I am a paid member of the Zero to Mastery Academy by Andrei Neagoie, a platform that offers various programming courses to help you get into the tech industry.
From experience, I find the ZTM platform helpful. Compared to other alternatives, it has a better user experience and is affordable.
It is a relatively new platform and they are consistently adding new courses to the platform. When I joined, they had about 45 courses, now they have about 54 courses on the platforms.
Some of the popular courses which I recommend taking are:
✅ Complete Web Developer – Zero to Mastery
✅ Complete Python Developer – Zero to Mastery
✅ The Complete Junior to Senior Web Developer Roadmap
Finally, purchasing the monthly or annual subscription gives you access to all the courses and you can watch them at your own pace.
You can get a 10% discount by clicking this link and entering the code “FRIENDS10”.
Zero to Mastery Academy, or ZTM for short, aims to make even absolute newbies in software development become advanced developers.
At least the naming suggests that.
As you well know, software development or coding, in general, is no child’s play. It is something universities, colleges, and boot camps charge thousands of dollars for, and you might not even get all the attention and assistance you need.
Then there’s the need to learn not just coding skills but also how to answer interview questions in a way that clearly communicates your competence.
We’ll find out in this review. I have dug out the pros and cons of the course, its audience, and a lot more information about the platform to help you make the right decision.
Ready? Alright, let’s get into it.
Overview of Zero to Mastery Academy
Zero to Mastery Academy is a compilation of several courses for developers. (any kind of developer).
The Academy’s team lead is Andrei Neagoie. He doesn’t do all the teaching and organizing alone, though, as he is assisted by other instructors like Yihua Zhang, Daniel Schifano, and Daniel Bourke.
The platform is meant to cater to the needs of software developers at all levels of experience. So beginners and experts alike are free to join.
You can even use the training you receive from ZTM to make up for the absence of a formal degree in Computer Science.
Moreover, you can enroll in the platform if you intend to learn coding and developer skills, participate in projects, and build your portfolio as a freelancer.
If you are the type of person who often takes online courses, then you already have an idea of what the platform offers.
There are many courses, workshops, and a community for interacting with other learners.
Speaking of courses, there are over 48 of them spanning more than 960 hours with over 9400 lessons.
Now that’s a whole lot.
But you don’t have to start scrolling endlessly to find a course that suits you. All the classes have been grouped into categories and levels of difficulty.
The goal of the course is not to present you with every problem you’ll encounter as a developer, along with their solutions. Instead, it teaches you how to find and solve problems.
Having gotten a good overview of ZTM and how it works, it’s time to learn more about its creator Andre Neagoie.
Course Instructors – Who is Andrei Neagoie?
Andrei Neagoie was an educational psychologist before he picked an interest in coding and created ZTM Academy.
He is also a course instructor on Udemy and has taught over 900,000 people software development skills.
Andrei’s teaching skills have received a lot of praise. On Udemy, he has a 4.7/5 star rating from over a hundred thousand reviews.
Andrei didn’t attend formal coding classes or boot camps but developed his coding skills from scratch by taking advantage of every free resource he could get.
With the knowledge Andrei gathered, he was able to work his way into several Fortune 500 companies and tech startups. Eventually, he became a senior software developer in Silicon Valley and Toronto.
Andrei teaches clearly and straightforwardly. One of the things I like about his lectures is how he breaks down complex concepts into simple, understandable bits.
When you listen to one of Andrei’s courses, you will notice that all those years he spent teaching himself—and his background in educational psychology—have helped him to understand how to make things simple for even stark beginners.
How does Zero to Mastery Academy Help You?
Good question. After all, that’s why we are talking about the platform in the first place.
The tech world has so many paths to choose from that it can leave even someone like Sheldon with a confused look.
Zero to Mastery provides you with dozens of courses in coding and software development, and with the help of their career paths, you can start learning with a clear focus in mind.
All you have to do is take their tech career path quiz, answer the questions, and get a personalized road map of courses, workshops, and other resources to guide you toward your tech career.
