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Add to SafariWhen comparing SmarterEveryDay vs freeCodeCamp, the Slant community recommends freeCodeCamp for most people. In the question“What are the best educational channels on YouTube?” freeCodeCamp is ranked 6th while SmarterEveryDay is ranked 7th. The most important reason people chose freeCodeCamp is:
Free for anyone who wants to take the camp.
Specs
Question Ranking
Pros
Pro Extremely likeable and articulate host
Destin makes the videos for himself above all, inviting the viewer to join him in his own personal quest for greater understanding. Few things are more enjoyable than bearing witness to a labor of love.
Pro Concise episodes that respect the viewer's intelligence
Each video is edited to perfection, maintaining a brisk narrative pace without sacrificing the key breakthrough pieces of knowledge that connect each piece to the next. At the end you want to build on what you've learned and research further while waiting for the next installment.
Pro Unique topics covered in valuable ways
The most valuable lessons are the ones that teach you what you didn't realize you didn't know. Supporting those choices are the use of elite recording equipment and eminent research facilities to present the concepts in the most illustrative and captivating ways possible.
Pro Completely free
Free for anyone who wants to take the camp.
Pro Open source
Due to freeCodeCamp being open source, you are able to contribute to the program that helped teach you how to code in the first place. It's a great way to give back and gain experience.
Pro Self-paced
There is no set schedule with freeCodeCamp. You can work through the program as fast or as slow as you want.
Pro Browser-based
All courses used by freeCodeCamp are done in the browser, rather than students having to set up their own environment. This makes it much easier for beginners to get started.
Pro Actively developed
They are frequently updating courses and adding new material.
Pro Welcoming, active community
freeCodeCamp strongly encourages interacting with other learners and experienced programmers. They provide chatrooms which are always active and full of members happy to answer any questions you may have. Pair programming (programming with another user) is encouraged as a great way to work through some of their coding challenges.
There are also meetup groups where you can code in person with other freeCodeCamp students.
Pro Six certificates available
There are currently six certificates available that you can get once you've completed all the projects:
- Responsive Web Design Certification
- Javascript Algorithms And Data Structures Certification
- Front End Libraries Certification
- Data Visualization Certification
- Apis And Microservices Certification
- Information Security And Quality Assurance Certification
Pro Gain real world experience while helping nonprofits
Once you've completed all the courses and practice levels on freeCodeCamp, you are able to participate with other learners on developing software for non-profits. It's an amazing way to gain experience and build your portfolio as a developer, while helping out a non-profit organization.
Pro Full stack certificate
There is a cool Full stack certificate
Cons
Con No longer offers opportunity to build projects one-on-one with nonprofits
There are no nonprofits to help upon completing the program.
Con Learning material is not in-depth
The teaching content provided by freeCodeCamp tends to act more as an introduction than a solid learning resource. Unless you already have some prior experience, you won't have enough knowledge to get through the coding challenges and development projects without using outside learning resources to fill in the gaps.
Con Massive time waste
Content mainly focuses on trivial concepts and is very sparse in those few areas that inch beyond 'complete beginner'.
Con Is an email list generator
Early focus isn't on programming. It is on signing up for all of FreeCodeCamp's social media and getting looped into their newsletters. The content is trivial. It is all just a massive marketing scheme to get email addresses of aspiring programmers to affiliate sell to by pushing novice developers to blog posts containing affiliate links.
That is until they sell to a 3rd party. Read their disclaimer. Whoever buys them out gets all their user data, email lists, etc.
Con No offline version
Con Excessive focus on the basics
This platform focuses too much on the basics.
