Last Updated on October, 2024
Are you planning to buy a course on edX?
Then, I recommend you read this review before buying.
These few minutes of reading will ensure your money’s value is secured with this learning platform.
In this review, not only do I cover everything you need to know before investing in edX, but I’ll also educate you on how to find the best courses and much more.
But, why trust me?
Features
Effectiveness
Price
Contents
- Why Trust Me?
- About edX
- edX Online Course Library, Course Structure, and Course Content
- Who are edX Courses for?
- Who are edX Instructors?
- Most Popular edX Courses
- Top 5 Tips to Find the Best edX Online Courses
- edX Certificates: How Recognized are They?
- How to Open an edX Account?
- edX App
- Customer Reviews on edX
- My Experience With edX: How Does edX Work?
- How Much is edX?
- The Refund Policy of edX
- edX Vs. Competing Platforms
- Pros and Cons of edX
- In Conclusion: edX Review
- FAQs
Why Trust Me?
I have been using edX since 2018 to follow professional education courses. So, it’s safe to say that I have thorough prior knowledge that someone should have to give recommendations.
Not only that, I browsed hundreds of Reddit, TrustPilot, and even Quora threads to understand all angles of people with prior experience. Unlike in most edX reviews, I created an edX account JUST for this review.
So, without further ado, let’s start.
About edX
edX starting roots are powerful as two Harvard and MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology) professors founded it. The online education platform has been able to get over 44 million learners since its inception in 2012.
Although edX’s tagline is “Empowering individuals worldwide through education,” their website directly communicates what they do best: build new skills. Advance your career.
They also provide valuable personalized certificates offered by leading universities and organizations worldwide. Sometimes, it doesn’t even matter whether you have prior knowledge or not.
With a comprehensive library with 4000+ courses, edX is resourceful enough to provide learners with qualifications from certificate to master’s level.
Let’s move to the next section.
edX Online Course Library, Course Structure, and Course Content
In this section, let’s look at edX’s elite course library, how their courses are typically structured, and the overall quality and nature of the content.
edX Course Library
edX features one of the biggest course libraries, which consists of 4000+ courses. The best thing is that many edx courses are not just certificate courses like Udemy offers.
edX offers you:
The recognition value of these programs is higher as edX offers them via reputed organizations and prestigious universities.
This article will not be enough to cover all subtopics that edX covers. Instead, let’s look at the main topics, which include:
Remember that these are merely the main topics, where there are hundreds of massive open online courses offered by prestigious universities. Yes, you read it right.
On computer programming alone, there are 100+ subtopics, and within them are multiple courses. After computer programming, topics such as Data analysis, Business administration, and Business Communications have the largest course base.
Just to give a glimpse, see the list below.
I’m sure this draws a clearer picture. Let’s choose the Strategy subtopic and go inside a subtopic.
edX Course Subtopics
edX provides an About section at the top for each subtopic, ensuring you’re where you want to be. You also can quickly access these from the search bar. Make a random entry, and you’ll land on the search results page, where you can filter more.
To show you an example, I searched Business Management, and this is what shows up.
Underneath Executive Education Courses are the Programs, and these are professional certificates. There are free courses, and the optional upgrade is available too, which is typically for the personalized.
However, I suggest you explore courses based on the subtopic. For instance, Strategy in Business is basically a comprehensive plan that shows how to achieve objectives. This is how edX’s strategy subtopic starts.
Below are the featured online courses relevant to the subtopic. Underneath the course title, you can clearly see the organization or the university that offers the said qualification.
If it’s a professional certificate, it will be clearly mentioned. Regardless, you can only get a shareable certificate for paid courses. I’ll cover edX pricing in a later section.
Here’s a glimpse of how each subtopic will list the courses down.
If you scroll down further, you will find the course curriculum that outlines course content generally.
Considering the Strategy subtopic, these areas are:
Moving further down, edX also educates you about possible jobs that you can land following the successful completion of these courses.
With Strategy courses, you can take on roles such as:
With all of these covered, let’s move inside a typical edX course and see the structure.
edX Course Structure
For example, let’s consider the Professional Certificate in Strategic Management. The typical course landing page.
At the top left, you can see the qualification pathway, which has general and professional certificates.
