25 Most Popular Online Courses Websites 2024 (Examples that Inspire)

Are you in search of the best examples of online courses? Or are youlooking for inspiration to start your online course website? Then, you’ve landed in the right place.

As Nelson Mandela once said, “Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world.” Today, that power lies in online courses!

Generally, an online course is a set of lessons that you can view at any time and from any location using a web browser. Essentially, you’ll get these courses via a Learning Management System (LMS), allowing for two-way communication between educator and learner.

But with many examples of online courses, how do you find the inspiration to create something truly exceptional?

In this article, we’ve come up with a list of the most popular and inspiring examples of online courses. So, let’s get started!

Why Online Courses Websites Matter?

First, let’s learn why online courses are essential.

Did you know, that the global e-learning market is expected to reach a whopping $1,080.32 billion by 2032? And the demand for high-quality online education is high.

Therefore, online course websites play a significant role in all of our lives. They are:

• Shared Knowledge: Online course websites are ideal platforms to share your knowledge, skills, and experiences with the general public.
• Monetization of Skills: It paves the way for making money through proper monetization of skills.
• Increased Productivity: When you do something instead of sitting idle, you’ll always be more productive.
• Acquire Technical Skills: One of the most important aspects of digitalization is the use of online course sites. Furthermore, you can pick up technological skills while creating your course site.
• Change Maker: You can influence people through your shared knowledge, skills, and perceptions and be a change maker!

By saying that, let’s move forward!

Some Facts About Online Courses

Here are some data about online courses.

• The online education market is expected to generate $185.20 billion in 2024. (Source)
• The number of users in online learning is expected to reach 1.12 billion by 2029. (Source)
• The online university education market volume is expected to reach $120.70 billion in 2024. (Source)
• Average Revenue Per User (ARPU) in the online education market is estimated to be $210 in 2024. (Source)

25 Most Popular Examples of Online Courses 2024

Here, we’ve listed some of the most popular website examples of online courses for 2024. You can go through them and find the right one that inspires you.

1. Udemy

Udemy is one of the most popular website examples of online courses, trusted by over 15,000 companies around the world. It has a broad selection of courses in areas like business, design, IT & software, etc. Importantly, its international course collection is available in 14 languages. Other than studying, you can also sell your skills and offer teaching materials.

Overview of Udemy

2. FutureLearn

FutureLearn is another popular site where you can learn anything with 200+ world-class institutions and educators. Essentially, you can explore various subject categories that interest you, created by the most reputable institutions. Further, you can deepen your education by enrolling in online courses and getting a degree.

Overview of FutureLearn

3. EdX

EdX is one of the leading providers of free online courses, providing university-level courses from 260+ world-class universities and companies. Further, you can find topics like computer science, language, data science, engineering, etc. Additionally, there are video tutorials, on-campus discussions, and textbooks available on the site.

Overview of EdX

4. Alison

Alison is a popular free website for online courses with learners from around 193 countries. It offers standard informative and educational programs that are relevant, engaging, and flexible. Moreover, it offers lessons in English, Spanish, German, French, and Arabic, among other languages. 

Basically, there are three types of courses available on the website. Namely: certificate courses, diploma courses, and learning paths (creating self-learning experiences). 

Overview of Alison

5. LinkedIn Learning

LinkedIn Learning provides video courses taught by 3,900+ professionals in 20+ languages for subtitles. There are also subscription-based courses in over 7 native language libraries. Further, explore role guides to support your career advancement for over 35 different roles and 1,300+ hand-picked pathways.

Overview of LinkedIn Learning

6. TEDEd 

TEDEd is one of the excellent examples of online courses for general learning. It has 618,908 lesson views with 1,444 questions answered on this platform. This educational site is full of informative videos including amazing animation and are all under 10 minutes long.

Overview of TEDEd

7. Coursera 

Next, we have one of the best examples of online courses with general, specialized, and university-recognized courses and degrees, Coursera. It has collaborated with 325+ leading universities and companies with 148+ million people joining Coursera. It provides affordable, flexible, and job-specific online learning to individuals throughout the world.

Overview of Coursera

8. Harvard Extension 

Harvard Extension is one of the top eLearning website examples of online courses from Harvard University. It offers a wide variety of courses on subjects like business, data science, humanities, mathematics, science, and so on. 

Moreover, students can use it to look for courses based on their professional certification. Further, courses are divided into 3 difficulty levels namely beginner, intermediate, and advanced.

