Business Finance | Venture Capital | IIM Calcutta
Well, for starters, big data is a part of data science. As a subject, data science has many areas of expertise like analytics, programming, machine learning etc. and also big data. Instead of the difference, you should first know how they are interlinked. This will also help you to get the difference truly because you will understand the relation between them.
See, there are types of data and tasks in data science. When you pursue a master's program in data science, you will learn these things. For instance, there are generally two kinds of data; big data and small data. While big data is a large quantity of data that deals with operations related to that only, data science is much wider. All the tasks and operations on data and various components can be put under data science as a whole. In other work, a data scientist can work on big data, but a big data expert can not exactly fill in for a full-fledged data scientist.
Big data basically refers to any large and complex collection of data. It can also be put up with analytics, where the goal is to produce broader insights. With big data, the information, insights, and other elements are hard to get because of the quantity. But data science is capable enough to get it done, of course, by taking more time. I hope this is making things easier to understand?
One thing that you must know when understanding the difference between these topics is that big data is a subset of data science. So while the field of work is the same, job roles differ in both areas, and so does income. Since big data can be considered a speciality, the options here are limited. However, career developments while working in a specialized area becomes more accessible. A basic big data specialist earns around $75,000 (around 670 lakhs) at prime locations.
A data scientist, on the other hand, has a wider space to work. With a data science degree, you can aim for analytics, data engineering, machine learning & artificial intelligence, mining, architecture and much more. On average, a data scientist earns anywhere from $130-190k, which is around 1 to 1.5 crore annually. Now, remember it includes every specialization under data science, including big data.
Did this answer your question, or did I just make it more complex? Anyway, big data is simply a part of data science that deals with large quantities of data. I cannot explain it any simpler. If you have any more related questions, feel free to ask.
Have another Question?
Get Answers from Experts within 12 hours