Free Python course with certificate: which listed courses give one
Among the 28 courses on this page, a free certificate comes from Harvard's CS50 courses, freeCodeCamp and IBM. Everything on edX, MITx Online, Coursera and Alison is free to study but charges for the certificate; Microsoft, MIT OpenCourseWare and Udemy issue none.
Free certificates: CS50, freeCodeCamp and IBM Cognitive Class
CS50's Introduction to Programming with Python (CS50P) and CS50's Introduction to Artificial Intelligence with Python award a free CS50 Certificate at a unique URL for scoring at least 70 percent on every problem set or project; a free edX account is needed to submit work.
freeCodeCamp publishes its certificates at a public URL on freecodecamp.org, and the exam for its current Python Certification is free of charge. Its Data Analysis with Python, Machine Learning with Python, Scientific Computing with Python and College Algebra with Python certifications still issue certificates but are archived coursework, no longer updated. On IBM's Cognitive Class, Python for Data Science, Machine Learning with Python and Data Visualization with Python each state that a certificate is offered at no cost.
Free course, paid certificate: Coursera's Learn to Program and Alison
Learn to Program: The Fundamentals from the University of Toronto is flagged as free on Coursera, so all seven modules are open without payment. It is the closest thing here to a Coursera free Python course with certificate, but the shareable certificate is a paid option whose price is not shown until you enrol, with financial aid listed. Introduction to Python on Alison works the same way: free to study, optional paid certificate, free Learner Record.
Paid certificate after a free audit: edX, BerkeleyX, HarvardX and MITx
The cheapest verified certificate here is $59 for Programming for Everybody. BerkeleyX charges $200 for Introduction to Python. HarvardX lists $299 for Introduction to Data Science with Python and Machine Learning and AI with Python, and $249 for Using Python for Research; Stanford's Statistical Learning with Python is $186. edX audits are time-limited and exclude graded work.
MITx Online prices 6.00.1x and 6.00.2x at $149 each and Machine Learning with Python: from Linear Models to Deep Learning at $300; auditing gives access to the course and materials, and the certificate track adds graded work.
No certificate: Microsoft Learn, MIT OpenCourseWare and Udemy
Microsoft's Get Started with Python Programming: Part 1 is free, but Microsoft issues only a profile trophy for a learning path, not a certificate. MIT's 6.0001 and 6.0002 on OpenCourseWare are complete lecture courses with no registration and no certificate. Python for Absolute Beginners and Learn Python for Total Beginners are free Udemy courses, which never carry a certificate of completion.
Where to learn Python free as a beginner
The right first course depends on whether you want to install anything, how much time you have and whether you want graded work.
Nothing to install
Programming for Everybody, from the University of Michigan, runs its homework in the browser, so a phone or public computer will do; it takes seven weeks at 2 to 4 hours a week and assumes no background. CS50P needs only a web browser too. Alison's Introduction to Python uses Repl.it, IBM's Python for Data Science runs its labs in Jupyter, and freeCodeCamp's Python Certification is completed in an editor on the page.
Short video courses
Python for Absolute Beginners is 1 hour 48 minutes of video from installation through variables, data types and string methods. Learn Python for Total Beginners runs 5 hours 36 minutes, adding lists, dictionaries, loops, functions and file handling with five exercises and solutions. Microsoft's Part 1 path is 3.2 hours of text modules and has you install Python and Visual Studio Code.
University-style first courses
Learn to Program: The Fundamentals is scheduled at three weeks of 10 hours a week and goes from functions and strings to loops, lists, files and dictionaries. BerkeleyX's Introduction to Python, seven weeks at 5 to 10 hours a week, is rated intermediate by edX and covers higher-order functions, scope and environment diagrams. MITx's 6.00.1x is instructor-paced at nine weeks and 14 to 16 hours a week, and MIT calls it rigorous rather than an appreciation course; the same lectures are on OpenCourseWare as 6.0001, ungraded.
Harvard free Python course: CS50P and what comes after it
CS50P is organised as ten weeks at 3 to 9 hours a week, each with a lecture, shorts and a problem set, ending in a final project. It covers functions, conditionals and loops, exceptions, unit tests, third-party libraries, regular expressions, classes and objects, and file input and output, and can be taken before, during or after CS50x. CS50's AI course is the next step for people who already know Python: seven weeks of projects on search, optimisation, machine learning and large language models at 10 to 30 hours a week, with CS50x or a year of Python as the prerequisite.
After the basics: data analysis, machine learning and research
IBM's Python for Data Science leads into Machine Learning with Python, estimated at 20 hours on classifiers, regression, clustering and dimensionality reduction, and Data Visualization with Python, 10 hours on Matplotlib, Seaborn and Folium. HarvardX's Introduction to Data Science with Python takes eight weeks at 3 to 4 hours a week to cover regression and classification with scikit-learn. Stanford's Statistical Learning with Python follows the ISLP textbook over eleven weeks. MIT's 6.0002 and 6.00.2x move into simulation, probability and introductory machine learning; 6.86x is a full machine learning course that expects probability, linear algebra and Python beforehand.
Neighbouring hubs
The programming hub covers other languages, data science collects the analysis and machine learning courses across languages, and computer science lists the theory courses CS50x and MIT's sequence belong to. The Harvard free certifications page lists the CS50 courses with a free certificate.