Overview of Harvard Extension

9. Khan Academy 

Khan Academy is one of the insightful examples of online courses and educational websites that help you achieve your learning objective. Being a nonprofit site, its resources are free and available both online and through the app. Moreover, its content is offered in many languages, including English, French, German, Italian, etc.

Overview of Khan Academy

10. AcademicEarth 

AcademicEarth is one of the leading examples of online courses and educational platforms that offer in-depth courses from universities since 2009. Its courses are tailored to your personal and professional requirements.

Moreover, it has proper lesson plans and original video sessions of lectures for its courses. Furthermore, this facilitates efficient and effective learning. 

Overview of AcademicEarth

11. Udacity 

Udacity is the well-known learning platforms and one of the best examples of online courses with a whopping 4.5-star review on Trustpilot. It offers courses in programming, data science, and web development. Moreover, it provides a nano-degree program for individuals aspiring to master a skill set in computing and technology. 

Overview of Udacity

12. Pluralsight 

Pluralsight is one of the prominent examples of online courses for keeping up with the latest development technology and frequently updated courses. Also, it includes tests and learning paths by industry professionals.

Overview of Pluralsight

13. Codecademy 

Codecademy is another one of the popular examples of online courses solely focused on coding and computer programming. Further, it offers AI Learning Assistant, that’ll auto understand your current course, instructions, and solution code, and then give you instant, personalized feedback.

Overview of Codecademy

14. W3Schools 

W3Schools is one of the most popular examples of online courses for web developers. Being the largest web developer site with 70 million visits each month, it covers all areas of web development. Here you’ll get tutorials that begin with the fundamentals and progress to professional references.

Overview of W3Schools

15. Yoast Academy

Yoast Academy is a renowned online education and one of the best examples of online courses. In this platform, you’ll get the most effective SEO training. Moreover, Yoast’s tools act as a large reference library for SEO guidance. Furthermore, each module includes rich video content as well as downloadable PDFs. Furthermore, this leads to creative learning and is beneficial even for the SEO beginners.

Overview of YOAST Academy

16. SkillShare 

SkillShare is another well-known example of online course for creative people interested in sketching, design, photography, etc. Moreover, its courses are also designed by 8K+ teachers to be bite-sized for maximum flexibility. Importantly, many people turn to Skillshare for inspiration and to advance in their creative pursuits.

Overview of SkillShare

17. MasterClass 

MasterClass is one of the fastest-growing websites that provides insightful courses in the creative sector and the best examples of online courses. It offers world-class online learning in a wide range of subjects like acting, art, food & drinks, etc.

Essentially, it provides you with one-on-one instruction from well-known heroes, idols, and experts in their fields.

Overview of MasterClass

18. MIT OpenCourseWare

Next on our list of the best examples of online courses is MIT OpenCourseWare. This platform offers course content and materials related to energy, entrepreneurship, African studies, transportation, etc. Moreover, you can freely browse and use course materials, no sign-up, and no start or end dates.

Overview of MIT OpenCourseWare

19. Duolingo 

Duolingo is the most widely used free language-learning website. They teach about 40 languages, like French, English, Spanish, Hindi, and Arabic. Essentially, its classes are meant to feel more like a game than a dry textbook. Also, this improves retention and makes language learning enjoyable.

Overview of Duolingo

20. MaxKnowledge 

Another one of the well-known examples of online courses that focus on the fundamentals of workplace abilities is MaxKnowledge. Being endorsed by 50+ esteemed partners and trusted by 4000+ institutions, its courses are developed with professional development in mind. Also, it’s a community of over 240,000 career experts, working together to make a difference.

Overview of MaxKnowledge

21. Facebook Blueprint

Facebook Blueprint is one of the best examples of online courses. It gives free online courses, training programmes, and certifications. With its fast and self-guided courses, you can build your marketing skills across platforms like Facebook, Messenger, Instagram, and WhatsApp.

Overview of Facebook Blueprint

22. HubSpot Academy

HubSpot Academy is one of the leading examples of online courses. Its main goal is to educate users on the HubSpot software so that they can market, sell, and grow their businesses.

Moreover, it gives unlimited access to hundreds of topics to learn everything you need to know for your business. Also, it offers quick practical courses to comprehensive certificates to help you advance your career and show off your skills.

Overview of HubSpot Academy

23. Treehouse

Treehouse gives great online classes on on-demand programming topics. Further, it includes expert-led video courses and multiple quizzes for interactive learning. Also, this site introduces Bootcamps, so enroll in a Techdegree program that lets you complete projects for a specific duration.

