Online learning sites enable us to expand our minds and creative spirit. No matter where you are in the world or how little prior experience you have with a subject, you can learn just about anything, so long as you have an internet connection. We test and review dozens of online learning platforms, and here we list the best ones for all kinds of non-matriculated learning.”Learning” isn’t limited to the education taught in school. There are sites where you can pick up new software skills, become a better manager, study the art of memoir writing, watch a tutorial on how to set up a sewing machine, and listen to a world-renowned master in their field explain how they got there. Are you looking for practical skills? Business skills? Professional development? Inspiration? Or are you a student who needs tutoring in AP History? You can learn any of these things and more.Read on for the top services we’ve tested, followed by everything you need to know about online learning.
Deeper Dive: Our Top Tested Picks
MasterClass
Best for Inspiration
Why We Picked ItEverything about MasterClass deserves an A+. Instructors are among the top names in their fields. Each class is designed in painstaking detail. The production quality is superb. And what you learn from MasterClass is a combination of practical skill and inspiration.Who It’s ForMasterClass is for anyone who has a curiosity and desire to learn, from teenagers on up. It’s for people who want insight into a chosen field, as well as those open to learning what they can from the highest achievers in other fields. Whether you’re passionate about standup comedy, filmmaking, leadership, baking, music, or scholarship, you can find wonderful insight from MasterClass.
PROS
A-list celebrity instructors
Supremely high production values in videos
Well-thought-out course structure
Great breadth of topics
CONS
Video and course run times and year filmed should be clearer
Ads for other MasterClass classes are frustrating and senseless
SPECS
Name
Value
User Created Classes
Some Celebrity Instructors
Some Courses Free
Learn More
MasterClass Review
Khan Academy
Best for Free Academic Learning
Why We Picked ItKhan Academy is one of the best online learning sources because it clearly and strategically helps you learn academic subjects for free. Whether you need to master a mathematical concept or advance your understanding of macroeconomics, Khan has you covered. The videos, readings, and interactive components it uses to teach are well thought out and delivered with care.Who It’s ForKhan Academy focuses on learning materials for students in kindergarten through early college. That doesn’t mean other people can’t use it or find immense value in it. However, when you look at the available courses, you will notice that many closely map to the US education system. So, for example, there are courses under the heading High School Physics. Khan Academy is especially adept at teaching math, science, computing, economics, history, and personal finance, among a few other subjects. You get sequential material, too, so you can work through one lesson at a time in order until you’ve learned what you need to know.
PROS
Free
No account necessary
Uses video lectures, readings, and quizzes
Impressive test-prep and college-prep resources
Generous language support
CONS
Missing some subjects, such as foreign languages and music
Caters uniquely to the US education system and needs
SPECS
Name
Value
User Created Classes
Some Celebrity Instructors
Some Courses Free
Learn More
Khan Academy Review
Coursera
Best for Free Access to University Courses
Why We Picked ItCoursera is different from many other online learning sites because it hosts real courses from prestigious universities and makes many of them available for free. In other words, you can get all the lectures (recorded to video) and reading materials from a class at, say, Yale University without paying anything at all. Coursera has other kinds of classes, too, but the university material is really what sets it apart. For some courses, there are options to pay for it and earn a professional certificate, bachelor’s degree, or master’s degree. If you don’t pay, you still get the exact same learning materials, but you don’t get any interaction with instructors or any grades on your assignments.Who It’s ForCoursera is for people who want access to real university classes and have the self-discipline to follow through on all the assignments, which can often take weeks or months to complete. You mostly learn through videos, readings, quizzes, and assignments. If you use Coursera for free, you may be able to get feedback on your assignments from other learners but not the instructor. Coursera is best for learners who can handle college-level course material.
PROS
Offers real courses from universities for free
Partners with private corporations for job-specific skills
Reasonably priced certificate courses
CONS
Interface dated in some areas
SPECS
Name
Value
User Created Classes
Some Celebrity Instructors
Some Courses Free
Learn More
Coursera Review
Kahoot!