But the benefits don’t end there.
ZTM Academy was launched in 2018. The very first course to be released was the Complete Web Developer. That course has seen its yearly upgrades from 2018 to 2023. The same goes for the other courses on the platform.
That means all the courses are updated yearly, and it’s a good thing because no matter how rich a course is at the moment, it won’t stay current forever.
Who Is It For?
ZTM is basically for anyone who is into tech or is planning to venture into it. Let’s dive into the categories of people who can call ZTM home.
Technical Interview Candidates
Technical interview candidates can use ZTM as one of their primary resources.
The platform is full of courses and lessons in almost every tech niche. As a technical interview candidate, it’s practically guaranteed that your tech skill is on the platform.
Beyond that, there are courses dedicated to passing the coding interviews at FAANG companies. That means you can brush up on your tech niche and also learn how to meet (and even beat) recruiters’ expectations.
Freelancers
Freelancers don’t usually have to bother to meet up with the stringent requirements of big tech companies.
But they must be very good at what they do if they want to keep a solid track record of client satisfaction and get recommendations.
So they must keep improving their skills by taking courses like those on ZTM. Freelancers should also have a portfolio of completed projects to convince potential clients of their expertise. ZTM will help with that as well.
You Want to Switch Careers
Adding value to yourself can sometimes mean learning something outside of your domain.
Company changes might mean you now have to handle multiple domains in tech. You might have no choice but to upskill if you want to hold on to your job.
Or you might decide it’s time to bid farewell to your current job and venture into tech or switch between tech skills.
In any event, you want to make sure you always stay relevant in the ever-changing job market.
With the surplus courses on ZTM, doing all of the above shouldn’t be a problem. But ZTM goes beyond just pumping technical skills into your head.
It also features workshop courses designed to help you learn about future-proofing and succeeding in any career you find yourself in.
Pros of Zero to Mastery Academy
In this section, I will go over some of the best things about Zero to Mastery Academy. Do they justify giving ZTM a trial? We’ll see.
1. Ample Courses and Lessons
There is no shortage of courses on ZTM. I guess it’s safe to say that you’ll be hard-pressed to find a tech skill missing from the catalog.
Coding? Blockchain? Programming? Those niches and more are all in the academy. There are even a few courses on life skills. My favorite among them is the one on learning. That’s right; there is a course that teaches you how to learn.
2. Personalized Career Paths
When you are thrown into foreign territory, there isn’t much that you can do other than stare at everyone and everything around you.
It doesn’t have to be that way with venturing into the tech space. With the career paths ZTM provides, you can find your interest and build on it. You can even get a customized career path with ZTM’s tech career path quiz.
3. Community Feature
Access to a virtual community comes with your ZTM paid subscription. It is essentially a vast network of learners that you can interact with whether you need some more explanation of a concept or you just want to make friends with similar interests as you.
4. Way Cheaper Than College and Online Courses
ZTM’s most expensive subscription plan costs less than a thousand bucks. By comparison, getting a college or university degree in tech skills will set you back by tens of thousands of dollars.
5. Access To Every Course
Career paths tell you what courses to study for a particular outcome, and they are arguably ZTM’s best feature. But that doesn’t mean that when you choose one specific lineup of courses, the rest courses on the platform are grayed out for you.
You will still be able to access any other course as much as you want to.
Top courses on Zero to Mastery Academy
Without further ado, let’s now isolate the top courses on ZTM academy. There are over 48 courses on the platform but the ones I will mention below stand out.
The Complete Web Developer in 2023: Zero to Mastery
This is the very first course on the platform, and as expected, it is a beginner course.
The course picks up on the fundamentals of web development, such as what it is and how it works.
From there, you will learn HTML, CSS, React, node js, machine learning, and more. There are up to 40 hours of videos, 200 bonus resources, and ten projects that will help you learn how to code from scratch and take off from there
Complete React Developer in 2023 (w/ Redux, Hooks, GraphQL)
This course promises to help you learn how to build large-scale projects like a real React developer.
