Here are the thirty-five most popular free online university courses and Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) starting in October 2021, based on Class Central learners’ activity.

If these courses don’t interest you, either browse Class Central’s extensive catalog of 40,000 online courses via our subjects page, or have a look at our thematic collections:

• Massive List of Thousands of Free Certificates and Badges
• 1600+ Coursera Courses That Are Still Completely Free
• 450+ Free Ivy League Online Courses
• The Best Online Courses of All-Time
• 100 Top FREE edX Courses of All Time
• 250 Top Udemy Courses of All Time

To see all our compilations, visit Class Central’s Collections.

Most Popular Courses

Speaking and Presenting: Conversation Starters
University of Michigan via Coursera
This course will teach you how to build persuasive surprises into your presentations, the kind of surprises that will change how your audience sees a particular situation or proposal and then gets them talking—in a good way.

Learning for a Sustainable Future
British Council via FutureLearn
Join a personal and professional global learning journey towards a sustainable future. What on Earth could be more important?

Camera and Imaging
Columbia University via Coursera
This course covers the fundamentals of imaging – the creation of an image that is ready for consumption or processing by a human or a machine. Imaging has a long history, spanning several centuries.

Creating Behavioral Change
Wesleyan University via Coursera
In this course you will learn about understanding and changing mental and physical health behavior. We will examine both the historical context and the current science. Major topics will include fundamental behavioral principles and basic elements of empirically supported individual treatments (e.g., motivational interviewing, cognitive behavioral therapies).

The Digital Marketing Revolution
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign via Coursera
This course examines this issue by asking how the Digital Revolution has impacted marketing in an analog world. The learning approach will be highly interactive, meaning that you will have both the opportunity to engage in a variety of hands-on activities and to participate as a member of a rich learning community.

Business Sustainability in the Circular Economy
University of London via Coursera
By the end of the course, your understanding of sustainability and business’s relationship with society will have increased considerably. You will develop new skills in research and analysis and will have lots of new ideas to take away with you and apply in your own organisation and your own working life.

Create video, audio and infographics for online learning
Macquarie University via Coursera
Multimodal texts make learning interesting. Video, podcasts and infographics not only have the capability to excite and engage, but to reach a broader demography of learners who don’t thrive on verbal language knowledge acquisition and exchange alone. Multimodal texts provide a variety of ways in which to communicate and provide information to learners, as well as meet the needs of different learners’ preferences.

Rehabilitation after COVID-19
Saint Petersburg State University via Coursera
COVID-19 has significantly resulted in a large number of medical, social and psychological consequences. After COVID-19 disease people can experience a variety of problems with normal functioning and will require rehabilitation services to overcome these problems.

Introduction to Abnormal Psychology
Wesleyan University via Coursera
This course presents an overview of the major domains of abnormal psychology. The course is made up of 5 modules, the first of which provides an introduction to the field through discussions of the concept of psychological abnormality, assessment and classification, and the major models in use for understanding psychological abnormality.

History of Mental Illness
Wesleyan University via Coursera
Our lexicon of mental illness is immense: there currently are hundreds of classified disorders and an extensive assortment of medications and therapies. This course explores the history of this productive science its discoveries, classifications, and treatments of psychiatric distress.

Data for Better Lives: A New Social Contract
Open Learning Campus – World Bank Group via edX
With this course, explore the 2021 World Development Report (WDR) and how data can be used for advancing development outcomes. Learn about the principles of a new social contract for data and data governance needed to transform lives for the poor.

Statistical Inference and Hypothesis Testing in Data Science Applications
University of Colorado Boulder via Coursera
This course will focus on theory and implementation of hypothesis testing, especially as it relates to applications in data science. Students will learn to use hypothesis tests to make informed decisions from data. Special attention will be given to the general logic of hypothesis testing, error and error rates, power, simulation, and the correct computation and interpretation of p-values.

Exploring Teaching and Assessments for Higher Education
Coventry University via FutureLearn
Discover new approaches to teaching and assessing students and understand how to effectively support their learning.

Online teaching: Using Zoom to connect with learners
Macquarie University via Coursera
Using cloud-based video conferencing platforms such as Zoom has become, for many people, a part of everyday life. This is particularly true for learners of all ages who are now spending more time online connecting with their peers or studying remotely. To ensure a successful learning experience for our online learners, educators and teachers need to feel confident designing and delivering a live Zoom class.

Visual Perception
Columbia University via Coursera
The ultimate goal of a computer vision system is to generate a detailed symbolic description of each image shown. This course focuses on the all-important problem of perception.