Best for Quizzes and Games
Why We Picked ItWe picked Kahoot! as one of the best online learning platforms because it lets you create games, quizzes, and other interactive content for your learning materials. Whether you are designing games and quizzes or playing them, Kahoot! is easy to use. We love that it adds engagement to all kinds of get-togethers, whether in the classroom, meeting room, or living room.Who It’s ForKahoot! is an ideal platform for businesses that need to teach something, as well as educational instructors who want to make their content more engaging. Once you have an account, you’ll see other fun ways to use the platform to create, for example, trivia for family gatherings or activities at conferences
PROS
Encourages interaction in a fun way
Variety of uses, from business training to student learning
Easy to use as creator or player
Players don’t require an account
CONS
Strict 120-character limit on question text field
No auto-advance option; host must manually move to next question or slide
SPECS
Name
Value
User Created Classes
Some Celebrity Instructors
Some Courses Free
Learn More
Kahoot! Review
Skillshare
Best for Creatives Learning Practical Skills
Why We Picked ItSkillshare’s videos teach you skills to lead a creative life. It covers everything from creative hobbies to tips for running a creative online business. This site offers short videos, sometimes as part of a much longer series, where you learn and practice mostly hands-on skills. You get additional materials, such as PDF handouts and sometimes community forums where you can upload examples of your work to get feedback from other learners. While its pricing has jumped around over the years, Skillshare now has a reasonable annual cost.Who It’s ForSkillshare is for people who want to develop creative skills or need help learning the ins and outs of running a creative business. It’s especially good at helping people with drawing, painting, digital arts, photography, cooking, writing, sewing, and other crafts. One aspect of Skillshare that we appreciate is that it does have some very short courses or lessons within courses that you can complete as a one-off. For example, if you just want to practice drawing cacti for five minutes, Skillshare has videos that will indulge your creative cravings.
PROS
Varied content topics all suited to creative types
Optional assignments and community interaction
Some free courses
CONS
Feedback from other learners is rarely insightful or instructional
No guarantee that instructors participate in community features
SPECS
Name
Value
User Created Classes
Some Celebrity Instructors
Some Courses Free
Learn More
Skillshare Review
Udacity
Best for Programming and Vocational Skills
Why We Picked ItWe picked Udacity as one of the best online learning platforms because it teaches highly specific, job-focused skills and gives learners an opportunity to create sample work to prove it. Udacity delivers rigorous courses, called Nanodegrees, that teach highly specific job-related skills, mostly in the tech arena. Some of the Nanodegrees have been created in partnership with big-name companies, like IBM Watson and Google. Learners come away not only with new skills but also—fairly often—sample projects to show their work, perhaps for a job interview.Who It’s ForUdacity is clearly for job seekers who want to work in a specific technical field and perhaps for a specific employer. How specific? There’s a course called Self-Driving Car Engineer, developed in partnership with Mercedes-Benz, Nvidia, Uber, and other companies. Udacity does offer some more general business courses on topics such as marketing. That said, Udacity is best for people who are willing to pay a few hundred dollars per month to complete one of its highly targeted Nanodegrees.
PROS
Focused on specific job skill development, especially in programming and computer science
Nanodegree learners come away with relevant work samples
Self-service cancellation, data download, and account deletion
CONS
Expensive
Difficult to measure the value for job seekers
Less inspirational and motivational than other learning sites
SPECS
Name
Value
User Created Classes
Some Celebrity Instructors
Some Courses Free
Learn More
Udacity Review
Wondrium
Best for Curious Minds
Why We Picked ItWondrium is a subscription-based video streaming service that focuses on educational programming. Wondrium was formerly called The Great Courses Plus, and while it has expanded its catalog in recent years, it still has everything that The Great Courses Plus had. The courses come across as a series of TV lectures or simple documentaries. You can watch video courses not only on your computer, but also via Apple TV, Roku, and other devices. The service has an overwhelming amount of content on topics such as philosophy, religion, and the natural world.Who It’s ForThe best way to describe Wondrium is to call it couch-side edutainment. It’s not geared toward teaching you hands-on skills or helping you achieve a specific learning goal (though it does have some skills-focused classes). Instead, Wondrium feeds your curiosity with videos that explore ideas that perhaps you know nothing about. In that sense, it’s wonderful for beginners or people who don’t have any prior knowledge of the subjects it covers.
PROS
Excellent accessibility options
TV quality production values
Variety of content
CONS
No free account or content
Prices somewhat high
SPECS
Name
Value
User Created Classes
Some Celebrity Instructors
Some Courses Free
Learn More
Wondrium Review
Udemy
Best for Taking One-Off Courses
Why We Picked ItWe included Udemy in this list of the best online learning platforms because it sells discrete video courses on an array of topics. Many people end up using Udemy because they met an instructor through another context, and the instructor pointed them to Udemy to purchase their course. Generally speaking, Udemy’s content covers both personal and professional development, with excellent lessons in management training, software use, and programming. We like that you can pay for Udemy courses one by one, with prices varying per course, or you can get access to a catalog of content with a business subscription. Regrettably, the subscription prices are high, and you need a minimum of five people for a business account.Who It’s ForUdemy is for three kinds of people: 1) those with a business subscription to the site who can simply explore what it has to offer, 2) people who are interested in a specific course offered on the site, and 3) instructors who want to host and sell their courses on Udemy. We didn’t do detailed testing or analysis for the third use case, instead focusing on Udemy from the learner’s perspective.
