Top 11 Best Platforms For Free Online Courses With Certificates
These include certifications from Google, Facebook, Harvard, and more…
Personally, I tend to prefer pursuing courses over reading books or scrolling through a bunch of youtube videos.
Although the best books could beat any mediocre courses, reading a hundred pages of books can frustrate a beginner’s mind. And that’s where online courses come into the picture.
They not only are more balanced but are also designed in such a way that anyone can understand and grasp their concepts easily.
There are a bunch of platforms that offer online courses from the top skilled professors but not all of them offer free certificates. To earn a certificate you need to pay a bunch of dollars or even more, it totally depends on the type you want to pursue.
Don’t get me wrong here. Of course, there is nothing wrong with learning something that doesn’t offer a certificate. Your motive should be to learn something. But you’ll definitely agree with the fact that certificates are great.
Certificates double up your resume’s value and give you an upper hand over the ones who don’t possess a certificate. It also boosts your confidence and motivates you to do more hard work.
So here is a list of top platforms that offers free online courses offered by top universities like Yale, Duke University, Johns Hopkins, Indian School of Business, and many more!
#1 LinkedIn Learning
On the top of the list, Linked Learning(earlier known as Lynda.com) is a boon for job seekers and working professionals alike with over 15,000+ online courses, in more than seven languages available both for free and with a subscription.
These training courses are perfect for beginners, intermediate learners, and experts. The certified courses are available in various categories like business, personal development, entrepreneurship, design & teach online courses.
- Total Courses available: 15,000+
- Price: Free for a 1-month paid trial period
- Certification: Free certificates for all courses during a 1-month trial period
During a 1-month trial period, you can take any online course and receive a certificate for free. And make sure to cancel the subscription within the trial period once you’re done with your course. Or if you want you can pay to take up their paid membership to continue learning.
#2 Alison
The site also enables you to choose three types of courses certificate courses, diploma courses, and learning paths. Unlike Lynda/ LinkedIn Learning or any other online courses platform that creates its own courses, Alison is more of a platform that provides thousands of free courses available all over the internet.
It basically has 17 million+ learners, 3 million graduates, and 2500+ courses — Ding, dong, ding! It’s Alison!
The certifications include an abundance of subjects such as languages, IT, media studies, journalism, math, design, lifestyle, health and fitness, business studies, web development, computer programming, networking, and much more!
- Total Courses available: 2500+
- Price: All courses are totally free, anywhere and anytime.
- Certification: Free certificates for around 1350 courses
Alison does provide a free digital certificate of completion for around 1350 courses from top universities — including Stanford, Yale, MIT, and Cambridge, among many others — as well as world-class professors, experts, and companies.
Additionally, all certificates are self-paced, so you can learn what works best for you!
#3 Facebook Blueprint
Facebook Blueprint is a free online training program for advertising on Facebook and Instagram. It includes over 90 courses.
Most of them can be taken in 15–50 minutes. … Facebook Blueprint is a handy way for digital marketers to stay on top of Facebook’s evolving portfolio of tools and ad formats.
- Total courses: 90+
- Price: Free courses
- Certification: Certificate after passing the exam
Basically to earn Facebook Blueprint certification you need to give an examination process that tests your Facebook advertising IQ and offers certifications and badges. These advanced exams require a minimum score of 700 to pass.
Once you’ve passed the exam, you’ll be presented with a Facebook Blueprint certificate which is highly valuable for digital agencies, freelancers, or new job seekers!
#4 Google Digital Garage
The Digital Garage is a non-profit program from Google which deliver free digital skills training/courses via an online learning platform. Everything available from the Google Digital Garage is absolutely free.
The courses are offered on a variety of topics like Digital Marketing, Productivity, Business Security, Business Communication, Social psychology, etc.
There’s no limit to how much you can grow with Google digital training. Most of the courses are completely free with included modules, no time limits, unlimited access, and videos.
- Total courses: 150+
- Price: All courses are free
- Certification: Free certificates for some courses
Once you’ve completed your chosen course, you’ll also receive an accredited Google certificate that can be downloaded and put on a CV or resume.
