CS336: Language Modeling from Scratch
Hacker ApprovedRanked 5 of 17 online courses by recommenders
People recommend this Stanford course for in-depth, up-to-date coverage of how LLMs are built and scaled, with rewarding hands-on assignments.
People recommend this Stanford course for in-depth, up-to-date coverage of how LLMs are built and scaled, with rewarding hands-on assignments.
13 people gave an opinion
- recommend it
- 12
- criticize it
- 1
- approval share
- 92%
Recommended in 5 of 13 months
- November 2025: recommended
- December 2025: not recommended
- January 2026: not recommended
- February 2026: not recommended
- March 2026: not recommended
- April 2026: not recommended
- May 2026: recommended
- June 2026: recommended
- July 2026: not recommended
- August 2026: recommended
- September 2026: not recommended
- October 2026: recommended
- November 2026: not recommended (month in progress)
Why it carries the badge
- 12 people recommend itNeeds 10 or more, met.
- 12 recommenders for every criticNeeds 2 to 1 or better, met.
- Recommended in 5 of 13 monthsNeeds 4 or more, met.
The same three rules apply to every product, and the badge can’t be bought. How the badge works
What people say about it
The reasons people give, with the number of comments that give each one. Open a reason to read what they said.
Why people recommend it
Each mark is one comment
In-depth theory and scaling coverage
“It covers all this curriculum in a lot more depth, introduces you into a lot of theoretical aspects”
Comment from 5 May 2026 in “Train Your Own LLM from Scratch” “I think this is the best structured class out there that teaches how to scale LLMs”
Comment from 24 Aug 2026 in “I were 17, I'd learn how to build LLMs from scratch” “they cover DPO/GRPO and relevant parts needed to train LLMs”
Comment from 26 Nov 2025 in “CS234: Reinforcement Learning Winter 2025” Up-to-date 2026 version
“it is great quality and the 2026 version is really up to date with architecture decisions”
Comment from 2 Jun 2026 in “CS336: Language Modeling from Scratch” “the 2026 version there is essential”
Comment from 1 Jun 2026 in “CS336: Language Modeling from Scratch”
Other online courses people recommend
The four most recommended other online courses, with the same counts for each, so you can compare like for like. The tick on each bar marks the 2 to 1 line the badge needs.
| Product | Recommend | Criticize | Approval | Months | Owned | Badge |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Math Academy | 35 | 1 | 97% | 12 | 9 mo6 owners | Approved |
| Nand2Tetris | 31 | 3 | 91% | 10 | — | Approved |
| Neural Networks: Zero to Hero by Andrej Karpathy | 29 | 2 | 94% | 9 | — | Approved |
| CS193p SwiftUI course by Paul Hegarty | 13 | 1 | 93% | 2 | 11.9 yrs5 owners | — |
| CS336: Language Modeling from ScratchThis page | 12 | 1 | 92% | 5 | — | Approved |
What people said
12 of the 14 comments that mention it, newest first. Each links to the original comment.
“Computational bottlenecks become much more intuitive when you've looked at the overall process.”
“It's a disservice to any young hacker to not learn it.”
“I think this is the best structured class out there that teaches how to scale LLMs”
“I use this primarily to exercise my brain.”
“it is great quality and the 2026 version is really up to date with architecture decisions”
“The one issue I had with the CS336 course was the delivery of the RL components”
“Oh this is brilliant, I've spent the last month doing something just like this.”
“You can really feel a sense of achievement after completing the assignments.”
“the 2026 version there is essential”
“It is challenging but rewarding.”
“It covers all this curriculum in a lot more depth, introduces you into a lot of theoretical aspects”
“they cover DPO/GRPO and relevant parts needed to train LLMs”
Counts come from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026. How we count. Report a mistake.