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Best Web Design Courses Compared

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We’ve identified 11 courses that can help you form or advance your web design skills, and Webflow University is our favorite web design course among them. It is a free platform that lets you discover basic and advanced modern web design techniques. You’ll learn HTML and CSS, style basics, and even SEO considerations. Once you’re earning more for designing spectacular and functional websites, you’ll look back and wonder how something so valuable was available for free.      

Top Web Design Courses: Golden Eggs

Webflow University offers a broad array of courses that gently walk you through the best practices of modern web design. Get all the quality of paid learning for free by creating your Webflow account today

Dash makes learning how to code for website creation easier than ever with its self-paced online course. Learn HTML, JavaScript, and CSS for free through Dash, provided by General Assembly. 

Codecademy offers detailed training tracks on web design, with lessons that cover everything from UI/UX design to Bootstrap, CSS, and more. Sign up in seconds and start learning for free

Crazy Egg's Golden Eggs: Top Web Design Courses.

Best Web Design Courses Review Process

Most review sites give you general insights into what makes a web design course good or bad. On the other hand, we provide you with a more detailed way to find the right options for what you want to learn. 

The 11 courses we reviewed below are broken down into three categories of common needs or wants of web design learners. This helps you to quickly determine which course will give you the best outcome for what you’re trying to accomplish. 

Those three categories are:

Finding the best courses within this structure allows you to save time while still finding quality options that will guarantee your success if you follow through. 

You don’t have to read every one of the over 2,500 words in this post. Simply head to the use case that fits your needs and zoom in on the courses that make the most sense for you. Each brand was hand-selected for that use case after a thorough review. We don’t waste your time with possibilities that won’t satisfy your desire to find the best web design courses on the internet. 

The Best Web Design Courses for Learning for Free

“Free” isn’t code for “lousy” in online education. In fact, the courses we list below are actually better than some paid options. This is a great place to start if you’re just getting your feet wet in the world of web design. These providers give you a solid foundation and even offer some advanced topics to help you become proficient beyond the essentials. 

Webflow University

Webflow University brand logo.

Webflow University is our favorite option on this list for more reasons than we can count. You’ll be surprised to discover how deep its roster of courses goes (over 100 educational videos) and how much you can accomplish once you get started. All of this is accessible for free. 

Choose from beginner and advanced courses, from learning the basics of HTML and page design to CSS and animations. Dive into the science of typography and how it affects engagement with the content you create. Learn how forms are not just for collecting data but also for boosting conversions as well. You can learn a lot, whether you’re just starting on web design or trying to fill in some knowledge gaps. 

Webflow University also walks you through how to use Webflow’s own software to create websites without using code. But, you’ll walk away from their University courses with the skills to tackle web design in many different ways without having to spend a dime on your personal development. 

Dash

Dash brand logo.

Web design and development don’t have to be all hair-pulling frustration. Dash, from General Assembly, offers a clear path to learning how to use programming languages to design website masterpieces. 

Their approach involves fun interactive videos and projects that give you a hands-on learning experience. So many courses are just theory and a few cookie-cutter templates to use. But with Dash, you’ll start with HTML and CSS, learn how the languages work, and then gain the knowledge to apply them to the things that you want to do. Then, you’ll jump into learning the most-used programming language in the world, JavaScript. 

Learn how to make your websites smarter, your site UI more inviting, and more design insights that will wow your employer or clients. There are no apps or software to download. All the learning is done inside your browser.  

Codecademy 

Codecademy brand logo.

The best part about Codecademy is how they divide the lessons they teach you. They have a dropdown menu on their website that separates the free courses from the paid ones. Plus, you can also determine if you want to start on courses that are pitched for beginners or designers with intermediate knowledge. 

Each course has anywhere from one to six lessons within it, drilling down into concepts so that you walk away from the course feeling like a pro. Dive into classes on the fundamentals of HTML and CSS, as well as how to do user research and design brainstorming. You can gain knowledge on these topics for free and move on to paid courses if you want to keep going into more advanced topics. Or, pivot to other topics like web development and take advantage of the free courses on Ruby, Node.js, PHP, and more.

