Best Premium Courses To Teach Yourself JavaScript – Info Tutorial

It takes a lot of time and effort to master coding. And JavaScript is by far the most in-demand language in modern times, not to mention one of the toughest to learn from scratch.

Unfortunately everyone starts from a different point so there is no single “best” course for teaching yourself.

But in this post I’ll outline the best courses I think are worth studying to learn JavaScript. This list includes a variety of skill levels from absolute beginner to more technical topics on Node and even 3D JS libraries.

Take a peek and see what you can find! If you’re serious about JavaScript then all you need is a bit of time and one awesome learning resource.

Codecademy JavaScript

I can’t say enough nice things about Codecademy. They’re a fantastic teaching tool and everyone who takes their courses recommends them to others.

Specifically take a look at their online JavaScript courses that offer a few different tracks depending on your current skill level. I mostly recommend this for anyone serious about JavaScript because it’s such a nuanced language.

Learning the basics will take time and this course can shave that time down by quite a bit.

The teachers are exquisite and the videos are all very high quality. You only have access to a few of the videos for free so it’s best to sign up for an account if you wanna go through the whole catalog.

But no matter what you’re trying to learn I think Codecademy is a great place to start. Efficient teaching resources and some of the clearest guides for beginners.

Quick Start to JavaScript

I’m also a huge fan of the Pluralsight library because this offers a bunch of content all for one monthly price. It works on a subscription basis where you can view all their courses(not just JS) with one account.

The Quick Start to JavaScript video course is one of the best ones in their list. It’s pretty short with only about 100 minutes of video.

But the teaching style really aims to bring a complete newbie up to a level of competence. This guide is meant to teach people who simply do not know where to start.

If you have no idea how to describe a variable or how to use it in a function then this course is perfect.

Just make sure you’re willing to Google solutions to problems because you may face some along the way. And learning to debug is a huge part of learning to code properly.

JavaScript From Scratch

Here’s another intro guide tailor-made for absolute beginners. JavaScript From Scratch is definitely comparable to the prior course and even works as a follow-up.

You get both from Pluralsight with one account so there aren’t any extra fees. Plus you can take this without any experience in coding so it’s a fantastic course regardless of your background.

This is a newer course so it does use Windows 8 and a newer IDE, although technically you can use any IDE you want.

Just keep this in mind as part of the Pluralsight library because it’s an excellent JS video course to learn from.

Basics of Programming with JavaScript

Real programming comes from understanding the fundamentals of logic and how to apply this into your code. That’s what you’ll learn in the Basics of Programming with JavaScript course.

Again on Pluralsight this one takes beginners to a whole new level of thought. But it is still a very simple intro course so you don’t need any prior experience to start.

What you do need is some patience to work through complex tasks and critical thinking to understand the logic behind each task. I recommend this ~3hr course for anyone serious about learning JavaScript from the ground-up.

It even pulls from a very well-known repo on JavaScript which is regarded as one of the best ways to learn.

I’d say this course works best as a follow-up to one of the originals.

Building a JavaScript Development Environment

One other follow-up I really like is this course on how to setup your environment. The way you code and how you write code is crucial to understanding the language and using it on a regular basis.

Building a JavaScript Development Environment is a massive 5-hour long video course taking you through rigorous training for a professional workflow.

You’ll learn how setting up an IDE and how to run projects properly with a Git repository. Later videos even get into GitHub teaching how to use it to publish your own code libraries.

Other topics include package management and npm/Node.js in a regular web dev workflow.

This course was first published in November 2016 so it’s incredibly relevant to modern coding.

Take a peek if you’re serious about JavaScript and wanna push your knowledge to the limits.

Advanced Fundamentals to jQuery & Pure DOM Scripting

Once you understand the basics I highly recommend learning a JS library. Most of the top libraries are free so you can use them on any project without paying a cent.

9 hours long with HD videos covering everything from simple jQuery selectors to complex Ajax calls.

If you aren’t sure where to begin with jQuery I would 100% recommend this video course. It again comes with any Pluralsight account so you can study this alongside other courses and push your knowledge as far as it can go.

Object-oriented Programming in JavaScript ES6

Learning OOP is the next natural step up from a rookie to a pro coder.

Object-oriented programming is a very complex series of ideas that surround building programs with objects and classes. And the ideas can be just as tough to learn as the actual JS code standards.

If you’re willing to push forward and really test your limits I highly recommend Object-oriented Programming in JavaScript ES6.

Does it help if you already have experience working in JavaScript? Absolutely.

But is it necessary? Not really, provided that you have some knowledge of programming in another language like PHP.

This course aims to teach JavaScript OOP from scratch by introducing the language and its OOP syntax.

