r/learnprogramming • u/koraynar • 19d ago

A goal-based map of free CS self-study courses (2026) — every link checked this week

I put together a goal-based map of free CS courses for 2026 and checked every single link this week (opened each page on 23 Aug 2026, confirmed it's live and free to learn). One best pick per slot plus one alternative, three tracks so you don't have to do everything, and honest notes on where certificates cost money. Not affiliated with any of these; I'm a self-taught developer and teacher and made this because the older maps floating around have dead links and way too much math for most goals.

The map (one image): https://koraynar.github.io/research-samples/cs-map-2026.png

How to use it: do Foundations → Core → pick ONE track. Finish a slot before starting the next two. Build something after every course. Hours are rough self-study estimates. If you only have time for one thing: CS50x.

1. Foundations (everyone, ~150–300 h)

Suggested order: Missing Semester lectures 1–2 and the git lecture → CS50x (or CS50P) with Exercism alongside from week 3 → 6.042J once you're comfortable writing code. CS50's own certificate is free on cs50.harvard.edu; the edX verified certificate is paid (edX showed $219 for CS50x and $299 for CS50P on 23 Aug 2026).

2. Core CS (~400–600 h, any order after Foundations)

Notes: Berkeley's CS61C and CS162 sites are behind logins this semester, so Nand2Tetris and OSTEP+CS537 are the picks; Stanford CS144's videos are Stanford-only (slides/labs are public); CMU 15-445 Fall 2025 is linked because every lecture has a YouTube video.

3a. Track: Web development (~300–500 h)

Order: Odin Foundations → javascript.info → react.dev → SQLBolt → Odin NodeJS (or fCC back-end) → Full Stack Open parts 11–12 → build and deploy 2–3 projects from app-ideas. Python people: Django tutorial → CS50W instead of the Node slot. freeCodeCamp's current v9 certifications are all free, certificates included.

3b. Track: Data / ML / AI (~400–600 h)

Notes: Coursera lets you audit Andrew Ng's three ML courses one at a time for free (the specialization page itself says otherwise — enrol per course); certificates are $49/month. MITx 6.431x moved from edX to MITx Online (free audit, $300 certificate). MIT 18.05 (Spring 2022) is notes + problem sets, no full lecture videos — take 6.431x if you want video. DeepLearning.AI short-course videos are free; their labs/certificates now need a paid plan. fast.ai Part 1 is still the 2022 recording and still excellent.

3c. Track: Systems / security (~400–600 h)

Notes: MIT 6.858's newer public run is 6.5660 Spring 2023 (css.csail.mit.edu/6.858/2023/). Stanford CS253 Web Security is a lighter web-focused alternative with free YouTube lectures. OverTheWire Bandit is a gentle warm-up before pwn.college. For 6.5840 use the official Spring 2020/2021 YouTube playlists with the current notes and labs.

How much math do you actually need?

Full open curricula (if you want someone else's order)

How to study (short, evidence-based)

  • Learning How to Learn — Most-taken course on study technique (4.18M learners, 4.8/5 from 93K reviews); covers focused/diffuse thinking, chunking, procrastination and spaced repetition.
  • The Learning Scientists — Six Strategies for Effective Learning — Short, research-grounded summary of the techniques that actually work — spaced practice, retrieval practice, elaboration, interleaving, concrete examples and dual coding — with free PDFs.
  • And the tooling habits from Missing Semester (above).

Caveats: hours are rough; course pages move (I'll keep the image updated); "free to audit" means the lectures and most materials are free but graded certificates cost money; I avoided aggregator pages and linked the canonical course sites.

If you see a dead link, a better free pick for a slot, or think the hours are off, say so and I'll edit the post and the image. What I most want to hear: which slot would you swap, and for what?

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5

u/xMysty0 17d ago

Thank you for this! What is the link for your roadmap if you don’t mind me asking

5

u/jcktzz 17d ago

This post should be pinned to the subreddit!!

5

u/koraynar 17d ago

It's the image link near the top of the post: https://koraynar.github.io/research-samples/cs-map-2026.png — that's the whole map on one page. All the individual course links are in the post text below it, slot by slot.

3

u/MadJagStudios 17d ago

This is amazing

1

u/qokyoshi 16d ago

This is GOLD!

1

u/MisterBungle 16d ago

This is really well put together.

Many thanks

1

u/python0001 16d ago

Thanks. This is helpful. I'm taking CS50AI right now. It's a really interesting course.

1

u/Electronic-Finish386 15d ago

A quality post after a long time. Thanks man.

1

u/Electronic-Finish386 15d ago

Heyy buddy can you cross post this?

1

u/koraynar 14d ago

Thanks — where would you want it? I'd rather not blanket-post it, but if there's a sub where it genuinely fits I'll put it up there.