Overview of Treehouse

24. General Assembly

General Assembly offers part-time and full-time courses for individuals and companies. You can find 15 free online classes led by instructors that last 1 week to many weeks. Also, you can choose an on-demand course to learn at your pace with one-on-one mentor support. On top of that, you’ll also see upcoming online workshops and events in which you can take part.

Overview of General Assembly

25. Domestika

Lastly, we have Domestika, one of the best examples of online courses. You’ll get to learn from creative experts who’ll share their knowledge and skill. Here, you can find courses based on categories, areas, and software. And if you’re a Plus plan member, then get a certificate per course with 1000+ free courses.

Overview of Domestika

Here’s a list of the best blogging and content marketing online courses and the best SEO certification courses to master SEO. Go through them if you need help or inspiration!

How to Make Online Courses Websites?

Going through the list of all these beautiful and popular online course websites, you may have got some inspiration. Don’t you?

So, do you want to set up your own LMS site?

First of all, you must decide on the niche of the courses you’ll offer on your website. Once you plan that, you can begin the website creation process.

Now, without further delay, here’s a quick guide to help you with that.

Step 1: Choose the Right Website Platform

Nowadays, making a website is quite easy and simple. But you need to consistently provide effort and time to get success.

Many website builders let you develop a website in just a few clicks. All you need to do is choose the right platform for your website.

WordPress – Our Recommendation

Out of all the other website builders, we recommend using WordPress.org. That’s because it’s the most popular and widely used CMS (Content Management System) platform. Since over 43% of sites are made up of WordPress on the web.

To know more about WordPress, go through our complete guide on what WordPress is. Creating an LMS website is different from other websites. So, learn the differences between LMS and CMS here!

Not to mention, WordPress is super user-friendly, so you don’t have to worry if you’re a beginner. It includes WordPress plugins and WordPress themes designed for creating online course websites. We’ll mention them later.

Step 2: Register a Domain Name and Set Up Web Hosting

After that, you’ll need a domain name and a web hosting platform. To begin, a domain name is a unique identifier for your website that visitors will use to access it. For example, Google’s domain name is Google.com. Similarly, the domain of our site is SiteNerdy.com.

You can look into our list of the best domain name generators to find a good domain name for your site. And then, register a domain from one of the popular domain registrars.

Second, as a means of bridging the gap between your website and the internet, use a web hosting platform. There are a plethora of hosting service providers that offer low-cost hosting.

Go through our blog on how to choose a web hosting company and select the right one for your site. Some of our top recommendations are Cloudways and Kinsta.

Step 3: Create Your Website on WordPress

We find WordPress to be one of the most user-friendly website platforms out there. Once you obtain a domain name and web hosting, simply install WordPress. You can then do the necessary customization by installing a suitable WordPress theme and multiple WordPress plugins as needed.

Use a Suitable WordPress Theme

The WordPress.org theme repository has several free WordPress themes for you to choose from. Also, there are premium themes in multiple marketplaces such as ThemeForest.

For making your online course website, you can choose a multipurpose WordPress theme like Astra, GeneratePress, OceanWP, etc. Otherwise, you can even select a theme designed specifically for an LMS site. Here’s the list of the best LMS WordPress themes.

Learn how to choose a suitable WordPress theme here. Then, install and activate the WordPress theme to easily get started.

Use a Suitable Online Course Plugin

Similarly, WordPress has a plethora of plugins to help you build an online course site. Some of the best plugins we recommend are LearnDash, TutorLMS, LifterLMS, etc.

Check out a detailed review of LearnDash, TutorLMS, LifterLMS, Masteriyo, and LearnPress to use one of them for your site.

Learn how to pick a WordPress plugin! Also, know the WordPress plugin installation process.

Step 4: Create and Publish Your Content

Finally, you may begin creating the essential content for your online course website. Documents, video tutorials, downloadable PDFs, photos, quizzes, and much more can be included in the content. All that’s left to do now is post the content and reap the benefits of having an online course website.

For a full guide, you can check out a similar article on how to start a coaching business. Also, make sure to read our blog on how to create a website.

Conclusion

So, that’s all! We’ve reached the end of this article.

We did our best to compile the most popular website examples of online courses in 2024. Along with a simple guide to get started with making your own online courses website.

Recently, online courses have become one of the most visited sites. Additionally, making an online course site helps you share your knowledge, skills, and experience. Also, it helps you make money.  

We truly believe this article will assist you in evaluating all these popular online sites and determining which type of site, to begin with. If you’ve any queries related to this article, then please do not hesitate to write a comment below. We’ll respond as soon as possible.

Also, you might want to check out our comprehensive guide on LifterLMS vs LearnDash and the best LearnDash alternative WordPress plugins.

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