Codecademy courses are well-rounded and give you the confidence to know the technical parts of web design and how to think about creating a website and how users will interact with it. 

Envato Tuts+

Envato Tuts+ brand logo.

Envato Tuts+ offers 27 completely free courses on web design that cover a pretty wide range of topics. You can dive into CSS, JavaScript, and more learning tracks pitched to beginners or heighten your capabilities with advanced courses on Figma, Adobe XD, and WordPress.

Perhaps best of all is their Web Design for Beginners course. Not only is this available for free on Envato’s website, but you can also access the entire hour-long course via YouTube. So, that makes it convenient to ingest these teachings on whatever device you’d like to watch it on.

The course clearly explains the difference between UX, UI, and web design, so you know exactly what you’ll be learning and why things are being explained the way they are. The care the instructor shows as he walks you through what you will learn is fantastic. You’ll learn about buttons, images and galleries, typography, and even what color palettes represent on websites. It’s beginner-friendly but also dives deep into the psychology of what you should be thinking about as you design your next website. 

The Best Web Design Courses for Learning Advanced Techniques

If you’re familiar with web design and you want to learn some other tips and tricks to master more advanced techniques, these providers fit the bill perfectly. At some point, you will outgrow your novice status and will want to step into the elite class of web designers. Here are the courses that help you save time searching for where to go next with your skillset. 

Web Design for Everybody

Coursera brand logo.

Coursera and the University of Michigan’s Web Design for Everybody course helps you solidify your knowledge of advanced design considerations. This class helps you make website accessibility for the visually and hearing impaired a priority, learn the Bootstrap framework so you can make websites even faster, and increase your knowledge of JavaScript so you can create web applications. 

You’ll even go through a capstone project that gives you something to point to in your portfolio after you’re finished. Your responsive design skills will skyrocket as you learn about the document object model (DOM) and learn HTML5 so you can apply code in a more efficient way. The best part is you’re held accountable for everything you do, just like in a real university setting. 

This course also entails peer feedback on quizzes and projects, so you’re never confused about what you need help with. You’ll also earn a certificate of completion to confirm your skills to clients, employers, and peers. But it’s still self-paced, so if you work full-time, you’ll have the flexibility to do lessons when you have time. 

LinkedIn Learning’s Become a Web Designer

LinkedIn brand logo.

LinkedIn Learning offers their Become a Web Designer course for anyone who wants to learn how to create websites that real business owners are looking for and crave. Help clients make more conversions and build an authoritative reputation for their brand through the knowledge gained in this course. 

Start with the core concepts of website design and the tools and best practices for building websites the right way. Learn about balancing site elements, unifying visual elements, colors, and UI, and enhancing website aesthetics to actually get results and not just look good. 

You will learn the web design mapping process, how that ties into content creation, and when development should stop and it’s time for launch. This course goes far beyond just learning how to code and drag and drop elements. You’ll learn about illustrator, photoshop, Responsive typography techniques, and much more. 

Treehouse

Treehouse brand logo.

Treehouse is an incredible provider of coding and design courses, and its Fundamentals of Web Design track is a comprehensive curriculum that walks you through advanced web design concepts. Start with an intro to HTML and CSS and then work your way through focused modules on topics like responsive layouts, CSS transitions, typography, and much more. 

In just 40 hours, you will learn a ton. Get into Bootstrap, learn how to use scalable vector graphics (SVG) and animate them with CSS, get guidance on prototyping wireframes of your design for clients, and more. ]You’ll start with the basics and, like a rocket ship, take off and blast your way into a new way of thinking about the underlying principles of web design for advanced use. 

By the end of this course, you’ll be teaching CSS and more to anyone who will listen because of all the wisdom you’ve gained. Even though it isn’t free, it’s an incredibly worthwhile investment in yourself—you can access Treehouse’s tracks on web design and other topics for just $25 per month.

Ultimate Web Designer and Web Developer Course

Udemy brand logo.

