Best 20 Free AI Courses For Beginners: Expert Opinion 2024

Artificial intelligence is a fascinating field that has garnered attention recently. As per the World Economic Forum, the AI industry will grow many folds in the coming years and lead to an increase of more than 58 million jobs globally. It has attracted a lot of students to pursue a career in artificial intelligence. The young professionals are keen to enter this growing field of science and earn millions a year.

However, learning AI is very important before entering the market. So, listed below are the top 20 free courses that you can pursue to make a career in the AI industry. 

These courses are provided by many prominent universities, like Stanford University, the University of Washington, Harvard University, and more. Students from all across the world can pursue these courses, as they are also available online.

Check out the list of Artificial Intelligence courses that are best for beginners below.

The Top 20 Free Courses in AI for Beginners:

1. Probabilistic Graphical Models 1: Representation

This is a sequence of three courses and is provided by Stanford University via Coursera. The course describes Probabilistic graphical models (PGMs) representations:
Bayesian Networks- These rely on a directed graph
Markov networks- These use an undirected graph
This course is available in the following languages: Arabic, French, Portuguese, Italian, German, Russian, English, Spanish, Kazakh, Hindi, Swedish, Korean, Greek, Chinese, Thai, Ukrainian, Japanese, Indonesian, Polish, Dutch and Turkish.

It is a 5-week long course that comes with 67 hours of study material. The course will be taken up by Daphne Koller.

2. Introduction to Artificial Intelligence:

This is a free online course in AI from Stanford University which can be pursued online via Udacity. The course deals with the history of artificial intelligence (AI), the basics of modern AI, and the representative applications of AI. The students will know about machine learning, probabilistic reasoning, robotics, computer vision, and natural language processing once they complete this course. This course is taught by Sebastian Thrun and Peter Norvig who are well-known names in the field of AI. It is a 16-week long, 6-hour-a-week course available online as well.

3. Machine Learning Foundations: A Case Study Approach:

This course is provided by Washington University via Coursera. It is available in many languages like Arabic, French, Portuguese, Chinese, Italian, German, Russian, English, Spanish, Korean, Thai, Indonesian, Kazakh, Hindi, Swedish, Greek, Ukrainian, Japanese, Polish, Dutch and Turkish.

It is a 6-week long course and has 18 hours of material. In this course, students understand machine learning through a series of practical case studies. Carlos Guestrin and Emily Fox are the faculty members of this course.

4. CS50’s Introduction to Artificial Intelligence with Python

This course was introduced by Harvard University. It can be pursued via edX. The course is free online but if you want a certificate, you will need to pay $200.

The course is 7 weeks long and the classes are conducted for 10-30 hours a week. It is a self-paced course for beginners.

The language of the course is English. The course taught by David J. Malan and Brian Yu explores the concepts and algorithms at the foundation of modern artificial intelligence. Students gain insight into the theory behind graph search algorithms, classification, optimization, and machine learning.

5. Practical Machine Learning

The course is provided by Johns Hopkins University via Coursera. It is a free online course.

This course is 4 weeks long and has 8-9 hours of material. The course provides a basic grounding in concepts like training and test sets, overfitting, and error rates. It also includes the process of building prediction functions including data collection, feature creation, and evaluation. The course is taught by Jeff Leek.

6. Learning From Data (Introductory Machine Learning)

The California Institute of Technology introduced this course in AI for beginners. It is a free online course provided by edX and is ten weeks long. The classes are scheduled for 10–20 hours a week. The course is available in both Portuguese and English. The course covers the mathematics and heuristic aspects of artificial learning.

7. Big Data, Artificial Intelligence, and Ethics:

This course is provided by the University of California, Davis, and can be done online via Coursera. It is a 4-week long course and has 12 hours worth of material. The course provides knowledge of big data and artificial intelligence. The course is taught by Martin Hilbert

8. Introduction to Watson AI

This course is provided by IBM via edX. The classes are conducted 4-8 hours per week. The students would learn the working principles of using Artificial Intelligence with the help of the mechanisms of IBM Watson.