Every course will show you where it is offered. In this case, it’s The Wharton School of Business connected to the University of Pennsylvania.
As the learning outcomes are clearly mentioned, it’s easier for anyone to really know whether the course will do what they expect.
There are 4 key details on the right:
If you scroll down a little bit, you’ll find the program overview. Below that is the course breakdown. For professional certificates, there will be separate courses you need to finish to get your certificate.
In this case, the certificate features 3 courses, and below that is the job outlook.
Scroll a little bit down and you’ll find the instructors and their credentials.
edX is established enough to offer bachelor’s and graduate degrees online. Let’s explore the degree level next.
edX Degree Level
As I said, edX offers degrees at the bachelor’s and master’s levels. The red flag with all online degrees is accreditation.
You don’t have to worry about that with edX; unless stated otherwise, all degrees are offered by leading universities. Although not as diverse as certificate programs, bachelor’s degrees are offered in multiple areas.
These include accounting, business, computer and data science, finance, cybersecurity, psychology, health and social science, and much more, which you can see on the landing page.
However, to maintain the accreditation levels, degree programs may have several entry requirements on par with standard degree programs. Let’s dive into the one-degree program to see how it works.
Bachelor’s in psychology programs (link) are a good example of this. You can see how edX boasts its accredited BA in psychology programs at the top.
You can also choose degree programs based on the university. For example, let’s assume you prefer doing an online degree at the University of London — you can check them out here.
The University of London offers nine degrees. BSc Data Science and Business Analytics, BSc Business and Management, and BSc International Relations are only some.
On the edX’s University of London landing page, you should answer their questions across 4 steps:
After that, you will be directed to this page where you can start your application. It will take a few hours to receive the information.
That’s about the bachelor’s degrees. Next, let’s talk about master’s degrees.
edX seems to increase their master’s degrees exponentially. These are also offered by reputed and accredited universities similar to edX bachelor’s degrees.
The biggest difference between edX bachelor’s and master’s degrees is that you don’t have to request details; they’re already there.
Below is the master’s degree landing page that gives a glimpse of the universities.
The most important value addition edX master’s degrees offer is that these are equivalent to on-campus master’s degrees.
In what areas are edX master’s courses available? Below is the list.
What does the master’s degree edX offer?
For instance, let’s take one of the high-demand master’s degrees: the Master’s in Artificial Intelligence (MSAI).
Below is its landing page.
If you scroll down a little, you can see that four tabs are fundamental for any edX master’s degree:
Let’s glance at what each of these covers.
The Degree overview section of any program gives you a clear idea about both the program and the awarding body. For this instance, Founded in 1883, The University of Texas at Austin ranks among the 10 best public universities in the U.S.
The curriculum section aims to give you a clear idea about the credits, mandatory and elective modules, and the exact college credit hours. Since edX clearly mentions who the degree is for, selecting master’s degrees is even easier.
You will also see that there are mandatory modules just as much as the electives.
For this example, the elective modules are:
This transparency ensures that future students know what they sign up for. The tuition and financial tab gives you the exact answers and directions to what most students ask.
You will see all the application deadlines and requirements when you finally come to the admissions section. Below that is the Apply Now button. It’s as simple as that.
With that covered, let’s discuss edX for business.
edX for Business
Similar to other leading online learning competitors, edX has a separate option for businesses. edX For Business is ideal if you represent a company or organization whose employees require upskilling.
edX for business is categorized into four areas such as:
Let’s understand what each of these is about.
edX For Business is a certificate program from leading industry experts from top universities such as Harvard, Stanford, and MIT, and well-reputed organizations including Meta, Google, and even Amazon.
edx boasts how they are trusted by close to 1,000 top businesses in the world for educating their employees. Some of these companies include Dell, Netflix, P&G, Sony, KPMG, and even Unilever.
What are the areas that your employees can learn? These include:
edX For Government is for you if you represent a government agency. These courses are designed to increase the competency levels of public service professionals and empower citizens.
edX For Campus covers edX’s organizational category for your university students. University students can follow several accredited certificate courses across the same list of areas for edX for Business.
Remember, that all these qualifications and education are offered by leading universities. edX is merely the bridge connecting the two parties. This ensures the recognition of qualifications and the quality of education.
edX For Impact partners with organizations through a collective impact model to power an equitable and inclusive learning environment, increasing access and opportunity for underserved populations. These are the areas edX covers at the organizational level.
