Monday, April 4, 2022

Udemy vs Coursera? Which is best to learn Programming & Tech skills in 2024?

When it comes to online learning, there are no better times than today, as you have access to many platforms like Coursera, Udemy, Pluralsight, Educative, Lynda, CodeCademy, and many more. Out of these, Coursera and Udemy are probably the most popular online learning websites, as more and more people have started using them. One question which keeps comings to me all the time is Coursera vs. Udemy? Which one is better for online learning and which has a better course in general? Earlier, I answered questions like Pluralsight vs. CodeCademy and Udemy vs. CodeCademy but never explained Udemy vs. Coursera, which many of my readers have been asking for some time. So, I decided to write this blog post to illustrate my point of view.

To be honest, this is an open-ended question, and there is no specific answer as both platforms are great and have some of the most beautiful resources for online learners. Though, I will try to answer this question based on their unique characteristics and my experience in learning Technical skills. 

While Udemy and Coursera both have a lot more courses for everything you want to learn, like Music, Photography, personal development, leadership skills, my comparison focuses on learning Technical skills like Java, Programming, Spring, Web Development, Machine Learning, Data Science, App Development and anything which is tech and programming related. 




Coursera vs. Udemy for Programmers? Which is better?

Udemy is a marketplace for online courses where experts create their class and upload it to Udemy. Great studies often rise to the top and get more exposure, while some of the better courses also die because of a lack of direction.

There is no particular structure imposed by Udemy other than a minimum of 30 minutes of content.

Udemy vs Coursera? Which is better to learn Tech and Programming?


Udemy also has free and paid courses, where free courses are there for marketing purposes, and when an instructor reaches his marketing target, it covert the free course to a paid one. This is actually a good strategy, and it benefits both students and instructors. Students get the course for free, while the instructor gets their reviews and social proof.

Some but not all of the Udemy courses also offer a certificate of completion, which you can show in your CV or add to your LinkedIn profile.

The best part of Udemy is its flash sales, which run every month. If you are lucky, you can get some bootcamp style courses worth $200, like The Web Developer Bootcamp by Colt Steel and The iOS Developer Bootcamp for just $10, which is fantastic. These courses are much more worth than $10, and getting them at such a low price makes them very affordable.

Coursera vs Udemy? Which is better to learn code


On the other hand, Coursera offers courses from top-class universities like Machine learning from Stamford University, HongKong University, and organizations like IBM, Google, Microsoft Azure, AWS, and many more. Courses are also structured in specializations, which are nothing but a bundle of related classes to develop a particular strategy.

While courses are free-to-audit, you need to pay to earn a certificate from Coursera. The certificate can be earned by enrolling in Specializations, which costs around 39$ per month, which is also very affordable for most people looking to learn online.

It has some of the best Machine Learning Specializations globally, like this Deep Learning Specialization offered by deeplearning.ai, guided by Andrew Ng, one of the Coursera founders and Machine learning pioneer. If you are looking to get into the world of Machine Learning and Data Science, there is no better place than Coursera. More than half a million people have taken this specialization.

Udemy vs Coursera? Which is better to learn Machine Learning


Coursera also offers things like Coursera Plus, which provides you access to more than 3000+ best Coursera courses and specializations in a single subscription. This costs around 300$ for one year, but it's completely worth your time and money.

Coursera also has Professional Certificates, Online Degrees and they recently launched Guided projects which can be used to learn a new skill quickly.  For example, you can take this Python Data Structure project to learn essential data structures like dictionaries in 2 hours. 

The best thing about the Guided project is that you don't need to download or set up anything. Your workspace is a cloud desktop right in your browser, and your instructor will explain to you what to do in a split-screen video. It's probably the following best after classroom and personal training.

On the other hand, Coursera doesn't run flash sales like Udemy and doesn't have a collection like Udemy, which has more than 80,000 courses to learn almost anything, but quality-wise most of the Coursera courses are very good.

You can't say something about Udemy as anyone can create courses there, and most of them don't have a proper structure. Still, if you compare top-quality Udemy courses with top Coursera Specialization, they are perfect.

They are structured well and teach in a style that is not academically driven but has an informal and personal touch. It's like Youtube of online courses where you can just search and learn anything you want.

You also have a lot of choices. If you don't connect to an instructor, you can choose one; Coursera doesn't have that many options.





Conclusion - Is Udemy and Coursera worth it?

So, you see, both Coursera and Udemy have a solid and weak points. While Udemy has more courses, Coursera's courses are often well structured, especially machine learning ones. Coursera also allows you to learn from top universities of the world, and their certificates generally hold more value because they are offered by top universities along with Coursera.

When it comes to learning, if you prefer a personal, informal style, then I suggest you go to Udemy, but if you are looking for a well-structured and academic, course, then Coursera is a better choice.

Once again, these are just observations, and it varies a lot between courses and instructors, so it's always good to preview the course you want to join. If you can get through the preview without too much forwarding and interruption, then it's a good indicator of a quality course.



Other Programming Articles You May Like to Explore

Thanks for reading this article so far. If you like my comparison of Udemy and Coursera for learning Technical skills in 2024, please share it with your friends and colleagues. If you have any questions or feedback, then please drop a note.

P.S. - If you are getting started in the I.T. world without an engineer or computer science degree, I suggest you check out some Coursera Professional Certificates to launch your career in I.T., like the Google I.T. Support Professional Certificate, which is offered by none other than Google. I.T. support is an in-demand skill, and this certificate will give you the knowledge you need for Job and distinguish you from other candidates. 

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1 comment:

  1. sergibaulMarch 26, 2022 at 12:13 AM

    A teacher I know was offering some free of cost courses in youtube. Very popular. Then, he found out that Udemy was offering his courses in Udemy paying money !!
    Apparently, someone copied the free youtube videos and offered the course to Udemy, charging money.
    The teacher tried to find who was, but couldn't.

    I think that, at least, Coursera offers courses from known institutions.

    ReplyDelete