If you’re wanting to change careers into a tech field, switch to a new tech field or simply pick up a new skill, there are plenty of online resources that can help. The difficulty is in finding resources and training that employers will respect, so your new-found skills can actually help you get a new job.
Thankfully there are a number of well-respected websites and real-world institutes that offer online resources that can offer you a certificate or similar when you complete the content. Here is our list of top five tech skills course sites.
Codecademy
Codecademy offers hundreds of classes in coding across 14 languages, as well as courses in seven other computing subjects. Courses range from introductory to intermediate skill levels although not all of them are free. Each course has an estimated duration and will list any prerequisite courses.
If you pay to subscribe to the pro account, you can get access to all courses as well as certificates of completion to prove your experience.
Harvard Online Learning
Harvard University is regarded as one of, if not the best university in the world. Obviously, not everyone can go there, but it’s possible for anyone to get a taste of what a Harvard education would be like, as they have published more than 600 courses online and most are in technical subjects. Some of the courses are actually delivered through the edX platform, which will be discussed next, while others are delivered in-house. Some but not all of the courses are free to take. You can pay to get a verification certificate to confirm that you have completed the module, although prices vary. Courses line up with actual term times but within that, you can go at your own pace.
EdX
EdX offers a huge number of courses on a broad range of topics from dozens of top universities. The technical courses will all be university-level content, some of which are available for free, while others will need to be paid for. The courses start on a schedule, but as you take the courses online you can proceed in your own time.
Alison.com
Alison.com offers more than 2000 courses for free that range from 2 to 20 hours in length, although not all are in tech-related fields. Once you sign up you can progress through the material at your own pace. Once you’ve completed a course you can pay for a certificate or diploma, depending on the level of the course, as a recognition of your achievement.
Katacoda
Katacoda offers a range of more than 250 tool-based courses that are quite specific such as “Learning to use Tensorflow for machine learning”. If you’re looking to pick up and gain a lot of useful experience with a specific tool, Katacoda’s style will likely suit you well. The courses are all practical experience orientated and spin up a cloud-based terminal for you to practice in. There aren’t any options for getting a certificate afterward, so you may have to find another way to prove your experience to potential employers.
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