Learning Services- Safari, O'Reilly, or Pluralsight
November 11, 2019
What’s the best option between all of the subscription e-learning services? There are a few criteria worth considering, including: the amount of content they have, the quality of content, the breadth of content, and the cost. But before you commit to any individual one, I’d suggest trying each of them out. They all have free trials and you may have to enter your credit card, just remember to cancel if you don’t intend on keeping it.
Lynda.com - This is now owned by LinkedIn, and has the most breadth of content I’ve seen. They have courses in technology, business, design, photography, music, management, and much more. If you’re retooling you skillset or have interests or hobbies that you want to learn, Lynda is a really great offering. My local library provides access to this for free so check if yours offers it as well.
Pluralsight - Pluralsight is a good option if you want access to a larger breadth of technologies. Unlike Lynda, they’re focused predominantly on the technology field. The quality of their core courses is high, but you may find a lot of poor quality courses on the website. Although my employer offers me access to their service, I choose other services first when looking to learn a new subject.
Safari Online / O’Reilly - This is the learning service run by O’Reilly publishing. You get access to all of their books, as well as a lot of textbooks from other publishers like Manning and Packt. Additionally, they have a large selection of video offerings from the authors of many of these books, as well as some offerings from udemy courses.
This is my goto service for gaining new technical skills. Despite having access to the other two services for free, I pay for this one because I enjoy it so much. Their price is pretty steep at $400 per year or $40 per month, but you can get the service included in your Association for Computing Machinery membership ($100/yr). I love this service because of its professionalism, quality of content, and breadth of content.
Note: I have not been endorsed by any of the above companies for my opinion.
Association for Computing Machinery: