We list the best JavaScript online courses, to make it simple and easy to learn and develop your programming skills in JavaScript, from beginner to advanced level.
Since its creation in 1995, JavaScript has pretty much taken over the web. Not to be confused with Java, JavaScript is the glue between HTML, CSS and your browser—and that’s not likely to change any time soon. JavaScript has been voted as the most commonly used programming language in StackOverflow’s developer survey since the last seven years!.
Over the years, JavaScript has cemented its position as the defacto language for the web. Conceptualized as a client-side language, it has now found its way into all sorts of programming projects, from mobile apps to game development. Thanks to new projects and libraries like Node.js, React, Ionic, Electron and others, you can develop with JavaScript for servers, mobile devices, and the desktop.
So whether you wish to develop for the web or upgrade your programming credentials, JavaScript should surely be in your repository of skills.
Looking for more online courses? We've also featured: Best online courses for learning HTML, Best online courses for learning Python and Best online courses for learning SQL.
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The best JavaScript online course for 2024 in full:
Best JavaScript online course for getting started
If you haven’t programmed in JavaScript before, the "Intro to JavaScript" is a wonderful free course that helps you graduate from writing HTML and CSS on to JavaScript.
Although the instructors suggest it’ll take you two weeks to get through the course, you can get through much faster depending of course on whether you are new to programming or just to the language. As the lessons have been designed for programming newbies, if you have programmed before, you’ll be able to digest them a lot faster.
The course will also help you build a basic understanding of how JavaScript operates. The instructors start with a history of the language and take you from defining your first variables all the way to writing functions and creating objects. You’ll be made to write JavaScript code at several stages throughout the course, that you can then compare with the instructor’s solutions.
It’s a great course that’s well-paced for JavaScript newbies. But don’t expect to be writing real-world code as soon as you get through the lessons. That said, the course will equip you with the knowledge and skills you need to read and write real-world JavaScript.
Read our full Udacity learning platform review.
Best JavaScript online course for web development
Once you’ve got your basics sorted, you should take the "JavaScript, jQuery, and JSON" course if you want to use JavaScript for web development. The course gives you hands-on experience building your own web apps using the three main pieces of technologies that make up much of the modern interactive web.
The course is designed by the University of Michigan and is part of their Web Applications for Everybody Specialization and can be audited for free. Besides several hours of video lectures, it also includes several hours of useful readings as well. The forum discussions with other students enrolled in the course are quite a valuable resource as well.
The course begins with a crash course on JavaScript before moving on to object-oriented programming in JavaScript in the second week, while week 3 and week 4 focus on jQuery and JSON respectively. The course’s top ranked instructor warns about the more involved nature of the course and encourages you to put in the effort to complete the assignments, the solutions to which are explained in detailed videos.
At the end of the course you’ll emerge equipped with the skills you need to read and write JavaScript web apps using industry-standard libraries and methodologies.
Read our full Coursera review.
Best JavaScript online course for real-world use
Once you’ve got a hang of writing JavaScript, take the "Programming for the Web with JavaScript" course to get familiar with the language’s real-world use.
The four week course is the fourth and final course of the CS Essentials for Software Development series by the University of Pennsylvania and is designed to build the foundations you need as a web programmer. It’ll help you develop dynamic, interactive web pages using JavaScript while introducing modern tools and frameworks such as jQuery, React, and D3.js.
The four week course starts with web programming basics in the first week that ends with using the Bootkit responsive design toolkit. The basics of JavaScript are introduced at the start of the second week that ends with lessons on DOM manipulation and event handling with jQuery.
The third-week is all about developing modular web page components using frameworks such as React and and D3.js. In the last week you’ll learn to generate dynamic content on the server with Node.js and Express, and communicate with a MongoDB database.
In between, the instructors will also teach you how to represent and exchange data using JSON and how to access RESTful APIs on the web.
Read our full edX review.
Best JavaScript online course for advanced users
Sure, writing code is the most important aspect of programming. However, another important aspect is learning how to debug the code. The course "Learning JavaScript debugging" teaches exactly that.
Tracking bugs is rather frustrating, especially when the code is written by someone else. This is why the instructor suggests developers to make use of the services of a debugger. In a little over 2 hours, the instructor shares several approaches to debugging code in the context of jQuery, a React project, mobile websites, Node.js and a Wordpress site.
You don’t need to be an expert in any of the libraries, since he talks through the parts that you need in order to understand the debugging examples. However, to make best use of the course you should be fluent with HTML and CSS and be familiar with JavaScript ES5 as well.
The course starts by impressing upon you the need for a debugger and then familiarizes you with some of the main concepts of a debugger. The instructor then starts by using the in-browser developer tools and basics of the console API, before moving on to using the debugger.
In addition to debugging code on the desktop, he also covers debugging code running on iOS and Android devices.
Read our full LinkedIn Learning review.
Best JavaScript online course for understanding
Just because you can code in JavaScript, doesn’t mean you understand the language. Although learning to use the most popular or the latest JavaScript library will definitely help your programming career, you wouldn’t be able to make full use of JavaScript without understanding the underlying core concepts. The "Learn Modern JavaScript: Advanced Topics" course is all about exactly that, especially around objects and functions, to help you become a much completer JavaScript programmer.
The course has over 11 hours of video divided into over 70 lessons. It teaches you the broad concepts and the industry-standard best practices that you can then apply to your projects irrespective of the JavaScript framework or library you are coding with. The instructor simplifies difficult concepts and provides lots of appropriate examples.
There are special sections throughout the course that will help you put the theoretical knowledge you’ve just gained to practical use. It would make sense to take the lectures serially, at least the first time around. However they are structured in such a way that you can dive into any section anytime after completing the course. While we won’t recommend the course to absolute JavaScript beginners, it’ll be very useful even for someone who has working knowledge of the language.
Read our full SkillShare review.
Best JavaScript online course FAQs
Which best JavaScript online courses is best for you?
When deciding which of the best JavaScript online courses to use, first consider what level of competency you are currently at. If you've not learned JavaScript before then you should start with the beginner courses, as these will break you into the basics you'll need before you cover more advanced programming features. However, if you already have a decent amount of experience with JavaScript or a similar object-orientated programming language then feel free to try your hand with the more advanced courses.
How we tested the best JavaScript online courses
To test for the best JavaScript online courses we searched for a range of popular online learning platforms for coding, as well as took recommendations from people who are already competent JS coders. Then we followed the tutorials to get an idea of how easy they were to follow, how easy it was to learn essential tools and processes, and additionally what sort of user level the courses were aimed at, such as beginner, medium, or advanced-level users.
Read how we test, rate, and review products on TechRadar.
Also consider reading our guide to the best online learning platforms.
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