9. Innovations in Investment Technology: Artificial Intelligence

The course provider is the University of Michigan, which can be done online via Coursera. Students gain insight into AI investing and online wealth management. By the end of the course, course, students will understand how to invest money using AI. The course is 4 weeks long and provides 10 hours worth of material to the students.

10. Machine Learning for Data Science and Analytics

Columbia University introduced the course in AI learning which can be pursued online via edX. Although the course is free, a certificate is awarded for $99.
It is taught by Ansaf Salleb-Aouissi, Cliff Stein, David Blei, Itsik Pe’er, Mihalis Yannakakis, and Peter Orbanz, and the classes are conducted for 5 weeks.

11. Convolutional Neural Networks:

Stanford University provides this course in AI which can be pursued online via Coursera. The course is available in languages such as Chinese, Arabic, French, Portuguese, Italian, German, Russian, Turkish, English, Spanish, Japanese, Korean, Thai, Indonesian, Kazakh, Hindi, Swedish, Greek, Ukrainian, Polish and Dutch. The fundamental program in this course is Deep Learning Specialization. The course is taught by Andrew Ng for 4 weeks.

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12. Intro to Deep Learning:

This course by Google can be pursued online through Udacity. It is a free online course providing in-depth knowledge of deep learning which is a part of machine learning. This course is good for all the nontechnical beginners in AI. The course aims to teach candidates how deep learning builds on machine learning in 12 weeks.

13. AI For Everyone:

Coursera is the platform to pursue this course in artificial intelligence. A paid certificate will be available for candidates by the end of this 4-week-long course. 11 hours worth of study material is provided by the teachers to the candidates pursuing this course.  

14. Generative Art and Computational Creativity

This course provided by Simon Fraser University can be pursued online via Kadenze free of cost. The course is available in English and is broken into two parts
Generative Art
Computational Creativity
It is taught by an Associate Professor from the School of Interactive Arts and Technology at Simon Fraser University and multidisciplinary researcher, Philippe Pasquier.

15. Machine Learning for Data Analysis

This course by Wesleyan University can be taken online via Coursera free of cost. All those interested in knowing the future outcome of their data can pursue this course. It helps students understand the application, testing, and interpretation of machine learning algorithms as alternative methods for addressing their research questions. It is a 4-week long course.

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16. Machine Learning for Trading

Georgia Institute of Technology via Udacity provides this course in AI. The course is very apt for those who wish to use artificial intelligence for financial gains. It is a 16-week-long course taught by Tucker Balch.

17. Google Cloud Big Data and Machine Learning Fundamentals

Google courses need no introduction. This course is simple and short. It is a two-week course that can also be pursued and checked on Coursera. It is available in languages like French, Portuguese, Russian, English, and Spanish.

18. Evaluations of AI Applications in Healthcare

This course by Stanford University is a boon for doctors and health practitioners all over the world. Coursera is the right platform to pursue this course. It is a 7-week long course that comes with 11 hours of material for the students.

19. Building Autonomous AI:

It is a 5 week-long course provided by the University of Washington via Coursera. In this course, candidates learn to solve industrial engineering problems inspired by real problems. It is taught by Kence Anderson and Juan Vergara.

20. The Economics of AI:

The University of Virginia, via Coursera, provides this course for 6 weeks. The course teaches candidates the economics of AI and the implications for economic growth and labor markets. Anton Korinek is the teacher of this course, and the study material is available to the candidates online in English, Kazakh, German, Hindi, Russian, Swedish, Korean, Portuguese, Greek, Italian, French, Chinese, Spanish, Arabic, Thai, Ukrainian, Japanese, Indonesian, Polish, Dutch and Turkish languages.

The above courses are free of cost for the students who wish to enroll in them and learn about artificial intelligence. AI is the future of science and the economy of the world and there is no harm in being prepared for the future.

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