Top mobile app development courses: free and paid

So you want to learn app development? We completely understand. App development is among the most rewarding industries to work in these days. With salaries higher than the national average and demand for people to fill app development positions skyrocketing, there’s never been a better time to learn mobile app development.

For budding developers, it’s time to hop aboard the gravy train. For current developers, keeping on top of your game in a rapidly growing industry is tantamount to a successful career. The question is, where do you start? This post aims to help answer those burning questions like “what courses should I sign up for to learn app development?” and “Should I teach myself app development?”

Obviously, it all depends on where your current level of knowledge and expertise lies, so, without further ado, here are some quick fixes and our top app free and paid app development courses.

Dee Aliyu Odumosu’s Mobile App Development course is ideal if you’re looking to break into iOS.

Learn how to create and customize 10 or more iPhone apps (using Swift and Xcode) with easy step-by-step instructions. This app development course begins with implementing of basic elements – UILabel, UIButton, UITextField etc. – Auto Layout and multiple-sized icons, with more advanced classes covering memory issues, storyboarding and displaying rich local notifications.

• Price point: $56
• Duration: 33 hours
• Level: beginner; ownership of a Mac is required

This is the ultimate Swift for iOS app development course, brought to you by Parham Aarabi and the University of Toronto.

Using XCode, Parham will teach you how to design elegant interactions and create fully functioning iOS apps, such as the photo editing app for iPhone, iPad, and Apple Watch. The course also includes best practices to help you become proficient in functional Swift concepts.

• Price point: 7-day free trial, $49 per month thereafter
• Duration: 6 months
• Level: beginner; ownership of a Mac is required

Imagine being able to go from app user to app creator at your own pace and being able to implement an app design all of your own? That’s what Harvard University’s Professional Certificate in Computer Science and Mobile Apps aims to help you do.

This mobile app development certificate is taught through edX and is a fast track to mastering important concepts like debugging, data structure, algorithms and abstraction. It also provides a firm primer in important coding languages for mobile app development such as Python, JavaScript, SQL, React Native and many more.

• Price point: $162
• Duration: estimated 6 months to completion
• Level: beginner to intermediate

This app development course, taught on Skillshare by Zeph Cohen – a developer with many years experience creating mobile and desktop software – provides bite sized videos detailing everything you need to know about iOS development and Swift, in order to get you to paid professional with zero experience.

Warmups, class projects and exercises will help keep you on your toes and you can also check out some of Zeph’s coding tutorials on his Youtube channel if you’re unsure about any aspects of the coding used in the videos.

• Price point: 30 day free trial; $15 monthly; $108 annually. Value discounts are available for groups and organizations
• Duration: 3 hours, 28 mins
• Level: beginners

Ben Deitch’s app development course Build a Simple Android App with Java will help you build simple mobile apps for Android, without any prior knowledge.

Best-suited to budding Android developers, this app development course will explore programming in Android and some very basic concepts of the Android SDK. By the end of the course, you’ll have a working knowledge of how a basic app works, as well as how to use Android Studio.

• Price point: around $25 per month
• Duration: around 3.5 hours
• Level: beginner

Simon Allardice’s tutorials on iOS Fundamentals is an iOS app development course that teaches you, from the ground up, how to use Xcode and Swift to make apps for multiple devices.

You’ll write your first iPhone app code and learn about how to create apps with adaptive user interfaces in addition to learning how to implement navigation options and work with data-driven controls.

• Price point: around $29 per month
• Duration: around 4 hours, 22 minutes
• Level: beginner

Developing Android Apps by Google, offered through Udacity, is a free app development course and counts towards part of the Android Developer Nanodegree.

This short course builds on basic coding knowledge to enable you to start building professional apps for Android in as little as two weeks, in addition to teaching you the best practices of mobile app development, with a particular focus on Android and its history.

• Price point: free
• Duration: just under two weeks
• Level: intermediate

Google developers training offers great Android app development courses all round, from zero developers to heros. The topics offered on this site cover everything from creating your first app to nailing graphics, localization and performance.

Android Development for beginners is a free set of courses that not only get you creating your first app from lesson one, but also how to add functionality, databases and connecting to the internet.

• Price point: free
• Duration: varies according to course
• Level: all levels

Ray Wenderlich is a community of experts in the field of app development from around the world. It’s a fun and informative site for beginners through to advanced developers that offers a plethora of free tutorials and app development courses to increase your knowledge in the shortest timespan possible.

