What's the Difference Between the CCIE And CCDE?

CCIE Overview:

The Cisco Certified Internetwork Expert otherwise known as CCIE is one of the most prestigious networking certifications in the industry. CCIEs would be regarded as networking masters because of their expert level of network engineering skills as well as are considered to be highly sought out individuals in the job market. According to Cisco, the professionals who are certified with CCIE would be represented less than 3% of all certified Cisco professionals and less than 1% of the total networking professionals worldwide. 

CCDE Overview:

The CCDE certification is considered to be a unique certification in the IT and networking industry and is believed to be one of the most if not the only recognized vendor-neutral network Design Expert level certification. When it comes to design, it is supposed as art: It couldn’t be taught or covered entirely by just going through a single book or any training course, because each design would be having different drivers, philosophy, as well as circumstances that would be collectivity created in its unique characteristic. 

Both hold their importance and both of them are worth pursuing, you need to decide, which would suit your interest. Whereas, for training purpose, you could join the prep courses which would be offered by the SPOTO.

Benefits of CCDE:

It’s Not Just Cisco Specified Certification:

There would be no IOS commands, there’s very little Cisco proprietary technology, and there are no hardware specifics at all. While the CCIE is, theoretically, not a Cisco-specific certification, the reality is testing build and troubleshoot skills always requires some sort of equipment to operate on, so the context of deploy / troubleshoot would always be going to be a specific set of command lines. Design, on the other hand, is considered to be about technology choices and analysis and while these could be pushed into vendor specified molds, the intent of the CCDE Team has been, from the very start, to craft a test that wouldn’t be assuming specific Cisco products or product lines.

It Stretches The Technical & Thinking Skill Sets:

The goal of the CCDE Team, from the very beginning, has been to cast the technological net as broadly as possible. Every broadly used and deployed technology is fair game on this test, from RFCs to those pieces of common knowledge that you would have just picked up over the years. To take the CCDE, you would need to have to gain all knowledge all seven layers in the seven-layer cake, not just one or two. 

You will acquire Skills Required:

That would be another reason for the CCDE Certification holders doesn’t include Cisco specific technologies or equipment, designers are required to be able to work with any underlying hardware as well as overlaying applications. Designers should know what questions you would be needed to be asked, and answered, about any conceivable technology, not just the ones that which would exist right now. The CCDE would be included equipment as well as applications that wouldn’t be existed specifically to test the abilities of designers so as to work with the unforeseeable and the new, the unexpected and the unknown.

CCDE isn’t Simple to Gain:

Designing skills are going to be what would be setting you apart as a network engineer in five years. As networks would be now becoming a bigger focus of the business, the intersection between business as well as networks would be needed to become a bigger focus of network engineers. 

So, you would now have understood the difference between both the certifications and also why it is worth pursuing. So, if you wish to have any of the above-mentioned certifications, I would recommend you to get trained with the prep courses offered by the SPOTO.