--- title: 'Free Online Courses That Give You Free Certificates' source: 'https://youtube.com/watch?v=Qk9OQQe5Rbg' video_id: 'Qk9OQQe5Rbg' date: 2026-08-17 duration_sec: 696 channel: 'Shane Hummus' --- # Free Online Courses That Give You Free Certificates > Source: [Free Online Courses That Give You Free Certificates](https://youtube.com/watch?v=Qk9OQQe5Rbg) ## Summary The video presents six legitimate ways to earn free certificates from reputable organizations like Google, IBM, and top universities. It focuses on Coursera's financial aid option and highlights other platforms like Google Skillshop, freeCodeCamp, IBM SkillsBuild, FutureLearn, and Cisco Networking Academy. ### Key Points - **Coursera Free Trial and Financial Aid** [00:52] — Coursera offers a 7-day free trial and a financial aid application that can cover the full cost of the certificate. The application takes a few minutes to fill out and is reviewed within 16 days. - **Google Data Analytics Certificate** [00:39] — The Google Data Analytics Professional Certificate is popular (2 million takers) and can be accessed via the 7-day trial or financial aid. - **Google Digital Marketing Course** [04:21] — The Google Digital Marketing course from Google Skillshop has 17 modules covering social media, email marketing, and more. It's free and provides a certificate recognized by employers. - **Salary Potential in Digital Marketing** [05:03] — Entry-level digital marketing jobs pay $54,000–$93,000/year; experienced marketers earn $70,000–$130,000/year. - **Google Ads Certification** [05:56] — The Google Ads certification requires passing a 50-question test with 80% or higher. It's free and can be retaken. - **freeCodeCamp** [08:34] — freeCodeCamp offers coding courses with certificates, though they hold less weight than those from Google or Coursera. The education is solid and job-relevant. - **IBM SkillsBuild** [09:00] — IBM SkillsBuild offers courses in AI, data analytics, and other tech topics. Certificates are respected but less so than Google's. - **FutureLearn University Courses** [09:40] — FutureLearn partners with Oxford, Cambridge, and MIT to offer over 70 courses with free certificates. Look for 'free digital upgrade' options. - **Cisco Networking Academy** [10:44] — Cisco Networking Academy offers courses in networking basics and Python. Certificates are highly valued in the networking industry. ## Transcript I've meant to do for a long time, and that is to show you how you can take the best certificates in the entire them doesn't work for you, or it's not the course or certificate that you want, then there's going to be other ways. So, the first way is to go to Coursera, and this is a way to actually get the certificate itself completely free. So, but get the certificate itself completely free. And then you basically just go to what do you want to learn? So, in this particular case, I'm going to say data analytics, and I'm just going to type that in there. So, I'm going to click data analytics. And there is a lot of different options. So, the one I'm going to pick here is the Google data analytics professional certificate. All right, so it took a moment to load there, and you'll see here that 2 million people have taken this, and you can try it for free, right? You can enroll to start your 7-day full access free trial. So, if you're going on with a new email, you can start a 7-day full access free "Shane, yes, you can get the 7-day free trial, but you're probably not going to be able to finish it within 7 days." And yes, Shane, you can also audit a lot of courses you can actually just like audit them, but you don't get the certificate, perks. And of course, what you want is the certificate to be able to put on how in the world can you get the certificate for free? Well, what you want to do, because they change this stuff up all the time, is you want to click control F, and then you want to type in financial aid. So, it says financial aid available, learn more, and then you want to go ahead, and you want to click next, right? So, you want to basically click next and apply for the financial aid. So, it takes just a few minutes to fill and go next. Now, I'm not going to submit this, because that would be course. So, I'm not actually going to to fill it out. And it says here it takes up to 16 days to be reviewed. So, 16 days later, they're going to review it. As long as you told the truth, and very good chance you can get it all completely free. So, we'll just go ahead and select educational level. I'm just going to fill these out. Um I'm not submit it, so you know, it doesn't really matter. Enter annual income. I'm really matter. Enter annual income. I'm just going to say, let's say 10,000. just going to say, let's say 10,000. Um let's see. USD. You know what, it doesn't really matter. I'll say Australian dollars, why not? Um Unemployed. Um and then why are you applying for financial aid? Just briefly explain. I want to get a good job, uh but I don't have the money. Uh just a brief brief explanation here. Oh, they they want 150 words. So, you got to you got to fill it out more. So, kind of stuff. And then you'd click next, and that's about it, right? So, you know, very easy to do. Uh that's about it, and you know, you wait 15 you don't want to wait 15 days, a lot of the courses you can audit, and a lot of the courses you can uh just use the 7-day free trial as well. So, yeah, the original price $49 a month, but you can apply for financial aid. A lot of people report online that they get accepted. Don't do this if you can actually afford it, right? Don't do that. This is for people who can't afford it. Don't abuse afford it, but you want to better your life, absolutely use this. Now, just a financial aid, right? Some people get approved, some people get denied. fill out the form. But, if you don't want to wait 16 days, you can check out Coursera Plus for $59 a month, and that gives you access to everything. Links in below, or you can just check that link in general to check out Coursera and really fast, like in a few days. Some people don't get approved at all, but it doesn't hurt to try. And the worst they can say is no. So, if you want to get without having to wait 16 days, you can do the Coursera Plus subscription. And You can just, you know, renew the free trial every like 6 days or so, and you free. Now, if you don't want to deal with financial aid applications, there are a lot of other really good options out there as well. So, let me show you really solid options. So, first of all, is the Google digital marketing course. fundamentals, and this comes from the Google Skillshop. And it's Google's this course has 17 different modules, and each module covers important topics. learn about social media marketing, you learn about email marketing, and you of learning total, but you can do it at your own pace. Now, some people finish depends on how much time you have. But, the best part is