If you’re looking for hands-on experience to gain advanced web design knowledge, the Ultimate Web Designer and Web Developer course from Udemy makes sure you’re not disappointed. You will build over 23 custom web design and development projects to learn more than 18 different web design disciplines and finish up by building a custom, modern website from scratch. 

You’ll learn about designing graphics with Figma, HTML, advanced CSS, the Bootstrap framework, and even Jquery, to name a few topics this course touches on. This hands-on class helps you learn by doing, and you become more proficient with popular web design tools and the concepts themselves.

Udemy’s course shows you how web design and development are intertwined and gives you the skills to work side-by-side with other developers on complex design projects. This can make you irreplaceable to employers and clients that need more than a general designer.  

The Best Web Design Courses for Site Optimization

Here we have the specialty section of this post. If you’re looking for a little more than a broad design course and want to be known for a specific set of skills, you’re in the right place. These courses below are geared towards getting results with your web design rather than just building a pretty website that gets oohs and aahs. 

Encouraging Clicks Without Shady Tricks

Awwwards brand logo.

A website that converts is an employee that never sleeps, takes breaks, or asks for a raise. If you can deliver that resource as a web designer, you will always be in high demand. Paul Boag’s Encouraging Clicks Without Shady Tricks from Awwwards is how you master the techniques that help a website increase subscribers, make more sales, and keep website revenue bursting at the digital seams. 

Paul Boag will teach you all about conversion optimization and incorporating those principles into your designs. Learn about how design can drive quality traffic, how to reduce cognitive load times, how to create compelling calls-to-action to add to websites, and much more. 

Often, design is viewed as just properly balancing white space, color schemes, and button position. But, with this course, you’ll understand how getting to know your audience matters and how users make decisions—which makes where you put content and images even more important and can guide your ability to place elements in a way that encourages more clicks from visitors. 

UI/UX Design Specialization

Coursera brand logo.

Ever been to a website that didn’t make any sense? You couldn’t find the contact button, the navigation was overwhelming, and the site was spilling over with too many options for you to find what you were looking for. That’s a clear example of poor UI and UX design. 

CalArts’ UI/UX Design Specialization course on Coursera teaches you a better way to engage with your visitors. You will learn the practical but skillful way of designing websites, so users smoothly go from one area to another—the way you want them to. 

This course is four months long and leaves nothing out. Start with the stages of the UI/UX design and development process, then delve into user research, information architecture, sitemaps, wireframes, and take that wireframe to a prototype. 

To test your knowledge, you will engage in visual and non-visual applied learning projects. This pushes your learning to new levels and makes sure you grasp the concepts explained. After every module you complete, you’ll earn a certificate of completion. 

Front End Web Design & Development

Udacity brand logo.

Web applications are something we can’t live without. So, learning how to make them is a great idea if you’re looking for an ironclad career in web design. The Front End Web Design & Development course from Udacity gives you the best of both worlds. You’ll learn web design and how to make irresistible web applications that businesses are looking to deliver to their site visitors and customers. 

This nanodegree program cuts out all the fluff of what a traditional university would charge you for. You’ll learn how to build responsive websites using the most up-to-date technologies and how to create applications that talk to each other, so when your client clicks a button in your application it gets the data it needs to fulfill the request. 

Become what they call a full-stack web developer with this course. You’ll be ready for real-world applications, not just filled with knowledge you don’t know how to apply—a big problem with most online courses. The only prerequisite is that you already have basic knowledge of HTML, CSS, and JavaScript. 

Further Reading

Now you have the most useful list of web design courses available on the internet. But if this post isn’t enough for you and you have the urge to learn even more about web design, we have a surprise for you. Below you’ll find many of our related Crazy Egg posts on web design. Good luck not becoming a know-it-all when the topic of web design comes up after educating yourself with these posts.  


Rockey Simmons is a content marketing strategist and professional direct response copywriter for SaaS B2B and B2C. He keeps readers in mind, helping them find solutions through clearly written analysis of business problems and technology. Rockey is endorsed by the International Association of Professional Writers & Editors as a writer who boosts conversions while still providing clarity and empathy.

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