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Best Courses Guides

6 Best Zoology Courses for 2024

Are you interested in becoming a biologist, naturalist, or life scientist? These zoology courses will give you a thorough grounding.

Who loves animals? Most of us have an affection for cats, dogs, otters, horses, deer, elephants, owls, and many others. Now, you can study animals with these Zoology courses. Not just cute furry ones, but also insects, worms, sea sponges, and spiders. Learn how they live, grow, and reproduce.

In this Best Courses Guide (BCG), we’ve selected the best zoology courses for you from our catalog. We’ve collated ratings and reviews from Class Central and course providers to narrow down the best choices.

Photos by Pat

Click on the shortcuts for more details:

Here are our top picks

Course Highlight Workload
Best General Zoology Course (University of Naples Federico II) 20-30 hours
Best Short Zoology Course (CrashCourse) 3-4 hours
Also Great Zoology Course (Professor Dave Explains) 6 hours
Best Entomology Course (University of Alberta) 49 hours
Best Animals Flashcards Course (Study.com) 4-5 hours
Best NEET Prep Course in Hindi (Unacademy NEET) 69 hours
Also Great NEET Prep Course (Competition Wallah) 103 hours

BCG Stats

  • 5 courses are free or free-to-audit and 1 is paid
  • 1 course offers a certificate of completion
  • The most featured provider is YouTube with 4 courses
  • 2.3K learners are following the zoology subject on Class Central.

Best General Zoology Course (University of Naples Federico II)

The highest-rated zoology course is Zoologia by the University of Naples Federico II, in Italian. Are you interested in becoming a biologist, naturalist, or life scientist? Learn about:

  • Interactions between hundreds of animal species in various communities and ecosystems
  • Animal knowledge, evolution, behavior, reproductive systems, and ecological roles
  • Concrete examples to evoke emotional and scientific understanding of nature

“This is possibly one of the best university level course[s] I have ever taken, both in person and online…” – Maria B.

Provider edX
University University of Naples Federico II
Instructor Domenico Fulgione and Valeria Maselli
Language Italian
Time Commitment 20-30 hours
Rating 5.0 (18)
Cost Free audit
Certificate Paid

Best Short Zoology Course (CrashCourse)

In Zoology, with CrashCourse’s signature fast-paced style including plenty of video clips and animations, Dr. Rae Wynn-Grant will teach you about:

  • What animals are and how they eat
  • Diversity of shapes and sizes, parasites, animal brains
  • The senses: sight, hearing, and others
  • Reproduction, animals working together, phylogenetics, what makes a species
  • Frontiers in Zoology

“Amazing! Couldn’t wish for a more enthusiastic lecturer. I learned so much. Dr. Rae Wynn-Grant is unbelievably great. Thanks for this course!” –  Kit Zonk.

Provider YouTube
Institution CrashCourse
Instructor Dr. Rae Wynn-Grant
Language English
Time Commitment 3-4 hours
Views 458K
Rating 5.0 (5)
Cost Free
Certificate No

Also Great Zoology Course (Professor Dave Explains)

Dave Farina (Professor Dave Explains) has released a series of free playlists about the sciences, featuring a wealth of images, definitions, and charts. More videos about Zoology are being uploaded regularly. You will learn:

  • What animals are
  • Constructing cladograms, major divisions of Kingdom Animalia, and the origin of animal life
  • Stages of animal development
  • Animal phyla: Porifera, Cnidaria, Placozoa, Ctenophora, Xenacoelomorpha, Nephrozoa, Spiralia, and Lophotrochozoa
  • More phyla: Platyhelminthes, Gastrotricha, Cycliophora, Orthonectida, Dicyemida, Chaetognatha, Gnathostomulida, Micrognathozoa, Rotifera, Mollusca and Annelida

“Great content to understand the material, however there should be more than 12 modules…” – Eric Peck.

Since this review was written, many more videos have been added to the playlist. After watching all the current videos, head across to Dave’s YouTube playlist for the latest uploads.

Provider YouTube
Institution Professor Dave Explains
Instructor Dave Farina
Language English
Time Commitment 6 hours
Views 203K
Rating 5.0 (3)
Cost Free
Certificate No

Best Entomology Course (University of Alberta)

I’ve always been fascinated by insects, and was delighted to see Bugs 101: Insect-Human Interactions has joined the wonderful selection of natural history courses created by the University of Alberta and covers a wide range of insect-related material. Learn about:

  • What is an insect? Insect traits, growth, and major physiological systems
  • Locomotion and strength: running, swimming, and flying
  • Insect decomposers and vegetarians, pollination, beekeeping, insects and disease
  • Sustainable human-insect interactions, conservation, and insects in human culture

Other popular University of Alberta courses include Mountains 101 (featured in our Geology BCG), Dino 101: Dinosaur Paleobiology (in our Paleontology BCG), and Astro 101: Black Holes (in our Astronomy BCG).

