In September 1995, Brendan Eich, a Netscape programmer, created a language called Mocha in 10 days.

Mocha would later become JavaScript, and it was originally created with the purpose of making small animations, user interactions, and other types of automation for the web. Little did he know that JavaScript would become so huge that the concept of the web would be unimaginable without it.

Today, 26 years later, in 2021, JavaScript powers 97.6% of the websites on the Internet.

So, anyone who wants to make a career in web development must walk this road of JavaScript. In today’s post, I’ll tell you why it’s important for you to learn JavaScript and the best courses where you can learn JavaScript for free.

7 Reasons You Should Learn JavaScript

1. JavaScript is the most popular programming language

In the 2021 Stack Overflow survey, JavaScript completed its 9th year in a row as the most popular programming language. What more evidence should I give you to prove its popularity?

2. JavaScript is the default language of the internet

JavaScript is the default language of the internet and native to your browser. Hence, you don’t need those fancy IDEs to start programming in JavaScript.

As long as you have access to a web browser and some text editor, you are all set to code, all your solutions will run inside the browser itself.

3. JavaScript is beginner-friendly in nature

JavaScript saves beginners from the hassle of setting up their development server which could have overwhelmed a lot of newbie coders.

The syntax of JavaScript is also easier to pick up than other programming languages like C++ etc.

Apart from that, thousands of awesome free resources and gigantic online community support also make JavaScript a great choice for beginners.

4. JavaScript is a versatile language

JavaScript is one of the most versatile programming languages in the world, you can learn both Front-End and Back-End development with JavaScript only, which means you don’t necessarily need knowledge of any other programming language apart from JavaScript to create awesome full-fledged websites.

But Web Development is not the only field where JavaScript rocks!

You can create desktop apps with Electron and Mobile apps with React Native if you know React which is a JavaScript framework.

Apart from websites, desktop or mobile apps, you can also use JavaScript to create browser games, web applications, web servers, smartwatch apps, and many more cool things :-)

5. Huge demand in the market

With the internet spreading its wings even across the remotest areas of the world, the huge demand for web developers is a no-brainer, and most of the web is essentially based on JavaScript so the demand for developers who know JavaScript is obvious.

In the 2021 Stack Overflow survey, JavaScript outperformed every other language as the most common programming language with 68.62% of professional developers using it around the globe.

6. Massive community support

Communities play a huge role in learning, most of the problems which you’ll face as a beginner have already been solved and documented by someone else.

JavaScript has one of the most active and vibrant communities spread all over the internet from Stack Overflow, GitHub, HackerNoon, Reddit, Twitter, Freecodecamp, Hashnode, etc. to different Slack groups and Discord servers.

7. Future-oriented

The number of internet users all around the world is increasing every day, so to cater their needs more JavaScript developers will be needed.

JavaScript as a language is also evolving every year, and with the advent of Web3, technologies such as Artificial Intelligence, Blockchain, IoT, AR/VR are making their way on the web.

This clearly shows that JavaScript has a lot to offer the world in the future.

5 Amazing FREE JavaScript Courses

1. JavaScript Algorithms and Data Structures @ Freecodecamp

Freecodecamp is a not-for-profit company whose mission is to help people learn to code for free. Their course JavaScript Algorithms and Data Structures is one of the best courses to start learning JavaScript.

This course takes you from the absolute basics of JavaScript to modern ES6, Regular Expressions, Basic Data Structures, Functional Programming, and Object-Oriented Programming along with lots of algorithmic challenges to strengthen your problem-solving muscles.

Unfortunately, this course doesn’t teach you about Document Object Model(DOM) but still, this is one of the best courses to start JavaScript, you can cover DOM from other courses mentioned below quickly.

2. Learn JavaScript Basics @ Codedamn

Codedamn is an interactive coding platform that provides both video lectures and hands-on practice sessions with its labs feature which means you are not just passively watching videos but also implementing what you learn side-by-side.

This course takes you from the absolute basics of JavaScript(variables, data types etc.) to intermediate concepts like function and objects etc.

This course is designed to cover only basic JavaScript and for advanced concepts Codedamn has another course, you can either buy that or cover the advance part from freecodecamp’s curriculum.

One great thing here is that this course teaches you about DOM, so you can complement the course with freecodecamp.

3. MDN Web Docs

MDN Web Docs is an extensive documentation created and maintained by Mozilla. Technically it’s not a course but documentation.

It covers structured content on JavaScript from absolute basics to advance, if you can directly understand and learn the language from here, that’s amazing, or else you can use it as a reference to look up when you find any topic confusing or want to learn a specific topic.

4. Learn JavaScript for free @ Scrimba

Scrimba.com is a code learning platform whose goal is to create the best possible coding school at the lowest possible cost for students.

Scrimba created a new video format for its code screencast tutorials. All their tutorials are screencast videos and, at any point, you can pause the video and edit the code which your instructor was typing - which is a mind-blowing way to learn.

This is purely a project-based course, here you’ll create a

*Passenger Counter App
*Blackjack game
*Chrome Extension

I would recommend you to first learn the concepts from the above courses and once you have a basic understanding of JavaScript, come here to learn how to implement those concepts while building actual projects.

Building these three awesome projects will be fun and also boost your development skills.

5. JavaScript.info

Another incredible documentation website similar to MDN but only for JavaScript. This website documents JavaScript from absolute beginning to absolute advance. If your goal is to master JavaScript or reach an advanced level, I would recommend you to check out this website.

In the initial stage, don’t use this website as a roadmap for your learning, but only as a reference to understand certain topics.

Your first goal should be to get to the stage where you can build amazing projects on your own.

JavaScript.info might overwhelm and demotivate you in the early stage when you look at the depth of the JavaScript language.

Once you go beyond the basic level of JavaScript, this website is your best friend.

Ideal Roadmap to learn JavaScript

My ideal recommendation for you as a beginner would be to cover the important topics from Freecodecamp and Codedamn: try to complement the learnings of both the platforms, and don’t study the same topic from all the websites if you already get it.

Once your basics are covered, sign up for the Scrimba course to get started in project building. If you complete the course sincerely, you’ll be skilled enough to walk on your own path and start building your own projects once the course is over.

If you have any doubts or you are stuck at something, feel free to DM me on Twitter, I’ll be more than happy to help you. :-)

Also published on HackerNoon