You’re never too old to learn. Once you graduate high school or university, that doesn’t mean you can’t acquire further knowledge in subjects that interest you. Evening and vocational classes have long been a way of learning new skills. Still, availability can depend on where you live and the popularity of a class. Plus, you might want to learn something considered niche and therefore find it hard to find a class that suits you.
Thanks to the internet, there’s been a steady rise in ways you can learn online. One of the most popular options is Skillshare, an “online learning community” that offers classes on anything you can think of. The developers of Skillshare founded the service “to close the professional skills gap and provide universal access to high-quality learning,” as they explain on the about page. But, of course, you don’t just take classes. You can participate with others taking courses, chat with classmates and teachers about things you’re struggling with, and some even involve doing projects.
Ranging from beginner to expert, Skillshare is a hub for anyone who wants to expand their knowledge, learn new skills, and even make friends on the platform. But as with many services like this, it comes with a monthly or annual subscription. So is Skillshare worth the money?
Skillshare offers three types of membership. First, there’s a one-month free trial that offers all the perks of a monthly or annual subscription (via Skillshare). Once that period is up, you’ll have the option to either pay for a monthly or yearly subscription. As Bussiness Insider reported, a monthly membership is $32, while an annual membership is $168 — which means you’ll be paying about $14 a month. So if you like what you saw during the free trial and plan on signing up for multiple classes, an annual subscription is undoubtedly the cheaper option.
And, as Skillshare notes on their website, subscription fees for the service support teachers on the platform. According to Instructor Academy, teachers can earn between $200 and $300 per month, depending on how long they teach on Skillshare. They might even be able to earn upwards of $100,000 annually.
There’s an added bonus for college students when it comes to subscriptions, as you can get 50% off as long as you sign up with a .edu email address, according to Business Insider. Once your membership is sorted, you’ll have “unlimited access” to over 30,000 videos on the platform (via Skillshare), which you can view on and offline through your desktop or mobile through the Skillshare app.
As for what you can expect with your subscription, there are various subjects and topics to choose from (via Course Reviewers). There are classes on advertising, business, and entrepreneurship for the more financially inclined. Those with a more creative mind can expand their knowledge in design, fashion and style, film and video, food and drink, photography, and music. There are also gaming, social media, technology, writing, and publishing classes.
Skillshare also offers multi-week courses with experts, which the service brands as Chroma Classes. These are a little different, as you don’t need a Skillshare membership to sign up (via Skillshare’s support page). Instead, you can put your name down on a waitlist to learn as a small group that can interact via a Slack channel. Some portions of the course take place on Zoom, in addition to live Q&As with teachers and experts hosting the class. According to IMHO Reviews, the cost for most classes is $499, which is relatively expensive, especially if you’re already a paid subscriber.
Of course, Skillshare isn’t the only website where you can take online classes. One of Skillshare’s main competitors is MasterClass, which features classes taught by celebrity experts like Christina Aguilera, Gordon Ramsay, Kris Jenner, Richard Branson, Melinda French Gates, and even President George W. Bush. MasterClass only offers an annual subscription (via Course Reviewers), which is split into three tiers — Individual ($180), Duo ($240), and Family ($276).
If you’re looking to obtain a certificate or even a degree from online classes, then sites like edX and Coursera are the ones to look out for. edX offers classes provided by more than 160 universities like the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Harvard, Boston, and Berkeley, among many others. There is no membership fee for edX, but if you want to obtain a certificate or have graded assignments, you have to pay for an individual course. These can range between $50 and $300 per edX’s support page.
Coursera also offers free courses, but if you want to earn a degree or certificate, you’ll have to subscribe to the service. Like edX, Coursera is partnered with more than 275 universities worldwide and major companies like Google and IBM. A monthly subscription costs $59, while annually, it’s $399 (via Coursera’s support page).
In terms of reviews, Skillshare ranks pretty highly across many student and career advice sites. For example, Career Sidekick wrote that the courses provided by Skillshare teachers “are excellent quality” and highlights that you can learn topics through “high-quality videos that you can watch at your own pace.” e-Student.org gave Skillshare a 4.2 out of 5, noting that the service is “easy to use all around” but is “not fully accessible,” and some teachers aren’t of the quality you’d expect. Upskillwise noted the same issue, writing that there’s a lack of quality control as “anyone can create their own course,” so the “quality can vary.”
Aside from quality control, Skillshare is an affordable option for those wanting to expand their knowledge or learn new life skills who don’t want to be dedicated to a specific course. It’s certainly the cheapest of the bunch and is an excellent introduction to online classes. But if you feel as though you need more from your online learning, there are plenty of other options like MasterClass, edX, and Coursera.
