适用范围不同：1.certificate比较官方，而且大多数时候指的是比较正式的，具有法律意义，能被法律认可的证书、证明；2.credential则是比较普通的，它是泛指那些可以用来证明某人的能力和资格的证明或证件。3.certificate：英 [səˈtɪfɪkɪt; (for v.,) səˈtɪfɪˌkeɪt] 美 [sɚˈtɪfɪkɪt; (for v.,) sɚˈtɪfɪˌket] vt. 发给证明书；以证书形式授权给…；用证书批准 n. 证书；执照，文凭[ 过去式 certificated 过去分词 certificated 现在分词 certificating ]4.credential： 英 [krɪ'denʃ(ə)l] 美 [krə'dɛnʃl] n. 证书；凭据；国书扩展资料（一）certificate例句：1.The pastor showed the marriage certificate to all of the guests. 牧师向所有来宾展示了他们的结婚证书。2.This field should be retrieved from the certificate and verified against the host name. 这个字段应该从证书中进行检索，并根据主机名进行验证。3.If the two don't match at this point, the certificate is only suspect, not invalid. 如果这两个实体在此处不能匹配，那么就只能怀疑这个证书是无效的。（二）credential例句：1.As mentioned earlier, the user’s credential information is not stored and remembered acrosssessions. 如前所述，用户的凭据信息不会在多次会话间存储和记忆。2.But in fact, career-academy students go on to earn a postsecondary credential at the same rate as other high-school students. 但事实上，职业学校的学生和其它高中生一样可以有同等的机会继续获得一个大专毕业证书。3.The credential token establishes what rights one has over a specific document and it is used tomanage access to documents. 证书令牌会确定用户对于特定的文档拥有什么样的权限，从而被用于管理对文档的访问。
qualification：n.
an exam that you have passed or a course of study that you have successfully completed（给了限定条件，如必须通过学习，考试通过后方可获得的）。
certificate：n.&v.
an official document that may be used to prove that the facts it states are true（强调官方的，正式的）
credential：n.&v.
a document attesting to the truth of certain stated facts（未必必须通过官方的证明）
