20 Websites for Skill Development

Whatever you can dream of learning, these 20 websites can probably teach to you — maybe even for free. Become one of personal development!

Coursera

With more than 1,500 courses, Coursera can bring you new skills in practically any field a university offers — business, social sciences, math, life sciences, and humanities.

Skillshare

 Skillshare offers more than 2,500 self-paced classes spanning creative arts, design, entrepreneurship, lifestyle, and technology. More than 200 classes are free.

Cody

Cody’s to combine the power of physical movement, technology, and community helps you to become your best self. 

Udacity

Developed with industry giants such as Google, AT&T, Facebook, Salesforce, and Cloudera, Udacity offers hands-on “nanodegree” programs and credentials to help people become web developers, data analysts, and mobile developers. 

Lynda

A 20-year veteran in online learning, Lynda has a library of 4000+ video-based online learning courses. Created by a pool of curated authors, the courses teach technical skills for developers, designers, educators, photographers, and marketers, as well as soft skills for business professionals. 

Udemy

With 35,000 courses and 19,000 instructors, Udemy is the 800-pound gorilla in the online learning space. Courses are offered across a breadth of categories, including business and entrepreneurship, academics, the arts, health and fitness, language, music, and technology. 

CreativeLive

 CreativeLive broadcasts live workshops with creative experts from around the world on topics such as photography, video, design, business, audio, music, crafting, and software development. 

Treehouse

Treehouse is where beginners and intermediate coders can learn or expand their web development and/or design skills. Treehouse has different tracks depending on your interests — you can start down the ruby web development track and detour into web design without missing a beat. 

Curious

The Curious model — bite-sized sections, attachments, and exercises — is based on the premise that people who “stretch their brain” for a few minutes a day are happier, more successful, and live longer. Curiousoffers more than 20,000 lessons: You can learn to tie camping knots, master card tricks, train a dog, bake a wedding cake, even develop an awesome memory. The lessons are accessible on any device, including Roku. 

Learnist

Often referred to as the Pinterest of online learning, Learnist is a crowd-sourced learning platform that features “learnboards” — images, videos, and text on topics such as technology, arts, crafts, history, and cooking. Learn to make latte art, win at Yahtzee, nail a job interview, or pack a suitcase like a flight attendant! Though most of the content is user-generated and free, Learnist now offers 99-cent premium boards created by experts.

GMB Fitness

GMB focuses on “movement re-education” and “physical autonomy”. Plans start with foundational movement, move to flexibility and strength, and finally shift to specific skills like using gymnastic rings and parallettes. 

America’s Test Kitchen Cooking School

Sharpen your knife skills, discover what your slow cooker can really do. Become a master griller, or learn to roast vegetables with America’s Test Kitchen Cooking School. well-established online cooking school offers a catalog of more than 200 courses, including Cooking Basics, Recipe Lessons, Technique Lessons, and In-Depth Courses. 

Guides.co

A marketplace for how-to content on life, work, and small business, Guides.co features hundreds of “guides”. Examples include: ”How to Get Your First 1,000 Customers,” “The Ultimate Kitchen Organizer,” and so on. 

Code.org

A non-profit organization and website, Code.org is on a mission to get adults and children alike interested in coding and computer science. The website includes free coding lessons for beginners on subjects such as javascript and iPad development, Code.org offers curated collections of the best learning resources from partners such as Grock Learning and Kahn Academy.

Duolingo

With Duolingo, you can learn 15 different languages in fun, bite-sized lessons. All it takes is 5 to 20 minutes a day. Duolingo has yet to add Asian languages, but it is ad-free and offers all courses free of charge. Taking a test for an official Duolingo certificate of English fluency.

Kahn Academy

Providing free, world-class education for anyone, anywhere, the nonprofit Kahn Academy offers online practice exercises and instructional videos in math, science, computer programming, history, art history, and economics, including prep for tests like the SAT, GMAT and MCAT. Catering to learners of all ages, 

Drawspace

Drawspace  you can master shading techniques, learn to sketch people and animals, create cartoons, or try your hand at acrylic painting.

edX

A nonprofit, open-source learning destination founded by Harvard University and MIT, edX offers nearly 200 wildly diverse courses. Want to learn Mandarin, accounting basics, supply chain management, or how to write a novel?

Rouxbe Cooking School 

Rouxbe believes the most effective way to learn to cook is to understand the techniques behind recipes. Rouxbe’s online professional certification courses avaialale and are designed for serious cooks and aspiring culinary professionals.

Highbrow

Highbrow teaches to Born from a desire to help people gain new knowledge in less time than it takes to drink a cup of  coffee, Highbrow emails you 5-minute lessons each day for ten days. You can choose from 56 free courses, taking one at a time.