The world of coding can be quite complicated, especially if you have no prior experience in this field. But it can also be really rewarding all the more passionate you are about it. The good news is that if you want to learn coding, you don’t have to go to university and attend classes. You can simply take some online coding courses, many of which are available for free. Today, we are going to provide you with a list of the best online coding courses you can find, so that you can make an informed choice.
Top Online Coding Courses
1. JavaScript Best Practices from Code School
If you are looking for online coding courses to teach you about JavaScript, we recommend you take a look at this one from Code School. You will learn JavaScript techniques that will teach you how to improve your performance quality, work safer, and be more legible. Professor Jason Millhouse has been teaching coding his whole life, so you know you will have plenty of things to learn from him. The class is divided into 4 levels, out of which the first one is free, and it only takes between 6 and 8 hours to complete, since it is made entirely of videos. Moreover, once you complete it, you will also get a badge to attest to this.
2. Programming Foundations with Python from Udacity
This is one of the online coding courses targeted to beginners, so if you are new to this field, you are definitely going to enjoy it. Course instructor Kunal Chawla is going to teach you about Object-Oriented Programming in a very interactive way. You will be required to build small projects in every lesson, so that you get as much practice as possible. While you will be an active presence in this course, you will also be taught programming concepts that will tell you everything you need to know about coding in Python. The course is free, it lasts for about 6 weeks, and you can learn at your own pace. What more reasons could you need to give it a try?
3. HTML/CSS Intro – Build Wiki Jr Pages from Code Avengers
If you want to move past basic websites that you can design without having any coding experience and to advance to the next level, you will need to learn HTML and CSS. This course coming from Code Avengers will teach you precisely that. It is made up of 5 lessons in which you will learn about tags, head elements, images, anchors, and CSS. A really interesting addition is the fact that at the end of the class, you will have to write 2 pages for Wiki Jr, which is a Wikipedia extension designed for children and powered by the people at Code Avengers.
4. C# Developers: Learn the Art of Writing Clean Code from udemy
If you are tired of code that is clearly poorly written and that makes it so much harder to understand, and you would like to learn some tips on what makes a code clean and beautiful, you might want to take a look at this online coding course from udemy. It will teach you the most often encountered mistakes that people make when coding and how you can use ReSharper to refactor them. What is refactoring, you ask? Well, it is meddling with the code’s design without anything changing on the ouside. If you pay $50 you get 21 lectures, each of them covering one mistake and the explanation of why it is bad and how you can fix it. You can access the course whenever you want and wherever you are (since it is smartphone-friendly), and you also get a certificate when you complete it.
5. Building D3 Data Visualizations from Tuts+
If you are looking for more detailed online coding courses, we recommend this one taught by Tiffany France on D3. In case you are not familiar with the term, D3 is the name of a JavaScript library where you can create documents that are data-driven, have really great visuals, and DOM manipulation elements. More to the point, you will need D3 if you want to build maps, diagrams, or charts to make your data stand out. You will learn how to use both JavaScript and D3 to make two distinct charts for which you will use CSV data. The instructor will teach you how to combine beauty and functionality to make users understand your infographics easily.
6. Make a Website by Codecademy
The people from codecademy have plenty of interesting online coding courses, but we thought you might enjoy this one in particular. Why is that? Because it involves you building four websites, which is great practice for anyone who wants to learn coding. You will be using HTML5, CSS3, and Bootstrap, among other web development tools, in order to get an outlook on how a website should look like and how you can modify it at your convenience. If you are wondering why you need HTML and CSS, you should know that every website that you see on a daily basis is built using these languages.
7. S.O.L.I.D. Programming Principles from Lynda
Wouldn’t you like to know some online coding courses that teach you solid programming principles? Although S.O.L.I.D. is just an acronym, it stands for something really important, namely the 5 things you should know if you want your programming and design skills to be object-oriented. If you want to know what these 5 principles are, make sure to check the course taught by Steven Lott. The lessons that you will be given include each of these principles accompanied by relevant examples from the real world. Furthermore, you will learn how to use them to make your code strong, yet beautiful.
8. Building Applications with React and Redux in ES6 from Pluralsight
Would you like to be able to build your own app? If you think this is too challenging for you, we are here to tell you that you can find plenty of online coding courses that teach you exactly that. For instance, take a look at the one taught by Cory House at Pluralsight. He will teach you how to use ES6, Redux, and React Router to build an app that can be used in the real world. The course is made of several lessons, but they are all short, so it won’t take you a long time to go through each of them. If you want to learn the basics of Redux and React, do not hesitate to check out this course.
Summing It All Up
If you are passionate about computers and coding and you want to make a career out of this, one of the best ways in which you can start building a foundation is to attend some online coding courses. Even if you only want to learn interesting things such as building a website or an app from scratch, and you don’t want to pursue this as a career, we would still recommend some online coding courses. Since most of them are free and don’t require a lot of time and effort, they are definitely one of the best ways to learn coding.
Leave a Reply