Teaching and Assessing Core Skills
British Council via FutureLearn
Develop your ability to teach core skills and learn how to measure your students’ core skills development.

Let’s talk about it: A Health and Immigration Teach Out
Johns Hopkins University via Coursera
As the United States grapples with both the short-term and long-term impacts and considers how different groups and individuals are affected, it can easily become overwhelming to keep up with conversations about health and immigration. Most people can generally agree that health and immigration policy affect ALL communities, families, and individuals in one way or another.

Europe and the World, ca. 1500 to 1914
Higher School of Economics via Coursera
The course aims to introduce the audience to global history from the European discovery of the Americas to the coming of the First World War. These transformative four centuries of the human experience traditionally called Modern history saw the growing economic, military, and political ascendancy of the European states.

Human Factors in AI
Duke University via Coursera
This third and final course of the AI Product Management Specialization by Duke University’s Pratt School of Engineering focuses on the critical human factors in developing AI-based products.

Online education: The foundations of online teaching
Macquarie University via Coursera
In a world that’s quickly becoming dominated by mobile technology, flexible working opportunities and a post-pandemic economy, online learning is here to stay. This course introduces you to the basics of reimagining, redesigning and optimising face-to-face offerings for the online environment so that learners feel connected, engaged and motivated to learn.

Political Geography and the Modern World
Higher School of Economics via Coursera
The course intends to provide an insight into the origin and history of political geography, while also engage with the modern-day developments and issues that directly pertain to the domain of political geographic thought.

Contemporary Biology
University of North Texas via Coursera
This course is an introduction to biology as it applies to our everyday life. Learners will explore the interplay between science and self through a personalized case study of themselves and their environment.

Why Scale a Startup?
IE Business School via Coursera
This course will guide you through all the key questions you need to ask yourself to prepare to scale up a startup, provide you with the necessary frameworks to begin the scaleup process, and offer insights from real, successful companies who have been in your shoes before and have made the transition

3D Reconstruction – Multiple Viewpoints
Columbia University via Coursera
This course focuses on the recovery of the 3D structure of a scene from images taken from different viewpoints.

Practical Python for AI Coding
Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology via Coursera
This course is for a complete novice of Python coding, so no prior knowledge or experience in software coding is required. This course selects, introduces and explains Python syntaxes, functions and libraries that were frequently used in AI coding.

Russian Language for Beginners
Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology via Coursera
We want to show you that Russian is not difficult at all if you study it systematically, as it is presented in this course. This express course has a clear structure of presentation of the material, following which you will master the basic grammar and vocabulary step by step to start speaking Russian.

Algorithms with Numbers
Saint Petersburg State University via Coursera
This course represents an introduction to algorithms with numbers, including linear algebra problems and arbitrary precision arithmetic, that appear virtually everywhere, from cryptography to audio processing.

Bridging Differences
University of California, Berkeley via edX
Learn research-based strategies for better relationships, dialogue, and understanding across divides. Relevant to anyone navigating conflicts and differences, especially geared toward college campuses.

Building Culture in a Scale Up
IE Business School via Coursera
Company culture changes in the shift from startup to scaleup – and as the company moves and incorporates different people profiles and roles, culture becomes increasingly vital in ensuring that everyone understand the company´s mission, values, strategy, and objectives.

Machine Learning Foundations for Product Managers
Duke University via Coursera
In this first course of the AI Product Management Specialization offered by Duke University’s Pratt School of Engineering, you will build a foundational understanding of what machine learning is, how it works and when and why it is applied.

Critical Raw Materials: Managing Resources for a Sustainable Future
Delft University of Technology via edX
Gain a systemic understanding of critical raw materials and learn about strategies and solutions to manage them in a sustainable way.

Global Systemic Risk
Princeton University via Coursera
What is globalization and how does it work? How can we understand the process as a whole? How are the parts of the world linked? What are the risks of living in a world where “no one is in charge”? This course introduces students to systems thinking, network theory, and risk analysis and uses these tools to better understand the process of globalization.

Cell Biology: Cell-Cell Interactions
Massachusetts Institute of Technology via edX
How do we know what we know about cells? Enhance your scientific thinking and data analysis skills with this in-depth adventure through cell biology.

Climate change and Indigenous People and local communities
Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (Autonomous University of Barcelona) via Coursera
Climate change is a global phenomenon, but its impacts vary among different social groups, who perceive and adapt to climate change impacts in different ways.

Understanding Modern Physics I: Relativity and Cosmology
The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology via Coursera
The 20th century was known as the century of physics. In the past 120 years, concepts such as space, time, energy, entropy and particles were understood to much deeper levels. New paradigms of thinking such as relativity and quantum mechanics emerged.