Zero To Mastery Academy Review - Is It Worth It?

Jeremy Kallowitz
|
March 21, 2024

Zero To Mastery Academy Review - Is It Worth It?

Hello fellow online learners! Today I'm really excited. As many of my regular readers know, I'm constantly saying that if you're looking to get into programming, ethical hacking or any sort of technical career or hobby... Pluralsight or Codecademy are the ones to go with, however... I think I've finally found a platform that has changed my mind. At least in some cases.

I came across ZTM Academy when my girlfriend sent me over a link. She's getting into tech herself and I'd bought her a Pluralsight subscription to help her - and she's been doing well with it. And when she sent me the link I will admit my first thought was... Another platform?? I just bought you Pluralsight... come on.

But then I looked at it and I thought... well... ok let's have a look at Pluralsight's refund policy. Hahaha!

I signed up myself for the purpose of reviewing the program (and learning a little too! I'm taking their Javascript: The Advanced Concepts course, because I suck at Javascript), and I've also got the advantage of having the perspective of my girlfriend too, which means you get the honest opinions of an expert and a newbie, all in one review. I hope this blog posts helps you understand Zero To Mastery, what it's good for and who it's good for.

I'll try to section up this blog post so you can scroll down and read what's important to you, but if you have the time I do recommend reading the whole thing. I've tried to make every part as helpful as possible.

You Actually Get Help Finding Your Career Path


Zero To Mastery Tech Career Quiz Start Page

Slightly annoyed and excited about this part! I'm actually in the process of developing a similar tool for readers of this website, but Zero To Mastery have already done it - and dang, they've done it well!

If you're a beginner, I know for a fact that one of the most confusing aspects of starting a career in tech is understanding just exactly what career path you want to take. It's incredibly hard to understand what you want to do, when you don't even understand half of the terminology let alone what will your day to day tasks be! Understanding what in demand skills tech startups and regular companies are actively looking for can be a challenge too.

 

Sidenote: If you are a newbie, don't spend too long deliberating exactly what career path you want, just get started. Take advantage of their quiz and get started straight away on what they recommend.

The beauty of Zero To Mastery is that you get access to every single course, so you can change your mind later. And if you're learning to program for instance, those base skills will be applicable in different jobs. If you learn to program in one language, you'll pick up another language 100x faster if you decide to make the switch.

Don't get stuck in analysis paralysis, take action and decide from there!

Take the Quiz Now

Find out what is the best career path for you in under 60 seconds.

Anyways, back to what I was saying before that tangent – it is hard to decide where to start. And even if you have experience, deciding where to go from there is hard as well! That’s why Zero To Mastery’s Tech Career Path Quiz is an amazing tool. It takes all the headache out of trying to figure out what would work best for you – and just let’s you know after a few simple questions.

If you haven’t taken it yet, I highly recommend you take it right now and then get back to reading this blog post after you’ve done it. It takes literally 60 seconds and once you’ve been given the career path, you can look at the rest of this blog post with the knowledge of what course you are going to go for.

Unique Advantages About ZTM Academy

If you can’t tell by now, I really do love ZTM Academy. But you may be reading this and thinking aside from the cool career path quiz… why? Well, I’m about to tell you.

They've solved the social problem
It’s a bold statement, I know. But I love what they do with their online classroom and virtual campus. If you’ve talked to people who’ve gone the traditional college or university route… if you ask them “was it worth it?” they’ll often say… NO I’M POOR, just joking, but if they do say Yes and you ask why… it’s because of the social aspects of university and college. (Whether that’s worth paying the extra $50,000 for is another question).

It’s true though, we humans are social beings. Even those of us who consider themselves introverted (*holds hands up high*) do still benefit from connecting with peers who are going through the same thing.

Not only does this help in learning, but it also helps in career path too. It’s not unusual for people to stay in touch for many years after attending a university together, and when a job comes up at a company they work at and they think “Ooo, Denise from class. She’s be perfect for the role. Plus she bakes a lot so maybe there’s some free donuts in it” Hahaha
A screenshot of me in the virtual campus. It's in beta, and it looks a little clunky, but it's actually very useful and you can just bump into people in a virtual world and have a chat like you would at a real university campus. Fantastic for networking!

The way they’ve setup their virtual campus is amazing. It allows people to network, help each other, make friends and build connections for the future, all without having to pay ridiculous money to attend a university. Admittedly, you’ll probably miss out on getting wasted and walking around with a traffic cone on your head, but y’know, that’s not for everyone anyways. And arguably not worth the extra money. This type of virtual coding bootcamp is the perfect balance between hefty universities and cheap online courses.

A Focus On Acing Technical Interviews

Interview Prep Courses Available/>

I love this. It's one of the most nerve wracking, confusing and anxiety inducing parts of the hiring process for new hires (or experienced people who just suck at interviews).