How to get access to these plans? Typically, through a demo. You can click the Book a Demo button on the top right, and you will be directed to this page.
Here, you should provide the info across three steps, with the first step being to select the number of learners. It can go as high as over 5,000 learners.
Once you provide your office email and contact number, they will get back to you to schedule the demo.
With that covered, let’s analyze the learning content of the typical edX course.
edX Course Overall Content Quality
The average edX learner starts with courses. You don’t have to worry about degree programs as their curricula are decided by the awarding bodies.
There are two types of typical edX courses for singular learners: free courses and professional certificates.
HarvardX: CS50’s Introduction to Cybersecurity is a great example of a quality benchmark for edX free courses. Below is its landing page, which is common for any other similar course.
Everything you need to know about the course is above-fold, and that’s another piece of evidence of how edX optimizes user experience.
The course title is at the top with a one-liner course description. The grey strip below shows the average pace, although it’s self-paced and it is free.
As I mentioned earlier, the optional upgrades come for the personalized and verified certificate. I’ll talk about it and other pricing in a later section — keep reading.
Below, you can see the starting and ending dates of the course. After this end date, all course materials will be inaccessible. The learning content quality starts after you scroll down a little.
There, you will see a one to two-paragraph explanation of the course. For this course, edX outlines it as:
“This is CS50’s introduction to cybersecurity for technical and non-technical audiences alike. Learn how to protect your own data, devices, and systems from today’s threats and how to recognize and evaluate tomorrow’s as well, both at home and at work.”
Below that is the section dedicated to what you’ll learn.
In this course, you will learn:
edX will feature the course instructor underneath that, which immediately establishes the quality of the learning source. Once you go inside the course and hit Start Course, the magic happens.
Even in this course, edX has managed to elevate the overall quality not only in terms of the subject materials but also in terms of the learning convenience.
Below is a screen capture of how the typical edX free course will go.
There are subtitles in multiple languages, and you can download the transcript while reading it in real time at the lecturer’s pace.
As you proceed, another tab will appear on the left of the video tab.
This is where you can access:
There also will be assignments as you proceed, further elevating course quality. The below lecture is a great example of that.
Lecturers ensure that you meet their timelines regardless of your pace. Meaning: that once you watch the lecture, you have to submit the assignment on time. Measures like these increase the standard of edX education.
See the image below for an example.
That’s all about the typical free edX course.
Next, let’s look at (paid) professional certificate courses. One of the biggest differences between typical certificate courses and professional certificates is accessibility. You can take the course in either verified or free audit track.
In the verified track, you get unlimited access to the course materials, with graded assignments and exams.
An edX professional certificate is always a program consisting of multiple courses, and this Professional Certificate in Corporate Finance is a great example of that. You can follow this course on the verified or audit track similar to the typical edX course.
However, you’ll notice that the full course’s detailing is higher compared to individual courses. When you scroll down a little, you can see the courses inside this certificate course underneath the Courses In This Program.
For this one, this is how it looks.
The quality of the learning materials doesn’t drop even if you take this course for free. The only problem is that the access time will be limited.
The lecturing style is a bit similar to the completely free courses, although there will be more assignments and practical examples. The instructors ensure that no knowledge-stone is left unturned and it helps you get a deeper understanding.
The below screen capture is from a certificate course.
Overall, all edX courses deliver the highest content quality whether you pay or not, which boosts the platform’s value. Finishing this major section, let’s answer an important question next: who are edX courses for?
Who are edX Courses for?
edX prides itself on being an online learning platform accessible to anyone in the world. But, who can benefit the most from edX?
edX is ideal for anyone who’s looking to start a career without spending on education, which can cost you a little fortune in the traditional setting. You can learn so much for 0$.
edX is also recommendable for anyone who wants a career switch but doesn’t have enough funds to take on high-end courses.
Personalized and verified certificates offered by edX are shareable on your LinkedIn. Loading your qualifications with accredited degrees will skyrocket your chances of being noticed by headhunters.
edX is one of the high-ROI educational institutions for career growth. That’s simply because you won’t be spending much on traditional degree programs; you just have to pay for the course.
edX can be quite beneficial for middle managers who want to climb up the corporate ladder with extra qualifications. After all, edX offers master’s degrees that include MBAs too. Does the list stop there? No!
