Coursera Review - Is it the right choice for you?

Coursera is one of the most well-known & prestigious online learning platforms out there with courses taught by professors from world-renowned universities like Stanford, Yale & Harvard. But can it live up to the high expectations, and is the steeper price tag for their premium products justified?

Let's find out together!

What is Coursera?

Coursera is a U.S.-based online course platform founded in 2012 by the computer science professors Andrew Ng and Daphne Koller. It's one of the biggest and most respected online learning platforms with almost 10,000 available courses and almost 50 million monthly visitors. Coursera offers lots of different programs that help you learn new skills, from free online courses all the way to full online degrees.

Most courses are developed in partnership with more than 200 leading universities worldwide, which means that the quality standards for Coursera courses are much higher than they are on other platforms. The courses are usually also more on the academic side, meaning if you're looking for niche courses for one of your hobbies, you should go with platforms like Udemy or Skillshare.

In total, Coursera offers 6 different types of programs & courses, which can get a bit confusing.

Let's go over the most important differences:

Courses

More than 1,800 free courses with the option to pay for a certificate. Typically taught by instructors from well-known universities or big companies.

• Average time commitment: 4-12 hours

• Price: Free

• Price of certificate: $25 - $75 USD

Perfect for getting started learning about a new subject. You can even showcase your new skill using the optional certificate.

Guided projects

Close to 2,500 short & interactive courses taught by experts. You can do everything in your browser and don't need to download additional software to go along with the tutorials.

• Average time commitment: 1-2 hours

• Price : $9 USD

Perfect for learning a specific job-relevant skill quickly.

Specializations

A series of related courses that help you work towards a certain career skill, like Excel, Java Programming or Business & Financial Modelling. You can take the entire series of courses, or just the course that interests you. At the end, you have to pass a hands-on project in order to receive a certificate for your newly acquired skills.

• Average time commitment: 1-3 months

• Price: $39 USD - $79 USD per month

Perfect for mastering a specific skill

Professional certificates

Training programs that prepare you for specific in-demand careers. They are taught by instructors from huge companies like Google & Meta and can come with certificate that are recognized by universities and companies. Average time commitment: 1-6 months

• Price: $39 USD - $79 USD per month

Get job-ready for your desired career

MasterTrack Certificates

Online modules of a degree program that can be used as credit to go towards your degree. You be an online student at the university you pick the MasterTrack certificate from.

• Average time commitment: 4-7 months

• Price: $2,000 USD - $5,000 USD

Earn a university-issued certificate and credit towards a degree

Degrees

Full online Bachelor's or Master's Degree from top universities worldwide. You go through your entire degree from the comfort of your home and at a much lower cost than on-campus degrees.

• Average time commitment: 2-4 years

• Price: $9,000 USD - $50,000 USD

Earn your bachelor’s or master’s degree

That variety of different offers is what makes Coursera so unique. There's something for everybody, whether you just want to learn some new skills or get a full-blown Bachelor's or Master's degree.

Pros and Cons

Who is Coursera for?

Since Coursera has so many different programs, there's something here to learn for basically any knowledge worker or student. The clear focus is on academic topics though, so you might not find any courses on hobby topics like cooking, fishing, music, etc.

Overall, I'd say Coursera is best for:

• People that want to complete a full online degree (Bachelor's or Master's)

• Professionals that want to acquire a specific new skill (Specializations & Professional Certificates)

• Students & curious people that want to learn something new, but don't have the budget for a full degree (Courses & Guided Projects)

When it comes to topics, Coursera also has decent range of different offers, like courses on:

• Technology

• Business

• Health

• Engineering

• Arts

• Social Sciences

Coursera pricing: How much do courses on Coursera cost?

The pricing of programs on Coursera can vary heavily. While Guided projects start at $8 dollars, full online Bachelor's degrees can cost you up to $50,000 USD. Here's a quick overview of the average prices for the different types of programs Coursera offers.

• Courses: Free with the option to upgrade to get a certificate (

• Guided Projects: $9.99 USD

• Specializations: $39 USD - $79 USD per month (subscription fee)

• Professional certificates: $39 USD per month (subscription fee)

• MasterTrack Certificate: $2,000 USD - $5,000 USD

• Full Bachelor's or Master's degree: $9,000 USD - $40,000 USD

Cousera Plus

If you want access to lots of different courses & certifications at once, you might want to check out Coursera Plus, which is Coursera's subscription model. It gives you unlimited access to 7,000+ courses, projects and certificate programs for a monthly or yearly fee. The monthly fee is $55 USD, while the yearly subscription costs about $350 USD.

Refund policy

There's also a free trial period and a refund policy for the subscriptions offers on Coursera. You have the chance to test out the waters and see if the courses are right for you, when you subscribe to:

• Coursera Plus

• A specialization

• A professional certificate

This free trial usually lasts 7 days.

Specializations and courses are also eligible for a 14-day refund period. Professional Certificate, MasterTrack Certificate and online degree refund policies are dependent on the university or company that runs the program, so you would have to contact the university or company directly.

