# Essence of Linear Algebra by 3Blue1Brown

16 Hacker News commenters recommended Essence of Linear Algebra by 3Blue1Brown and 1 criticized it, November 2025 to November 2026. It was recommended in 7 of 13 months. It meets the Hacker Approved badge rule.

**Verdict:** Free YouTube video series that builds geometric intuition for linear algebra through visualizations, helping concepts click for many viewers. Main caveat: the videos are dense, and some say they learned little from them.

## Why people recommend it

- Strong geometric intuition and visualizations (6 comments): "I urge all my students to watch this series as soon as possible. It's great at giving them a geometrical understanding" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48949393)) "3B1B's linear algebra videos for example are wonderful tools for gaining geometric understanding and motivation" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49951721)) "It has fantastic visualisations for building intuition and in general is wildly superior to this" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45800005))
- Good starting point from scratch (2 comments): "Start with 3Blue1Brown's Essence of Linear Algebra series" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50226467)) "Starts from scratch and works up to advanced." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49095405))
- Helps students understand core concepts (2 comments): "those videos help my students understand the concepts of linear algebra" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50147433)) "because they learn stuff from them" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50146983))

## What people warn about

- Dense; expects repeated viewings (1 comments): "his videos are densely packed with information and his expectation is that you will watch the video a few times" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45802969))
- Some say they teach little (2 comments): "I'm not sure I've ever really learned anything from one of those videos." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45800657)) "they produce no learning gains for anyone" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50146359))

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## Cite as

Hacker Approved, "Essence of Linear Algebra by 3Blue1Brown", https://hackerapproved.com/p/essence-of-linear-algebra/ (counts from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026).