# Coursera 26 Hacker News commenters recommended Coursera and 37 criticized it, November 2025 to November 2026. It was recommended in 6 of 13 months. **Verdict:** People recommend Coursera for courses from reputable universities that can be transformative and quick to learn from. Critics say quality is uneven and more content now sits behind paywalls. ## Why people recommend it - Courses from reputable universities (3 comments): "high-quality, curated courses from reputable professors and institutions" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48109576)) "it's easy to filter out good/bad courses on Coursera by stuff like University name" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46306510)) "it had so many great courses to pick from" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48106801)) - Transformative for education and careers (3 comments): "Coursera was transformative for my education and it wouldn't be an exaggeration to say it changed my life for the better." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46310053)) "I gained a lot from both Udemy and Coursera. Stuff that has helped me a fair amount in my career." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46307262)) "Coursera has courses in medical AI, and is where I cut my teeth." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46757621)) - Quick, cheap path to knowledge (2 comments): "The key value I get out of Coursera is an unbeatable "time to knowledge"" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46301981)) "The first two can give certificates cheaply." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46302471)) - Still useful open education resource (3 comments): "online resources (like Coursera) worked really well for decades and are not obsolete at all" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46867580)) "audit a class and watch videos in Coursera or some other open education platform" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48886090)) "they do offer useful material at the very least" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46061323)) ## What people warn about - Quality uneven; many weak courses (4 comments): "thousands of courses, many clearly without as much thought or effort" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46301813)) "These modules are absolute slop garbage, often asking repetitive questions that have no grounding in actual course content." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48108814)) "They make it reaaaaally hard to find the good stuff." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48108359)) - Content moved behind paywalls (4 comments): "From around 2017 these platforms started limiting free access, so now in most cases you can only see the lecture materials" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49321996)) "Coursera put NAND to tetris behind a paywal after being free for like a decade" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48109029)) "you can’t access all the materials. Videos, code files etc are now paywalled." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48123737)) - Quality declined after corporate changes (4 comments): "The ongoing enshittification of Coursera, Udacity, and EdX is sad to watch." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46301933)) "Coursera HAD good courses. I used to use it, now it's fully enshittified." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48111000)) "EDX and Coursera got bought out and are now money-making online ed sites" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48641135)) - Buggy login and slow site (3 comments): "they f'ed up their login so much, that they required Google stuff to be loaded" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46304882)) "they f'ed it up even more now, so that the login page doesn't even appear" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46307983)) "Extremely slow load times, annoying AI chatbot that takes up the right half of the screen" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49152907)) ## Alternatives hackers recommend - [Khan Academy](https://hackerapproved.com/p/khan-academy.md): 67 recommend - [Udemy](https://hackerapproved.com/p/udemy.md): 16 recommend - [MIT OpenCourseWare](https://hackerapproved.com/p/mit-opencourseware.md): 14 recommend - [Brilliant.org](https://hackerapproved.com/p/brilliant-org.md): 12 recommend - [Bloomy](https://hackerapproved.com/p/bloomy.md): 12 recommend ## Where to get it - [Visit the official site](https://www.coursera.org/) ## Cite as Hacker Approved, "Coursera", https://hackerapproved.com/p/coursera/ (counts from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026).