You can get free and instant access to professionally made, informative courses with videos ranging from topics such as iOS & Swift and Android & Kotlin to Unreal Engine (a cross-platform engine for game development) tutorials.

• Price point: free or pay between $99 and $240 for unlimited access to highly specialised all videos year round
• Duration: courses vary between a few minutes to several hours
• Level: all levels

Offered by the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology through Coursera, this Specialization consists of a series of hybrid app development courses and will give you the chance to build complete web and hybrid mobile solutions, as well as master front-end web, hybrid mobile app and server-side development.

This course goes into details regarding both hybrid and front-end app development. You’ll learn Bootstrap 4 front-end frameworks, how to build hybrid apps using Ionic, Cordova and Native, in addition to implementing NoSQL databases with MongoDB and working within Node.js environments.

• Price point: 7-day free trial, $39 per month thereafter
• Duration: 7 months
• Level: intermediate to advanced

Washington university’s Certificate in Java Programming app development course sets out to lay the foundations of the most commonly used APIs along with how to know when and when not to use them.

They aim to teach you the most widely used tools in the industry for developing and testing applications built with Java, along with the best practices used for developing with this language.

• Price point: $1,142
• Duration: 10-11 weeks
• Level: beginners

If you’re looking for a zero to hero app development course that sets you up to both design and develop professional iOS apps, then NYU Stern’s iOS App Development Intensive: from Concept to App Store might be for you.

Like the name suggests, this app development course takes you from the ideation stage, right through to the finished product ready for publication. It’s beginner friendly and provides you with training in the latest iOS development and iOS SDK tools.

• Price point: $2,800
• Duration: 2.5 months
• Level: beginners; must own a Mac for homework

USC’s Mobile App Development course teaches you how to develop standards-compliant apps for both Android and iOS tablets and smartphones, in addition to innovation and design rationale for app development.

This course also teaches you how to build apps using the relevant libraries to process user input and obtain an authentic look and feel.

• Price point: $2,800
• Duration: 1 year
• Level: beginners

Stanford University’s free app development course promises to get you up to speed with the latest in iOS development. IT teaches you all the tools and APIs necessary to successfully build apps for both the iPhone and iPad, for which you’ll use iOS SDK.

Among the innovative techniques listed on this online app development course is how to correctly implement user interactions via multi-touch technology, in addition to Swift 4.2 programming practice and object-oriented design.

• Price point: free
• Duration: 32 hours
• Level: knowledge of C# language and object-oriented programming required

CS50’s Mobile App Development with React Native app development course from Harvard, done through edX, picks up from the CS50 introduction to Computer Science, for which completion isn’t compulsory.

This app development course serves as a great introduction to JavaScript and JSX (an extension for JavaScript created by Facebook). You’ll work on practical projects using React, as well as design and develop your own app from scratch.

• Price point: free to audit, or $90 for a Harvard certificate
• Duration: 13 weeks
• Level: intermediate

The London App Brewery provides a bootcamp app development course which promises to get you from zero to hero in little more than a weekend!

They offer in-person app development courses for to get you up to speed with Android and iOS development, with one-to-one tutoring and all resources provided. Or, for an extra $130, you can avail of the certification course that provides you with an accreditation and LinkedIn Badge.

• Price point: $655 for the in-person course, $787 for full certification
• Duration: one weekend
• Level: beginner

Learn Quest aims to help you master the fundamentals of iOS native app development with plenty of hands-on coding exercises using Swift. Their app development courses will teach you all the practicalities you need to build and run your first iOS apps, including the appropriate design patterns for the iPhone and iPad.

They offer a two-day app development course which covers the foundations of Swift 4.2, a three-day course which builds on the foundations for running apps and a five-day course that builds on everything learnt in the previous two.

• Price point: $1,573 for introduction to Swift 4.2, $2,365 for Introduction to iOS 12 SDK and $3,940 for App Development with Swift 4.2
• Duration: two, three and five-day courses available
• Level: intermediate – you’ll be required to know the basic concepts of logic, strings and variables.

Are you in Spain, looking to do an intensive app development course and become an expert in JS but not sure of where to find a reputable school? Look no further than Barcelona Code School, where you can avail of a nine week course, five days a week from 9:30am to 7:30pm. They give you the skills to start freelancing immediately after you finish your training.