#5 Coursera
One of my favorite platforms for online courses is Coursera. To help people during the Corona Lockdown, Coursera has also offered 100 free university courses from well-known universities.
These include courses on a variety of topics right from Health, Personal Development, Computer Science, Data Science, Business, Languages, and more.
- Total courses available: 7550+
- Price: Free+Paid
- Certification: Free certificates for some courses
These certified courses are offered by Yale, Duke University, Johns Hopkins, Indian School of Business, Imperial College London, Princeton, among many others…and also including certifications from companies like Google, Facebook, Microsoft, etc.
#6 Microsoft Learn
Just like Google Digital Garage, Microsoft also offers up their own online learning platform for those wanting to excel in their skills and job prospects.
Microsoft Learn is a free, interactive, hands-on training platform that helps people develop in-demand technical skills related to widely used Microsoft products and services including Azure, Microsoft 365, Power Platform, Microsoft Dynamics, and more.
The classes are divided based on your current experience level namely developers, IT pros, and data pros.
- Price: All courses are totally free
- Certification: Free certificates for some courses
#7 PluralSight
Pluralsight is the technology skills platform to build in-demand tech skills with access to thousands of expert-led video courses, downloadable content, certification prep, and more.
The platform has partnered up with some of the largest companies in the world such as Google, Oracle, Adobe, Unity, and Microsoft to help deliver the classes in fields like software development, cloud computing, AI, machine learning, Data, IT Ops, Cybersecurity, and many more.
- Total courses available: 1400+
- Price: 10-day free trial
- Certification: Free certificates included in all courses
Just like Linked learning, Plural sight is also paid service, but users can freely access the courses by signing up for a 10-day free trial and if you complete the course within 10 days, it won’t cost you a dime!
And once completed, you’ll be able to receive a certificate via email.
#8 Open Learning
Open Learning is much like Alison. Instead of producing the classes and courses themselves, they instead offer a collection of courses from universities, colleges, and learning platforms from all over the internet.
Total courses: 1300+
Price: Free+Paid
Certification: Free certificates for some courses
The free certification program in open learning is entirely dependent on the third-party provider who is running the course. But in most cases, they do supply a printable certificate, but users will have to dig through their library of classes to see which ones do.
#9 Standford Online
Stanford Online is an educational initiative launched by Stanford University. It offers a variety of professional learning opportunities via free online courses, online degrees, grad and professional certificates, e-learning, and open courses.
The courses and programs are in a variety of categories like Cybersecurity, Innovation, Arts & Humanities, Artificial Intelligence, Environment Energies, Health & Medicine, Digital Transformation, and many more!
These courses or sequences of courses, grant ID-verified certificates of completion which are offered at three levels: Professional Certificate, Achievement Certificate, and Certificate of Completion.
- Price: Free+Paid
- Certification: Free certificates for some courses
#10 Edx
EdX is a joint, not-for-profit partnership between The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and Harvard University to offer MIT and Harvard classes online for free to millions of people around the world.
Edx courses and training programs offer courses from top universities Harvard, MIT, Berkely, Standford, etc., and certifications from companies like Google, Microsoft, Facebook, and many more!
range from Project Management, Data Science, Computer Science, History, Humanities, Artificial Intelligence, Law to even TOEFL preparation.
- Total Courses: 4200+
- Price: Free + Paid
- Certification: Certificate at a price ($50-$300)
For their entry-level courses, they are completely free! The only downside is that students will have to pay for a certificate upon completion, which comes at a hefty price of around $50-$300 depending on the course.
#11 Udemy
You might have already heard about this platform. Udemy has got some of the best courses by some amazing trainers all over the world. This is one of the sites that include both paid and free courses. It basically offers over 130000+ courses and 35 million+ students enrolled from all over the world.
Udemy is a favorite destination for students and professionals looking for affordable and free courses online. It isn’t limited to university instructors but any kind of expert can offer the courses on this platform.
- Free Courses available: 130000+
- Price: Free+ Paid
- Certification: No certificates for free courses
According to Udemy, currently only paid, approved courses offer a certificate. Free courses and courses that only include practice tests do not offer a certificate.
