Best Free Scrimba Courses in 2026, Ranked
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Scrimba has 24 fully free courses, no credit card and no trial clock. Start with Learn React if you already know JavaScript, or Learn JavaScript if you don't. Both are current, both are free, and together they cover more ground than most paid beginner bootcamps.
New to the platform? See how Scrimba works before you pick a course.
Reviewed with a Pro account from inside Scrimba's catalog, September 2026, cross-checked against data/courses.json. The catalog moves, so a course listed free here can shift behind Pro later; this guide is updated when that happens, but check a course's own page above before you commit.
Who this is for
Anyone trying Scrimba without paying: budget-conscious learners, people validating the format before subscribing, students supplementing freeCodeCamp or The Odin Project.
Which free Scrimba course should I take first?
Take Learn React if you already know basic JavaScript, and Learn JavaScript if you don't. Those two cover more real building than anything else free on the platform, and neither has dated.
1. Learn React
15.1 hours, 358 lessons across six modules, taught by Bob Ziroll: Learn React (opens in a new tab) is free and it's the platform's flagship course.
Bob Ziroll builds from static pages to state to side effects across six modules, then closes with two capstones you actually ship: Tenzies and Assembly: Endgame. The same course is mirrored as a free video on freeCodeCamp's YouTube channel.
Six modules and two shipped projects is real depth for a free course. Most platforms hold their flagship framework course back for paying users; Scrimba doesn't. If you already write basic JavaScript, start here instead of repeating fundamentals you don't need.
2. Learn JavaScript
Learn JavaScript is free, 9.4 hours, 238 lessons across eight modules, taught by Per Borgen, Scrimba's CEO. The pace is friendlier than Ziroll's React course, which makes it the right pick if JavaScript itself is new to you. You build a passenger counter, a blackjack game, a Chrome extension, and a mobile app before the course ends, then move straight into Learn React once it's done.
Strong free courses to take after the first two
Three more free courses are worth your time before you touch Pro. None needs its own card: pick the row that matches the gap you actually have.
| Course | Hours | Lessons | Instructor | What you build |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Learn HTML and CSS | 5.7 hrs | 121 | Per Borgen | Five deployed sites (a Google clone, a digital business card, a space exploration page, a birthday site), then a sixth site you build alone |
| Learn TypeScript | 4.2 hrs | 79 | Bob Ziroll & Rachel Johnson | Fundamentals, then TypeScript inside React, then inside Express |
| Learn Node.js | 3.5 hrs | 53 | Tom Chant | A JSON REST API on Node's built-in http module, no Express, plus a small site with static files and server-sent events |
Per Borgen has you deploy five real sites, then hands you a skeleton for a sixth and steps back. It's the strongest starting point on the platform for someone who has never written a line of code.
Take TypeScript once you've used JavaScript on something real. Ziroll teaches the fundamentals, then Rachel Johnson moves into typed React and typed Express in under four and a half hours total, so you see the payoff in two frameworks, not just in isolation.
Tom Chant teaches Node with no framework at all: you see what http gives you before anything hides it. Take Learn Express.js right after, also free, for the framework built on the same ideas.
The 24 free courses on Scrimba include the platform's flagship React course (Bob Ziroll) and its flagship JavaScript course (Per Borgen). That's rare: most paid platforms gate the headline product. Feel the format first with the public demo scrim (opens in a new tab), no signup required. For the structural comparison to a bootcamp, see Scrimba vs coding bootcamps.
Other free courses worth knowing about
Scrimba's free tier now reaches past frontend. These are full courses, not previews, and each links to our from-inside review:
| Course | Hours | Instructor | What you build |
|---|---|---|---|
| Learn Python | 4.1 hrs | Treasure Porth | Three terminal apps: an expense splitter, a word-scramble game, a karaoke queue manager |
| Learn SQL | 3.8 hrs | Gregor Thomson | 62 challenges querying a vintage car dealership's database |
| Learn Express.js | 4.0 hrs | Tom Chant | A REST API, then a SQLite-backed vinyl store with sessions and hashed passwords |
| Intro to Supabase | 4.8 hrs | Jonathan Hill | A React sales dashboard with a live Postgres query, realtime charts, and row-level security |
| Learn Next.js | 8.5 hrs | Bob Ziroll & Rachel Johnson | A 3D-model catalog site (PrintForge) with the App Router and a SQLite database |
| Learn Vue | 96 min | Rachel Johnson | A Vue Facts app built from single-file components |
| Intro to NestJS | 83 min | DonTheDeveloper | A DevMatch profile API on NestJS 11 |
| Learn to Code with AI | 4.5 hrs | Guil Hernandez | Prompting and pairing with an AI coding assistant on real tasks |
If you only want one of these, take Learn Node.js or Learn SQL first: both are short, free, and give you a backend fact React and JavaScript alone won't.