PROS
Great learning courses for hard and soft professional skills
Interesting array of content
Clear resources for instructors
CONS
No subscription for individuals; pricing is per class
Price for Business accounts somewhat high, with a minimum of 5 people
SPECS
Name
Value
User Created Classes
Some Celebrity Instructors
Some Courses Free
Buying Guide: The Best Online Learning Services for 2024
Practical Tips for Successful Schooling at Home
How Effective Is Online Learning?All the sites included in this roundup use video as the primary teaching method. Some add interactive quizzes, PDFs, links to additional resources, and discussion areas (usually little more than a section for comments) so that everyone engaged with the material can learn from one another.Videos can be standalone, although usually, they’re part of a series. A course might contain several hours of videos, but they’re always broken up into parts. The best learning sites take care to plan out how much content goes into each video as well as the sequence of videos. In this way, your learning is cumulative. You’re typically building new ideas or concepts on top of what you’ve already learned.When quizzes are available, they can be private to you or shared with an administrator or instructor if your login is part of a business account or associated with a formal class or tutoring (in the case of Khan Academy). They help you track how well you’ve retained new information. Some sites offer certificates upon completion. They are not widely accepted by other institutions, but they may be helpful to you in some cases. For example, if your employer pays for you to have a subscription to a learning website, you can offer these certificates as evidence of using it.A note on learning languages: There are so many excellent websites and apps for learning a foreign language that we have a separate article for them. When you want a language app, you’ll have specific questions, such as: Which one offers the language I want? How much time do I need to spend on it each day? How much does it cost? You might also want to know which apps are better for developing a base vocabulary versus advancing existing skills. Our roundup of the best language-learning apps and websites covers all these points and more.Similarly, PCMag has a separate article on the best courses for learning to create websites. It’s another concrete skill that comes with specific questions. We have an entire article dedicated to the best online courses for Photoshop.
(Credit: MasterClass/PCMag)
Is MasterClass Worth the Money?MasterClass is an on-demand learning website where you get hours and hours of video featuring top talent talking about their fields. Everything about it is extremely well made, and if you’re interested in even one course, we think it’s worth paying for a year’s subscription. You will certainly find other courses if you are interested once you get into the catalog.MasterClass is simultaneously binge-worthy, educational, and thought-provoking. The quality alone leaves you whispering, “How is this so good?”In the recent past, MasterClass has done a good job of improving its lineup of instructors to include more top talent who are people of color and women (it was previously weak in this regard). The catalog of classes is growing all the time. The content is top-rate, and the quality is exceptional.Where Can You Take Real College Classes Online?Coursera is one of the best online learning sites that offers plenty of free video courses and materials. It also partners with universities to make some of their degree programs available online. If you want the degree, you have to apply to the program and pay tuition to the school, just as if you were an in-person student. However, if you don’t care about getting the degree and you just want access to real courses and materials from the likes of Yale, the University of Singapore, and Sciences Po in France, you can create a free Coursera account and have access to them.No matter how you attend, you get video lectures, reading materials, quizzes, and, in some cases, the opportunity to submit assignments for peer review (when you audit a course) or grades (with paid enrollment).
Recommended by Our Editors
(Credit: Coursera/PCMag)
Coursera also partners with private companies to offer accessible education in a variety of fields, from programming to designing with AutoCAD. Other examples of classes you can take include Introduction to Food and Health, Google IT Automation with Python, and Introduction to International Criminal Law.What Are the Best Online Learning Platforms for Specific Job Skills? If you need to learn specific job skills, there are two online sites that we recommend. One is Udacity because it teaches highly specific, job-focused skills. If you are aiming to get a job from one of the companies that Udacity partners with, the Udacity courses could give you a leg up. While Udacity offers a handful of courses that aren’t technical in nature, the majority are, and they are highly specific. How specific? There’s a course called Self-Driving Car Engineer, developed in partnership with Mercedes-Benz, Nvidia, Uber, and other companies. The other site is LinkedIn Learning. We like it best for brushing up on general job skills, such as public speaking and developing interviewing strategies; we also love its video tutorials on learning creative software, such as Photoshop. Many of those software programs come from Lynda.com, which was acquired by LinkedIn some years ago. Lynda.com was the best resource for learning software for many years, and we’re happy it lives on today at LinkedIn.
(Credit: Microsoft/PCMag)
Learn at Your Own PaceThe next time you feel like you need some fresh ideas, take a spin through one of these sites and learn something new. You might find yourself caught up in wonderment at new and interesting ideas or taking notes on something useful. The beauty of online learning sites is that they don’t require any commitment, so you can learn what you want at your own pace.
