You lot don't have to travel to a academy or pay tuition to admission many learning resources, with a diversity of institutions offering free online college classes through open learning initiatives.

While virtually of these free courses don't offer credit or certificates (unless you lot pay a certification fee), they are a great way for you to aggrandize your knowledge and keep upwardly-to-date with your industry. So, there's the benefit of being able to learn anywhere, someday, and at your ain stride.

Interested in accessing free college-level courses while at home? Here are some of the best sites to take free online college courses.

i. EdX

edx free courses website

EdX is one of the largest massive open online course providers in the world, giving over 14 million users admission to free courses from universities. Originally founded past Harvard University and Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), the site now includes courses from the likes of Boston University, Caltech, and dozens of other prestigious universities from around the world.

You tin can study courses in a wide range of fields on the website---including scientific discipline, education, history, medicine, and more. There is besides a wide range of free estimator programming courses available.

While the courses are free, verified certificates and degrees are not. EdX offers certification and online master's degrees on the website, but these require users to pay fees or tuition.

2. MIT OpenCourseWare

mit opencourseware website

Massachusetts Institute of Engineering (MIT) was a pioneer in offering online college courses. The university gives you lot the ability to download and follow their archived courses through its OpenCourseWare platform.

The do good of using the platform is that yous get access to a huge range of actual courses that the university has offered over the years. The downside is that you may all the same demand to purchase textbooks to follow the curricula.

The website also doesn't offer accreditation or certification, since these are archived courses. But they are a useful resource if yous want to expand your cognition on sure subjects.

3. Carnegie Mellon OpenLearning

carnegie mellon open learning initiative website

Carnegie Mellon Academy provides free online courses for anyone wishing to access them. In fact, information technology even offers materials for instructors who wish to teach their students these courses.

For contained learners, in that location are curt courses on topics such as computer science, biology, psychology, and more. The downside is that the number of open up courses is much more limited than other open up learning websites.

Carnegie Mellon's open courses are similar to what a paying student would receive minus the course credit or access to an instructor.

4. Coursera

coursera website screenshot

Coursera is another online learning platform through which many universities and companies offer their open up courses. Like other class providers on the list, you can admission courses for costless, but you won't receive accreditation or a document without a fee.

Withal, the site provides a great platform for online learning. Major universities such every bit Knuckles and Columbia offer courses on the platform. Meanwhile, yous can also access online courses from Google and companies such as Intel or Amazon.

If yous wish to access the certification and specialization features on the platform, there is a monthly subscription you tin buy. However, all private courses are bachelor to view for complimentary if you lot choose the audit option. This gives you lot access to all the material and lectures in the course, minus a document or accreditation.

5. Stanford Online

stanford online course website

Stanford Online is the website through which Stanford University offers all its online courses. While you would accept to pay tuition to consummate a certificate or degree through the platform, the academy'south open up learning courses are available to anyone for gratuitous. This includes courses offered by the different university schools, such equally Stanford School of Medicine and Stanford Business School.

These open courses are particularly useful for those looking for Continuing Medical Education (CME) credits, which can be earned by completing certain courses on the website without needing to spend a cent.

6. FutureLearn

futurelearn online courses website

FutureLearn is some other platform that offers courses from universities and organizations around the earth. Like the other open learning platforms, courses are available for free simply certificates require a fee.

The website has an impressive range of courses across different fields, as well equally various courses aimed at improving life skills. For example, FutureLearn has courses dedicated to improving your budgeting skills, online enquiry skills, critical thinking, and job interview skills.

The platform is a neat tool for those looking to expand both their academic knowledge and useful everyday skills.

7. OpenLearn

open university free course website

The OpenLearn platform offers content from The Open up University--- a university that pledges to exist open up and offer free learning to as many people equally possible. While the academy has concrete classrooms based in the Britain, it has also opened its content to anyone online through its OpenLearn website.

The online higher courses are laid out extremely well and cover many different topics. A great feature is that it offers courses for differing skill and knowledge levels, from beginners to experts.

Once y'all take completed a form, you can receive a statement of participation to show potential employers. While this does not count towards academy credits, information technology provides evidence that you have successfully completed courses from The Open University.

8. Harvard Online

harvard online courses website

If you're interested in courses from Harvard University, the institution offers many through its online portal. While some of these courses are paid, in that location are dozens that are likewise available for free.

Some of the university'south gratis courses include religious studies, game development, app evolution, and information science. When you lot filter co-ordinate to complimentary courses, over 50 are bachelor, and then wait at which ones might involvement y'all.

9. OEDb.org

oedb free online courses search engine

The Open Education Database (OEDb.org) isn't its own college, simply rather a site that helps you explore free online classes from universities. It's substantially a search engine for online courses. Kyoto University, Utah State Academy, and Tufts University are a few of the institutions included on the aggregator.

It can be tricky finding available courses using the "degree finder" on the site, so we propose rather using the search field or scrolling down the folio to search courses past category.

ten. Grade Central

class central college courses search

Form Central is some other costless college form search engine that is user-friendly and easy to sort through. It aggregates courses from universities in dissimilar countries, but likewise other due east-learning websites such equally EdX and Coursera.

If you don't want to be limited to searching for courses from i provider or platform, an aggregator like Class Cardinal helps yous find the courses that adapt y'all best. The website fifty-fifty has a filter specifically for Ivy League institutions.

Online Learning Is Easier Than Always

These online courses are a great manner to expand your knowledge on certain topics for free. But you can also access online learning through other platforms. Increasingly, free apps are offering people ways to larn new skills with their smartphones.

From coding skills to foreign languages, apps tin can assist you fit learning into your busy schedule. Check out how you can acquire a new linguistic communication with Rosetta Stone or look at these Android apps that will help you learn new skills anywhere, at any fourth dimension.

14 Ways to Brand Windows 10 Faster and Improve Functioning

Read Next

About The Author