Small, useful free courses
Under two hours each, good for a specific gap rather than a learning path:
| Course | Duration | Why it's worth an hour |
|---|---|---|
| Command Line Basics | 1.7 hrs | Navigation, file operations, and git from a terminal, before you need any of it under pressure |
| Intro to UI Design Fundamentals | 1.2 hrs | Layout, color, and type principles for developers who never studied design |
| What's New in React 19 | 1.2 hrs | The Actions API and the new hooks, for anyone who learned React before 19 |
| Intro to Mistral AI | 1.4 hrs | A working sample of Scrimba's AI catalog through one model's API |
| Intro to Vite | 39 min | What the build tool under most modern React and Vue projects actually does |
| Learn Regular Expressions | 46 min | Pattern matching taught by freeCodeCamp's own instructor |
| Deploying with Netlify | 23 min | Push a static site live in one sitting |
| Build Serverless AI Agents with Langbase | 50 min | A serverless agent pattern, useful as a sample of the AI catalog |
Free courses that are showing their age
Be clear-eyed about these. They were solid when filmed. They aren't where current practice lives.
- Build a Space Travel Website (6.8 hrs, Kevin Powell). The 68-lesson runtime looks substantial, but it's an older project course. Learn React and Learn JavaScript teach the same skills with current tooling.
- Learn Imba (2.9 hrs, Nathan Manousos). Imba is a niche language built by Scrimba co-founder Sindre Aarsæther. Interesting on its own terms, not something to learn as your first language in 2026.
Two courses moved the other way since we last checked: Learn Bootstrap and Learn CSS Grid are both Pro now, not free. If you bookmarked them as free picks, that bookmark is stale.
What requires Pro
The sequenced products all sit behind the subscription:
- All four career paths (Frontend, Fullstack, Backend, AI Engineer)
- Advanced React, Learn React Router, React Challenges
- Learn CSS Grid and Learn Bootstrap, both moved from free to Pro
- Interview prep courses
- Most of the AI catalog beyond the intro courses listed above
See Pro vs free for the full breakdown. Check the student discount before paying full price for any of it.
How to use the free tier well
Pick one course. Learn React if you already know JavaScript, Learn JavaScript if you don't. Block 90 minutes a day for two weeks and don't open a second course until the first one is finished. Sampling five courses for twenty minutes each teaches you less than finishing one.
After two weeks of consistent progress, you'll know whether the format works for you. That's the moment to decide on Pro, from evidence instead of a guess. If you make it through Learn React and want the rest of the Frontend Developer Path, that's when Pro starts paying back. If two weeks of free lessons didn't stick, no subscription fixes that. See Scrimba Review 2026 for the full case.
Free alternatives outside Scrimba
If even the free Scrimba courses don't click, the credible all-free alternatives are freeCodeCamp (text plus full YouTube courses, including Ziroll's own), The Odin Project (an open-source curriculum with a strong community), MDN Web Docs for HTML, CSS and JS reference, and JavaScript.info for depth on the language itself. MDN names Scrimba as its recommended course partner for the same reason: the Frontend path lines up with MDN's own curriculum.
See Scrimba vs freeCodeCamp and Scrimba vs The Odin Project for the side-by-side.
Enjoyed the free courses?
Unlock career paths, advanced courses, and the Discord community with Pro.
Frequently asked questions
Learn React if you already know basic JavaScript. Learn JavaScript first if you don't. Those are the two strongest free courses on the platform, and both are current.
Yes, no credit card and no trial clock. But which courses are free changes: Learn Bootstrap and Learn CSS Grid were free in past versions of this guide and moved to Pro. Check Scrimba's all-courses page for the current list.
Learn React, Learn JavaScript, Learn HTML and CSS, and Learn TypeScript are current. Build a Space Travel Website and Learn Imba are older and shouldn't be your starting point.
No. A certificate, for a course or a path, is a Pro feature. Finish a free course on Free and you get the lessons, not the certificate; upgrade to Pro to unlock it.