it's made by Google actually work at Google, and they know what they're talking about. And when you certificate. And this certificate goes on your Google Skillshop profile. You LinkedIn profile page, and you can put it on your resume. And this is one of certificates in the world. Why? Because it comes straight from the horse's mouth, Google. Google is basically telling you exactly what they want, and people to know how to use their platform. And a lot of these jobs pay really well. Entry-level positions, you can make like $54 to $93,000 a year, and experienced marketers are making $70 to $130,000 a year. The job market is also marketing, from small restaurants to big corporations. So, there's tons of jobs, online. So, very solid option. The next Now, I'm not going to go over this one too long, cuz it's also on Google really good certifications on there. And just from my experience, knowing how to advertising in general, that's probably one of the easiest ways to get jobs. And to become a Google partner, you need this certification. And Google partners access to new features, just as an example. Plus, they get support directly from Google, and they get listed in Google's directory. And many companies advertising. So, this certificate can literally get you jobs that other people to take a test at the end. It's a 50-question test, and you need to get 80% or more to pass. But, the test is completely free, and you can retake it attempts. So, yeah, this is another really good free certificate and free right, guys, in the editing process right now, and I just wanted to mention that if you're struggling to grow on YouTube, you're having trouble getting even picking a niche, I'm going to be hosting a free one-time live workshop that goes over exactly how to help with that. How to finally make money from youtube.com in 2026. So, make sure to mark that down, and also make sure to the pinned comment below, so you don't miss out. And if you attend live, you'll also have a chance to be the one person I pick for a real-time channel audit once we move into the interactive portion of the workshop. And if you feel you're worried that your niche might be too broad, or it's not profitable enough, then this workshop is for you, because I'll be giving away the 60-second niche validator 2.4 completely free. This is the latest and most optimized version of my GPT-powered niche validation tool, and it helps you instantly test and uncover profitable YouTube niches before you waste time creating content that doesn't bring in leads, sales, or money. It's smarter, faster, and trained on even more data be giving it away completely free, but only at this live workshop. And just a times I give this tool away for free, because I'm planning on making it into a the fence, this is definitely a good time to pick it up. Now, during the workshop, there's a full presentation on how to grow on YouTube, followed by Q&A, on Zoom, and people do ask a lot of questions the majority of the time about niche clarity during the session itself. And the same strategies I teach are the ones that helped clients like Nicole, who went from 85 subscribers to $85,000 in a single month. Seth, who went from years without a viral video to immediately getting 300,000 views right after starting work with us. Or Davis, able to remove himself from recording. And even people who aren't clients, like Isaiah, were able to make $20,000 only using the free content and live workshop Click the link in the description or the pinned comment to register, and add it to your calendar, so you don't miss the chance to grab the 60-second niche validator AI. And if you miss the date, that's okay. Check the link still to see to sign up to a list that will tell you when the next one does. So, see you Time. Now, back to the video. The next one is free Code Camp, and free Code education world, and they have a bunch do. Basically, anything involved in coding, and you can learn it on free Code Camp. Now, I will say the certificates here don't hold as much weight as Coursera, or directly from Google. But, with that being said, the education itself is very solid, and it's well respected, and it can teach you how you the skills that you need to land a job. Now, next one is IBM SkillsBuild. So, you go to skillsbuild.org, and this comes directly from IBM. And IBM is one world, and they have courses on artificial intelligence. They have courses on data analytics. Basically, courses on everything. And it's all the hot topics in tech right now. Now, IBM is a respected company, so I think this free Code Camp, but a little bit less weight than coming directly from Google. So, yeah, overall, really good stuff. A lot of different organizations use IBM systems, like hospitals, government agencies, etc. So, yeah, this can teach on a resume, and look really good on your LinkedIn. All right, next one FutureLearn, and this is different from the others. FutureLearn partners with they have over 70 courses with completely free certificates. And these courses come from universities like Oxford, Cambridge, and MIT. And topics intelligence, and sustainability. Now, a lot of FutureLearn courses cost money for the certificates, but some courses have sponsors, and the sponsors pay for similar to Coursera, where you can basically apply for the sponsor and you can get it for free. So look for courses that say free digital upgrade. Again, digital upgrade because it might change basically means that you get full access to the course. And then you get the certificates come from real universities. And not just any universities, but top universities that employers recognize. And the courses are courses. So this can be really good depending on the type of career you're got Cisco Networking and Cisco Networking Academy. So this is and Cisco is the biggest name in computer networking. So they do hold a lot of weight in that industry. And when you connect to the internet, your data probably goes through Cisco equipment. And most companies use Cisco routers and switches. So Cisco skills are always in demand. And they have courses on networking basics. They have courses on Python programming. Etcetera, etc. And it's all taught by Cisco experts. And seven out of the 10 courses at this certificates. And the certificates include introduction to cybersecurity, programming essentials in Python, etc., etc. And again, these hold a lot of you're going into an industry related to networking, this holds a lot of weight. So there you have it, six different ways to get free certificates. These aren't Google, IBM, top universities, and industry leaders. Now again, Coursera is out. Link is in the description in the pinned comment below. And also check out this video right here where I go over some of my favorite Google certificates. favorite to my least favorite, although I do like all of them. And you can check I do like all of them. And you can check that out by clicking right here.