Here, all the training, taught in English, is in-person and intensive. They’ll teach all the practical coding skills required such as JS, React Native, HTML and CSS, MongoDB and even some basics in UX!

• Price point: $6,565 (get a discount if you’re over the age of 40!)
• Duration: 9 weeks
• Level: beginners

CCT’s diploma in Mobile Application Development focuses specifically on Android native app development, and provides an introduction to the different types of approaches used in development today.

You can expect to learn everything on this app development course, from creating data storage solutions and data feeds, to accessing internal resources such as a device’s GPS and sensors.

Price point: $1,352

Duration: 11 weeks

Level: beginners

Another relatively cheap course – Training Dragon’s Android Programming app development course in London sets out to give you training and practical experience by helping you develop Android native apps to include in your portfolio.

In a class size of no more than 10, you’ll learn about important concepts in Android development such as Broadcast Receivers, Databases, Content Providers, Graphics and Animation, including how to upload your apps to Google Play.

• Price point: $1,245
• Duration: 4 days
• Level: beginners

Asia Dev Academy’s Android App Development course was designed to teach you how to develop apps from scratch in six months. It’s delivered by some of Asia’s finest developers.

You’ll have classes in instructor-led labs, in addition to learning the foundations of OOP and Java, Backend Development, Firebase and Google Play marketing.

• Price point: $520
• Duration: 24 weeks
• Level: beginner

NTUC’s Android Programming and App Development course teaches the full range of knowledge and skills needed to build an Android application from the ground up, and it does so with a special focus on the Java and Kotlin programming languages.

From day one students will be learning object-oriented programming in addition to techniques geared towards SDK, meaning you won’t waste any time (or money) on this practical course.

• Price point: $2,181
• Duration: 4 days
• Level: intermediate; experience in C#, Java or other object-oriented language

Not only does this app development course cover the fundamentals of programming for both iOS and Android platforms, SAE’s Mobile Application Development Short Course also sheds light on both the App Store and Android Market business models.

This is an intensive app development course that aims to cover everything from the ground up, and is essential for those with a business idea for an app but that aren’t sure how to go about designing or developing it.

• Price point: $1,634
• Duration: 6 weeks
• Level: beginners

Looking for a great free app development course to take in Australia for developing cross-platform apps? You’re in luck!

Cross-Platform Mobile App Development by the Charles Sturt University introduces you to the open-source Phonegap, a framework that lets you write code only once and reuse it across multiple platforms.

The only downside is that, as the course was delivered in 2015, there are no longer certificates given on completion, though learning materials and exams are still accessible.

• Price point: free
• Duration: 5 weeks
• Level: intermediate

This online app development course promises to cover everything you need to know about about developing with the C# programming language, as well as ground you in the basics of using object-oriented core programming techniques and object-oriented concepts for modular software development.

This app development course will teach you everything you need to know about designing, writing and testing apps with an IDE (integrated development environment).

• Price point: $1,135 (NZ students); $2,643 (international students)
• Duration: 3 months
• Level: beginners

If you’re a rookie coder or just starting out, it might be an idea to try app prototyping with our prototyping tool. When building an app, developers often have to work closely with design teams, usually in respect to prototypes delivered to them in designer handoffs.

Prototyping is a crucial aspect in mobile app development. Furthermore, creating prototypes will help you get the hang of app functionality (both for Android and iOS), before you even start to get your head around the code. It’s also a great way to visualize what you’ll be building further down the line.

On top of that, Justinmind’s integration with Phonegap also allows you to generate and share native apps from your prototypes on Google Play and App Store.

Developed by Google and maintained by MIT, the App Inventor is a great way for people with little-to-no experience creating apps to practice putting an Android app together. Packaging and Sharing is a feature that lets you download your apps and share them with your friends. You can also upload them to the Google Play Store.

There’s never been a better time to take an app development course. It can be a very lucrative and rewarding career for those with both a logical and creative streak running through them.

It is, however, a very technical area and while there is always a certain amount you can teach yourself, for those starting out, taking some crash courses is the best way to make sure you’re fully prepared to enter the developer world.

For those who are already developers, it never hurts to take the occasional course to stay abreast of all the developments (pun intended!) in a rapidly growing industry.