I would also recommend edX for any professional who wants to get to the consultant level. If you’re a person (of any caliber) who has the least time for learning, edX online courses would greatly help.
The last type I want to pinpoint is anyone who doesn’t have access to American or British education. If you get one of these qualifications, you’re surpassing your local competition much faster.
With that covered, let’s look at edX instructors.
Who are edX Instructors?
As I have mentioned, almost all courses on edX are affiliated (and offered) by leading universities and organizations in the world. These high-end organizations do not want to tarnish their superior brand reputation.
That’s why they only feature experts not only in the field but also from their respective organizations. That’s why edX learners are getting the best. In fact, that’s another reason why edX is similar to Coursera and better than Udemy.
To publish a course on edx.org, you must have an agreement with edX and specific approval from your organization. These instructors have years of hands-on experience just as much as multiple academic and professional qualifications.
Next, let’s look at some of the most popular edX courses.
Most Popular edX Courses
Although there are hundreds of popular edX courses of all types, I handpicked five of the most popular based on edX recommendations and timely relevance.
1. Master of Science in Artificial Intelligence (MSAI)
Artificial intelligence has never been more popular, and it is the future. Thus, taking a master’s in AI is a foolproof way to stay ahead of the competition.
This MSAI is offered by The University of Texas at Austin, founded in 1883, and is a leading research university. As mentioned earlier, this master’s degree brings a multidisciplinary perspective with a 30-credit curriculum.
You will have to take one mandatory module (Ethics in AI), and 9 elective modules, which are:
This is where you can access:
It’s safe to say that it’s one of the most comprehensive professional qualifications that edX offers.
2. HarvardX: CS50’s Introduction to Artificial Intelligence With Python
This course is not a master’s and takes only 7 weeks to complete at the recommended pace.
Offered by Harvard University, this AI-focused course aims to educate learners about the subject with Python. As you might know, all machine learning engineers are proficient in Python (just as much as Java, JavaScript, and many more).
However, learning about AI programming with Python will certainly increase your market value.
This course will cover areas such as:
Delivered by a Harvard professor and a senior preceptor of computer science, this course is another one of the most popular edX courses.
It’s surprising that you can get 100% free access to it.
3. GTx: Introduction to Analytics Modeling
The best thing about analytical modeling is that you can apply analytical modeling for several fields including, marketing, finance, healthcare, and operations research.
The cherry on top is that it is offered by a prestigious university. The Georgia Institute of Technology is a public research university and institute of technology in Atlanta, Georgia, established in 1885.
This course aims to educate you across three key competencies:
These factors affect the popularity of this course.
4. MicroBachelors® Program in Marketing Essentials
Microbachelors are one of the fastest ways to a fully fleshed bachelor’s degree. If you’re in marketing, this is a recommendable penetration point for academics.
As you can see, you can finish this Microbachelors in just three months with a reasonable weekly hours commitment.
The program consists of four key milestones namely:
Quality is assured as you must pass with a 70% grade or higher for credit or a program certificate.
Remember that credit for this program is not provided by Doane University. This program is awarded three academic credits at Thomas Edison State University towards a general elective course.
Nevertheless, it’s one of the most popular edX courses.
5. Master’s Degree in Public Health
Career paths such as health administration, health educator, community services manager, and even wellness coordinator are linked to qualifications in public health. If that sounds like your field, this is one of the best master’s courses to take in edX.
This online master’s course is accredited and is offered by Boston University. It is a private research university in Boston, Massachusetts, founded in 1839, belonging to the top 50 universities in the USA.
The best part? It also belongs to the top 10 best public health schools in the US. You’ll also see a few prerequisites to enroll similar to other accredited master’s degrees on edX.
This master’s in public health is a 42 credits coursework program, and these are the covered areas with respective credits:
The program consists of four key milestones namely:
All these factors make this master’s one of the most popular courses on this E-learning platform.
Let’s talk about how to filter the best online courses on edX next.
Top 5 Tips to Find the Best edX Online Courses
Don’t be discouraged if I can’t feature the most popular course in your field. That’s because I’m about to share my top 5 tips to find the best on edX.
