Top 12 Online Cybersecurity Online Courses for 2024 (Free and Paid)

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With so much online courseware on cybersecurity today, it can be a daunting task to narrow the top choices. To create this list of cybersecurity courses online, we talked to leading security professionals about what they recommend to newbies, computer science students, businesspeople and security pros looking to advance their careers.

When it comes to free cybersecurity courses online, keep in mind there’s no free lunch. Many free courses make students pay for a certificate on the back end, and online groups sometimes offer short seven-day or 30-day trials followed by a monthly subscription charge. Federal agencies, such as the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) and the National Security Agency (NSA), are great sources of free security information. And those new to the field should check out the National Cyber Security Alliance (NCSA).

For paid courses, we started with some of the favorites among hackers and security researchers and refer readers to MIT cyber training courses, as well as online courses at the University of Maryland Global Campus (UMGC), Western Governors University (WGU) and Cybrary. As a bonus, we also linked to the NSA’s Centers of Academic Excellence (CAE) courses. While not exclusively online, people seriously pursuing careers in security need to be aware of these courses and the fact that many programs offer online options in the wake of COVID-19.

Best of the free cybersecurity courses online

1. TryHackMe

TryHackMe features content for people new to cybersecurity and covers a broad range of topics, including training for offensive and defensive security. TryHackMe also has Capture the Flag exercises with walk-through write-ups by contributing users that let members see how to approach and solve problems. Four levels are available:

  1. Complete Beginners. For those with no computing knowledge and who are unsure of where to start.
  2. Early Intermediates. For those who have basic computing knowledge and have used Linux.
  3. Intermediates. For those who know how computers work and have basic security experience.
  4. Advanced. For those who work in cybersecurity and penetration testing.

TryHackMe also has…

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