Anyone getting into object-oriented work or anyone looking to advance their coding skills will appreciate this course. No doubt it’s one of the best on this subject.

WebGL and Three.js Fundamentals

To wrap with the Pluralsight courses I wanna mention the WebGL and Three.js Fundamentals video series.

This teaches you everything about 3D JavaSCript development running on HTML5 canvas, WebGL, and the Three.js library. All of these features are supported in modern browsers but are not well-supported in legacy systems like Internet Explorer.

But the web advances more each year and it’s up to developers to stay on top of the changes. That’s exactly what you’ll learn in this course with a start-to-finish look at 3D development in JavaScript.

There are no easy vanilla techniques for JS 3D design so it’s incredibly valuable to stick with a library. It just so happens Three.js is the most popular option so it’s really the best place to start.

The course is a couple years old but the information inside feels timeless.

JavaScript Essential Training

If you’d rather go with a different teaching resource you can try Lynda. They have a tremendous library of courses aimed at beginners and experts like.

One of their beginner-level courses JavaScript Essential Training is my #1 recommendation for noobs.

This follows the typical Lynda.com “essential training” format which teaches fundamentals and very simple concepts with crystal clear language.

If you have any experience working in JavaScript then this course may feel babyish. On the flip side if you literally cannot grasp JavaScript at all then this course may be the one gem that helps you get somewhere.

The teacher Morten Rand-Hendriksen gently introduces new concepts over the total 5+ hour video series. I recommend this primarily to younger devs or newer devs just getting into the field.

Rethinking Asynchronous JavaScript

Here’s a more technical Lynda training course with a direct focus on Async JS code. This topic can get pretty detailed but it basically describes how JS can load separately from the page, even after the page finishes loading!

Usually this relates to Ajax but can also relate to code(s) you enclose in a tag.

If you push forward with JavaScript beyond the basics then you’ll absolutely want to learn about async. And this course is probably the best way to grasp the concept.

Again just make sure you have some prior knowledge because this is a complex area of study.

Learning JavaScript Debugging

As you build projects you’ll inevitably run into bugs. These are errors in your code that prevent JS from running properly.

The entire process of debugging JavaScript is very different than other programming languages like Python or C++. But learning this process does not have to be difficult with a course like Lynda’s Learning JavaScript Debugging.

This detailed video series covers 2 hours of exercises and preview code snippets for testing. You’ll learn absolutely everything about JS debugging from scratch with all the best browser extensions and IDE addons.

And once you learn how to debug you’ll never lose it. Kinda like riding a bike, you’ll struggle at first but the end result is a permanent improvement.

I absolutely recommend this Lynda course above all others if you’re trying to get into debugging.

JavaScript For Beginners – Learn JavaScript From Scratch

The teachers over at Udemy have some really incredible courses and you can usually pick these up at a steal. For beginners my top recommendation is the JavaScript For Beginners course.

It does feel really short with only 2.5 hours of video. But what you’ll take away is a depth of practical knowledge and sample code snippets you can apply to the real world.

If you honestly just cannot grasp JavaScript and you’ve tried other courses to no avail this may be your saving grace. It’s geared towards beginners(like other courses) but it offers supplementary materials to help you learn.

Most of this course is an intro guide so you really need to be comfortable working through the basics first. If you’re OK with that and like what you see in the preview video then definitely consider running this course.

JavaScript: Understanding the Weird Parts

This is probably my favorite learning resource for serious JavaScript development, and it’s a recommended staple by Udemy as well.

Understanding the Weird Parts really delves into the strange oddities of Javascript that you may not understand or be able to explain.

JS is a language with a lot of quirks because it slowly grew into a stable piece of the modern frontend setup, although it was never supposed to.

It is by far one of the strongest languages you can learn but it also has a lot of weird behaviors that don’t carry from other programming languages.

If you want to learn JavaScript you’ll need to learn about these oddities and learn how to deal with them.

In this course you’ll pick up all the fundamentals plus tips for typecasting, global scope variables, and handling Ajax requests.

Once you feel comfortable with JavaScript think about grabbing a copy of this course. It is far from perfect but it’s definitely a resource you can learn from.

The Web Developer Bootcamp

Last but certainly not least is The Web Developer Bootcamp. This is not just a JavaScript course, but rather a full-blown online bootcamp for anyone hoping to push the boundaries with frontend development.

It is no question a real online boot camp and the video lessons total over 42 hours long. That’s almost two days of videos!

You can easily spend a couple months going through these lessons working out ideas to apply to your work.

It’s not an easy process and certainly not one of the easier courses you could study. But it’s really one big video series you can use to go from a complete novice to a skilled coder in JS and beyond.

Keep this in mind when you’re picking courses and look into some other options if you’re willing to combine this webdev intro with more detailed JS courses.