“In three words: take this course. A lot of thought clearly went into it. …” – Michelle V.

Provider Coursera
University University of Alberta
Instructor Dr. Maya Evenden
Language English
Enrollments 47.9K
Time Commitment 49 hours
Rating 4.9 (1.4K)
Cost Free audit
Certificate Paid

Best Animals Flashcards Course (Study.com)

If you need some help to memorize all kinds of zoology facts, Studying Animals Flashcards may be useful. As well as the flashcards themselves, learn how to use them for effective memorization. Flashcard sets include:

  • Animals from many biomes including arctic, desert, various forests, grasslands, oceans, freshwater, etc
  • Animal phyla, invertebrates, herbivores, carnivores, omnivores, scavengers, invasive animals, warm-blooded and cold-blooded animals
  • Aquatic animals anatomy, fishing techniques, bony fish and sea animals
  • Asexual reproduction, endangered and extinct species, farm and zoo animals, apes and birds
  • Collective nouns for animals and zoology terms
Provider Study.com
Language English
Time Commitment 4-5 hours
Views 48K
Cost Paid
Certificate No

Best NEET Prep Course in Hindi (Unacademy NEET)

If you want to apply for medical studies in India, you may need to pass the NEET exam. Medhavi NEET 2022/23: Zoology by Seep Pahuja goes deep into zoology issues, targeted at students who plan to take the NEET exam. You will learn about:

  • Animal tissues
  • Biomolecules, chemical coordination and integration
  • Digestion and absorption, breathing and exchange of gases
  • Body fluids, circulation, excretion
  • Neural control and coordination, locomotion and movement

“Scoring maximum number in zoology because of you mam thank you so much” – swatijha3118, YouTube learner.

Seep Pahuja also has two other zoology playlists on the Unacademy NEET channel as well as her own channel:

Provider YouTube
Institution Unacademy NEET
Instructor Seep Pahuja
Language Hindi
Time Commitment 69 hours
Views 781K
Cost Free
Certificate No

Also Great NEET Prep Course in Hindi (Competition Wallah)

Zoology : UMEED 2.0 | NEET 2022 covers all the chapters of zoology including previous year questions. You will learn about:

  • Cockroaches
  • Animal tissues, digestion, absorption, excretory products, breathing, gas exchange, and circulation
  • Biomolecules, chemical coordination, and biotechnology
  • Locomotion, neural control, reproduction, and evolution
  • Human health and disease
  • Animal kingdom and animal husbandry

“He is such a nice and patient teacher!!!!” – sanskritisharma4134, YouTube learner.

Provider YouTube
Institution Competition Wallah
Instructor Alakh Pandey
Language Hindi
Time Commitment 103 hours
Views 1M
Cost Free
Certificate No

Why You Should Trust Us

Class Central, a Tripadvisor for online education, has helped 80 million learners find their next course. We’ve been combing through online education for more than a decade to aggregate a catalog of 250,000 online courses and 250,000 reviews written by our users. And we’re online learners ourselves: combined, the Class Central team has completed over 400 online courses, including online degrees.

I’ve personally completed over 200 online courses in a variety of subjects.

How We Made Our Picks and Tested Them

Trying to find “the best” can be daunting, even for those of us who live and breathe online courses. Here’s how I approached this task.

First, I combed through Class Central’s Catalog and other sites to find a variety of free and paid open courses, with and without certificates. You don’t need to enroll in a university to learn about zoology.

I looked for recognized institutions and experienced instructors, and examined courses that covered a range of topics. I extracted information from course syllabi and reviews, and compiled their ratings, using the Class Central database as well as available course provider ratings. I watched some course videos to sample courses I hadn’t already taken.

I defined the scope for these recommendations and chose a range of top courses.

Ultimately, I used a combination of data and my own judgment to make these picks. I’m confident these recommendations will be a reliable way to learn about zoology.

Best Courses Guides. Start Learning, Stop Procrastinating.

Pat Bowden Profile Image

Pat Bowden

Online learning specialist, still learning after 200+ online courses completed since 2012. Class Central customer support and help since 2018. I am keen to help others make the most of online learning, so I set up a website:  www.onlinelearningsuccess.org

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