Andrei teaches the course, and Yihua Shang contains 42.5 hours of video, has more than 140 bonus resources, and features two projects.
One of the projects includes building a large e-commerce app using Redux, Hooks, GraphQL, ContextAPI, Stripe, and Firebase.
Complete Python Developer in 2023: Zero To Mastery
The complete python developer helps you become proficient in python.
Python is the most commonly used programming language. That’s because it’s relatively easy to understand than other programming languages.
Machine learning is one of the topics you will treat in this course, but it’s rather basic. Machine learning is quite complex, and you’ll be better off learning it on a platform like Coursera.
JavaScript: 20 Web Projects To Build Your Portfolio
Here you will dive deep into JavaScript and how to use it to build web applications. Jacinto Wong of the Canadian broadcasting corporation hosts the program.
You will be building apps for a variety of purposes. The list includes but is not limited to music player app, video player app, developer setup app, joke app, and much more.
As you engage in those projects, you will become more familiar with UI/UX practices, asynchronous programming, web APIs, DOM, and more.
Master the Coding Interview: Data Structures + Algorithms
This is one of my favorite courses at ZTM Academy. It teaches you not just the technical skills but also the tactics to use to impress a potential employer.
In a coding interview, you need to stand out from the rest of the candidates, and knowledge of technical skills alone wouldn’t do that for you.
The course is taught by Andrei and acquaints you with different data structures and algorithms so you can tackle any challenge the interviewer throws, whether on a whiteboard or an interactive code environment.
Are Students Getting Results?
Sure. But I’ll leave that gist to the screenshots below.
How much does Zero to Mastery Academy cost?
Zero to Mastery Academy has three subscription levels, and they are all cheaper than what physical boot camps charge.
Depending on your budget, you can opt for a monthly, annual, or lifetime subscription.
The monthly plan costs $39, while the annual plan is billed at $279 yearly. For lifetime access, you only need to pay $999 once and never again.
Any Available Discount?
For now, there are no available discounts for any billing plans, but if you choose the annual plan, you will pay only $23 monthly instead of $39 when you pick the monthly plan.
Refund Policy
ZTM’s policy is pretty simple and is what we are used to. If unsatisfied with the package, you have 30 days from your payment date to request a full refund.
But wait, does everything I’ve just said about ZTM Academy mean it’s perfect?
No, of course. There is a lot to like about the platform, but it has its flaws which I will get to in a minute.
Cons of Zero to Mastery Academy
Okay, here we are. The major flaw in the courses (more subjective than objective, though) is that they can be overwhelming and underwhelming simultaneously.
Andrei tries to teach everything you need to know about a domain in tech. In doing so, he has to cover almost all the topics in that subject and not in a standalone manner. That’s the overwhelming part.
Hence you might end up being good in the overall domain but lacking in specific aspects.
Let’s use the Complete Web Development Course as an example. In this course, you will treat myriads of topics like HTML, CSS, JavaScript, Node.js, React, MongoDB, and so on.
When you treat everything at once like that, you won’t give them equal coverage. You might elaborate on some and skimp on others to avoid information overload.
Fine, you might become a good web developer, but you might need to treat a topic like, say, React on its own to be good at it.
But so far, that’s the only downside to the platform that I’ve noticed so far.
Wrapping up
We are now at the end of this review of Zero to Mastery Academy by Andrei Neagoie, and it’s been great having you around.
Hopefully, your curiosity has been satisfied, and maybe now, you see yourself buying the course; maybe not, or you are like … let me think about it.
Before I summon the final dot, let me quickly do a rewind of the most important points in this review.
Andrei, the creator of Zero to Mastery Academy, is a software engineer with an authoritative online presence going by the thousands of positive reviews of his courses.
Zero to Mastery Academy provides you with a path to follow to a suitable career in tech. The courses are also updated yearly, and you can have lifetime access to the platform for a fee cheaper than most physical coding or tech boot camps.
No doubt, Zero to Mastery Academy is a legit online coding boot camp that I highly recommend for a trial or two.
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