands-on experience than choosing a vendor is more important. This will give you adequate knowledge of Hadoop ecosystem. Both Cloudera and HortonWorks Hadoop certifications test your hands-on skill as well as practical knowledge of Hadoop ecosystem. However, it’s your ability to be industry ready from the beginning and that’s the key criteria for the success. Moreover, look into your organization’s choice for Hadoop distribution and define your own path in that direction to select the best Hadoop certification. Adding up a certification will definitely open up many sources for your career as a future Big Data professional with expertise in Hadoop framework.

Hope this article will give you some light on the Hadoop certification choice. Now it’s your time to move forward and choose the right one!

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Whizlabs Big Data Certification courses – Spark Developer Certification (HDPCD) and HDP Certified Administrator (HDPCA) are based on the Hortonworks Data Platform, a market giant of Big Data platforms. Whizlabs recognizes that interacting with data and increasing its comprehensibility is the need of the hour and hence, we are proud to launch our Big Data Certifications. We have created state-of-the-art content that should aid data developers and administrators to gain a competitive edge over others.

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About Aditi Malhotra

Aditi Malhotra is the Content Marketing Manager at Whizlabs. Having a Master in Journalism and Mass Communication, she helps businesses stop playing around with Content Marketing and start seeing tangible ROI. A writer by day and a reader by night, she is a fine blend of both reality and fantasy. Apart from her professional commitments, she is also endearing to publish a book authored by her very soon.