Guided Projects are completely exempt from the refund policy.

Plans for teams, businesses & students

Coursera also has a lot of additional offers that are designed for teams, huge corporations and students. Let's go over them one-by-one:

Coursera for teams

Coursera for teams is the learning plan for startups and small businesses. It's great if you want to give your employees an easy way to level up their skills and can also be a great benefit to attract talent for your company.

The standard plan costs $399 USD/year/user and gives you access to 5,000+ courses, Specializations, and Guided Projects on Coursera. It also comes with management features that help you keep track of your employee's progress and to customize the suggested learning materials your employees see.

Coursera for businesses

If you're part of a big organization, the Coursera for business plan might be better suited for you. It's a custom option for large corporations, governments, etc. that gives you a lot more flexibility about the content you get. It also gives you access to Single-Sign-On features and access to Coursera API, as well as integrations with popular LMS providers.

The pricing is custom, so you will have to contact Coursera directly to get more information.

Learning & Customer support

Coursera gives you varying levels of support depending on the learning product that you purchased.

As any good platform should, they have a basic self-serve knowledge base available for all the standard questions around your account, how to sign up for courses, etc.

They also offer communities for the different topics they serve, ranging from Business to Arts & Humanities, where you can ask questions and get help from fellow students.

If you decide to go for a full online degree or one of the MasterTrack certificates, you will also get access to the faculty and the teaching assistants of the university that you're enrolled in. These types of courses often include weekly sessions to connect with fellow students in a virtual classroom.

Overall the level of learning support you will get greatly depends on the type of course you book. If you're going through a free course or a guided project, you might get help in the public forum, but you will not get any personal help directly.

If you want more personal support while learning and you don't want to complete a full degree, you might want to check out platforms like Udacity or Codecademy which offer more personal support when you're stuck at lower prices, depending on the program you choose.

Certification

Certification on Coursera is different depending on the program you sign up for. Let's go over the certificates available and what they mean for your professional career.

Free courses

Free courses give you the option to upgrade to receive a certificate for the skills you learned. Here's what your certificate might look like:

These certificates are nice-to-have, but they are not formally recognized by universities. They might still help you find a job though, if the skills you learned in the course are relevant to your employer. It will just show your name, the course you took and the institution that organized the course.

Guided Projects

Guided Projects are just quick 1-2 hour courses. They don't offer you a certificate, as they're meant to help you acquire just a small additional skill in a short period of time.

Specializations

Specializations offer a series of courses that help you achieve proficiency with a specific skill over a longer period of time. They include a graded assesment, which you have to pass in order to receive the certificate. This certificate is not recognized by universities either, but it's harder to attain than the certificate for free courses.

Professional Certificates

Professional certificates are pretty similar to the specializations. You have to take a graded assessment in order to receive your certificate of completion. Again, these certificates aren't formally accredited, but they might be recognized by potential employers, as they are usually handed out by big companies like Google, Salesforce, etc.

MasterTrack Certificates

The MasterTrack certificates give you the option to earn credit towards actual university degrees. They are usually recognized by the university that offers them, but might also count towards degrees from other universities.

Full online degrees

The full degrees have different accredition based on the university offering them, but many off the programs on Coursera are from globally recognized institutions. They count as full degrees and will definitely help you find a job on your desired career path.

Create a Coursera account

To create a Coursera account, all you need to do is to click the "Sign up" button on the Coursera homepage.

Then you just have to enter in your email address and password to get started. Alternatively, you can sign up with Google or Facebook.

Popular courses on Coursera

Let's go over some of the most popular courses on Coursera, so that you can get a feel for the things you can learn on the platform.

Machine learning

A beginner's course on machine learning taught by Coursera co-founder and Stanford professor Andrew Ng. This course has more than 4.6 million learners with an average rating of 4.9/5! You can get started for free or upgrade to receive a certificate for $70 USD.

Check out the course

First step Korean

Start learning Korean with Seung Hae Kang, associate professor of Korean Education as a Foreign Language at Yonsei University in Seoul. With more than 1.1 million learners and an average rating of 4.9/5. You can get started for free or upgrade to receive a certificate for $43 USD.

Check out the course

Introduction to Psychology

Get an introduction to the human mind from Paul Bloom, Professor of Psychology and Cognitive Science at Yale University. With more than 850 thousand learners and an average rating of 4.8/5. You can get started for free or upgrade to receive a certificate for $43 USD.

Check out the course

Coursera instructors

To sum it up, instructors on Coursera are mostly highly qualified professionals, subject-matter experts or scientists from some of the best universities and companies worldwide. The overall course quality these instructors can provide is significantly higher than you will find on most other online learning platforms.

Summary: Is Coursera worth it?

In my opinion, Coursera is definitely worth it! It's a fantastic platform with high-quality courses created by experts from universities and large companies. It's one of the most well-known platforms for online degrees, and professional certificates.

If you're in the market for an online degree, you will love Cousera for:

• The wide range of courses

• High-quality learning materials developed with 200+ top universities

• The seamless learning experience with their mobile app

• Official recognized degrees and industry-standard certificates