Tip #1: Simply browse on the Explore Top Courses tab
Why do things manually when edX does it for you automatically? The ‘Explore top courses’ is a great starting point as these are system generated. Before you move to other tips, check whether you can find what you seek here.
Tip #2: Check the recognition of the awarding body and resource person
Almost all edX-verified certifications and degrees are offered by reputed organizations. Not all are the same. A great way to assess their reputation level is by rankings. You can just Google it. What if they are pretty close and you want the best?
The second deciding factor is the resource person. Check if it is a professor, a professor, AND a director. Follow up with their track record and you’ll have the answer.
Tip #3: Always go with AI-focused ones
Artificial intelligence will be the most relevant and highest-demand aspect in any field. If it’s a choice between marketing and AI-powered marketing, always go for the latter.
Tip #4: Check the prerequisites
Prerequisites typically apply for degrees. Their value is high as they’re typically offered via accredited organizations. The better they are, the tighter the prerequisites would be.
My advice is to always choose the ones with the tightest prerequisites as they are the highest valued.
Tip #5: Review the course outline and content
I always take my time to carefully tally my requirements with learning content. This helps me understand whether the course in question can teach me what I need.
Do that, and you’ll find the most relevant one with the highest ROI for you. This must be done extensively with degrees.
With that covered, let me answer an important question.
edX Certificates: How Recognized are They?
Everything edX offers is fully accredited. If not, they will mention that explicitly. As I mentioned before, this is why edX is better than Udemy and sometimes surpasses Coursera thanks to the relatively lower pricing point without the price.
To do all these, you first need to open an edX account; let’s see how to do it next.
How to Open an edX Account?
Although you can open an an account through the mobile app too, I recommend you to do it via the website and sync later with the app.
Here’s how to do it.
Step 1: Visit the https://www.edx.org/ page and click the red button on the top right: Register for free.
Step 2: Once you go there, enter your full name, email, public username, password, and country, and click the red button. Create an account for free.
Step 3: Answer the next few questions they ask to personalize the experience such as the highest level of education.
Step 4: edX will prompt you with a few recommendations to start with, and you can skip them.
Step 5: Confirm your email address.
And that’s it. Now you have your account, and you ideally should be on the below or similar landing page.
Mind you, recommendations for you will be different.
With that covered, let’s look at some of the customer reviews about edX.
edX App
You can follow up with all courses with the edX app available for both Android and iOS devices. Both versions are highly safe and user-friendly rated 4.5+ with 100,000+ user reviews.
In other words, the edX app is amazing.
Customer Reviews on edX
Any company website would feature what’s beneficial for them. To overcome that, I always go for credible reviews sites like TrustPilot and heavily user-moderated platforms like Reddit.
I did the same for this review too.
edX is a great platform, with courses and programmes (and qualifications!) from top education institutions. I always wanted to study with Harvard and Cambridge but ended up doing my degrees elsewhere, so it was a great opportunity to experience their teaching too. Also excellent. Kind and helpful customer service too. Thank you!
This user from Great Britain labels edX as an important education platform, and I agree. When you get access to qualifications from Harvard and Cambridge for free with excellent teaching methods and customer service, what more can you ask for?
“edX has been an incredible resource for me on my journey to achieve a TOEFL certification. Their platform is not only user-friendly but also packed with high-quality educational content. The fact that they offer this course for free is truly remarkable, making education accessible to everyone. I’ve found the course structure and materials to be comprehensive and well-organized.
An incredible source of education is another label for edX, and this user emphasizes the platform’s user-friendliness and the quality of the educational content, for completely free.
So, of course, incredible is another way to put it.
Definitely worth it for me. I completed the MicroMasters in Supply Chain Management from MITx and I then applied and got accepted to the on-campus Masters Program in Supply Chain Management at MIT. I’m writing this to you from my MIT dorm room and I graduate next month.
Pay for the course. You will love it!
I found this conversational Reddit thread with several positive comments, and this caught my eye. I agree with the user; paid courses are the best.
Not only that but remember that there’s a whole subreddit (like a Facebook/Instagram page) dedicated to edX with over 10K active users. This sort of peer review process confirms our expectations.
With that covered, let me tell you my experience with the platform.
My Experience With edX: How Does edX Work?
As I said, I have used edX to educate myself since 2018. Up until now, I’ve never had an issue, especially with paid courses that I had with Udemy and Coursera.
I opened a new account just for this review, and the platform’s guidance for choosing and following courses is impressive.
For instance, edX has important features such as weekly goals WITH reminders, as you can see below. These simple measures immensely helped me with edX’s professional education.
Although I don’t intend to switch careers, I have taken so many free courses at this point that I probably could do it if I wanted to.
In parallel, I have finished several industry-related courses (both paid and free). They have immensely helped me work better and stay updated.
edX feels like an online campus with high quality, from the course page to the video lectures on professional education.
edX’s customer service deserves a shoutout just because of how friendly and fast they are.
Not only do they provide you with direct solutions, but they also give you alternatives. Never have I been ever pushed to buy anything.
I have checked the credibility of each certificate I have obtained in multiple ways, including directly reaching out to the affiliated university. Never have I ever experienced anything fishy with the recognition of them.
How about the affordability? I would say they are much better than Coursera and comes close to the industry standards. It would have been problematic and suspicious if they were cheap.
I also admire how edX doesn’t cage us into subscription plans that can truly mess up our daily activities. Reason? All of us want the best value for what we pay.
Ideally, subscriptions should only be provided for organizations as that comes with a completion obligation. edX figured that out early. Next, let’s talk about edX pricing.
How Much is edX?
edX (thankfully) doesn’t have personal plans; they come only for edX for business and similar organizational levels.
Professional verified certificates have the highest value at the certificate level. This is because you will be finishing multiple courses under one program. Remember that edX pricing applies only when you need the completion certificates.
So, I would say the edX pricing on this level varies between $30 and $500. This depends on the seriousness of the course and the reputation of the offering body.
The below image is a great example of that — the certificate comes from Harvard.
In the bachelor’s and master’s level, the course fee can vary between ~$8,000-$25,000. Remember that this is much cheaper than the traditional way and your degree is accredited on par with an on-campus certificate. How about the refund policy of edX?
The Refund Policy of edX
For any course in the verified (paid) track, you can get a full refund within 14 days after the payment, or within the 14 days of the course; whichever comes last.So, even if you get self-paced courses, you should keep this in mind.
This applies to certificates and degree levels equally. edX refund policy makes edX a risk-free online platform.
edX Vs. Competing Platforms
Throughout this review, I have mentioned Coursera and Udemy to compare as they could be potential edX alternatives.
Let’s have a quick comparison.
edX Vs. Coursera
Coursera has a Coursera Plus subscription just as much as individual course purchases. There’s no doubt that Coursera’s course library is much larger, and that’s why their general pricing point is high.
I also have experienced a quality drop in Coursera’s individual courses over the years; especially the free ones. A sensible explanation is that perhaps Coursera is trying to push learners for paid courses.
Customer service quality has also dropped over time, for me.
If you want a detailed comparison between these 2 platforms, here’s our guide.
Verdict: edX is better.
edX Vs. Udemy
Coursera is the best competitor for edX and Udemy is much below both of them. The biggest reason is that Udemy certificates aren’t accredited.
Udemy also doesn’t offer degrees.
Verdict: edX is better.
edX Vs. Masterclass
MasterClass is one of the most popular online learning platforms thanks to its unique market positioning with celebrity-level instructors.
I mean, who doesn’t like to learn how to cook Gordon Ramsay’s famous Beef Wellington from Gordon himself?
The only issue is that when Udemy offers a certificate even if it is not accredited. Masterclass offers none. Conversely, they always charge you annually and you cannot buy individual classes.
Verdict: edX is better.
Pros and Cons of edX
Pros
Cons
Other Online Learning Platform reviews:
In Conclusion: edX Review
Is edX legit and reputed enough? Yes!
edX is one of the leading online learning platforms growing and improving exponentially since 2012.
As you have read about the platform inside out, from the course library, and what you get in courses, to my rating. Unlike many other edX reviews, I showed you real evidence.
I’m sure the answer is clear — edX is worth your time and money.
I hope this review was helpful to you. Feel free to share it with your friends and family to raise more accurate awareness.
FAQs
Was this article helpful?
Was this article helpful?