They don't just focus on teaching you the skills for job, they also teach you how to do technical interviews, and do them well. This is incredibly valuable. Companies that are hiring get a ton of applicants, and learning how to stand out and ace that technical interview can be difference between getting a job and getting a dreaded "Thanks for your application, but..." emails. (Or just being ghosted, which is all too common in this industry, but that's a rant for another day...)

My girlfriend especially found this useful. She's currently working as an executive assistant, so she is learning part time and she wants to transition to a more technical role soon, but she's so intimidated by these technical interviews she hasn't even submitted an application yet. Well, that was until she went through the "Master The Coding Interview" course. She feels a lot more confident now, and she's submitted some applications. She hasn't completed an interview yet, but at least she has the confidence to try. That's a big thing!

A Big Focus on Open Source Projects For The Courses

I. Fricken. Love. This. LOOOOOOVEEE!!

I suppose a lot of my readers may not know this, but I am a massive open source advocate. If you're not sure what this means, open source is simply programs/applications/websites that share their entire source code with everyone. And anyone can join in and contribute as well.

The internet is MADE on open source. The very web browser you're viewing this in, is most likely largely open source components. The web-servers I host this website on... all running on open source (and that's not just because I am an open source nerd, everyone uses it!)

Now, I love that they are promoting open source. That's one thing, and that's just my opinion. But there is real, tangible benefits to this for you, the learner, as well.

Open source projects are typically managed using a software called GIT, this is also what most companies use to manage their projects (open source or not). So therefore, contributing to these open source projects allows you to get very familiar with GIT and that is a massive bonus when people are interviewing you for a position (Because GIT can be a bit confusing for newbies, not gonna lie to you. But it sure is worth learning!)

Secondly, did you know having a Github account with open source contributions in it is one of the main thing recruiters look for? There's nothing better. No well-written CV, sharp tongue or gift basket will get you on the good side of a hiring manger than contributions to open source. There's a few reasons for this.

One being that a lot of developers are open source advocates too, so you're already "in the club" so it goes. But also, they get direct access to your code. They can see how you do, what stuff you're good at. They can see how you interact with the other open source members. It's an invaluable thing for a recruiter, and it puts you to the top of the list!

What Can You Learn?


Zero To Mastery has an impressive selection from beginner courses to advanced courses. Their online community is filled with people from senior software developers to new parents who are looking to enhance their career prospects from home for when the baby is a little bit older and they can get back to work.

The employable skills they teach range from the technical courses to get you up to date with the actual tech, to the interview skills you need to take advantage of the amazing career opportunities available in Silicon Valley & other tech hubs. (Not to mention, if you want to work online and not worry about your commute, tech is really the place to be).

The comprehensive courses available explain the complex subject matter in an easy to understand way. Tech education has a reputation of being a little difficult to get into - and it is to begin with. But with the easy to understand online training and friendly, enjoyable teaching style of Andrei Neagoie and his fellow instructors you'll breeze through hours of video and pick up the critical skills you need efficiently.

Again, if you're looking for some guidance on exactly what to learn or what career path to choose, I'd really recommend using their handy tech career quiz. It really helped my girlfriend understand what she should be focusing on, and if I'm honest, it did it a little better than me... (Don't tell her I said that).

You can learn how to become a modern web developer using The Complete Web Developer in 2022 course. A highly in demand role for which the work is not drying up any time soon!

You can learn to be a Python mastermind and do some challenging projects with their Complete Python Developer Bootcamp course.

If you already know some Javascipt but, you just kinda suck at it (This is me) then you can take their Javascript Advanced Concepts course. I'm not even finished with it yet and some of the things I've learned have helped me make suggestions and improvements to my clients that make them happy (and by proxy, me too!)

And one more thing, that I really can't stress enough is incredibly important to anyone looking to get into tech, is courses on life skills and mindset. Tech can be an intimidating thing, you'll frequently be confused and you'll never stop learning. It's fun and rewarding, but if you don't have the right mindset you can end up becoming dissuaded pretty easily. I haven't gone through the whole Future-Proof Yourself Workshop myself but my girlfriend has and I can tell the difference in her confidence and vision for her own development as a developer (pun... intended)

If you want to take a look at everything that is available, click here for an extensive look at their entire catalogue. It's jam packed with useful stuff.

Is Zero To Mastery Worth It?

Yes, it is. After me and my girlfriend went through their courses (a newbie and a not-so-newbie) we both were converted. 43+ courses, 867 hours of up-to-date videos and 8,300 lessons on topics covering ethical hacking, web dev, algorithms and more for such a low monthly fee is hard to argue with.

Is there any reason I should not use Zero To Mastery

Well, I have to include this because I am a big believer that people are individuals, and how they learn will depend on that. ZTM Academy is really great, and if you're comparing it to places like Udemy and Pluralsight, ZTM Academy wins hands down. It's also perfect if you're looking at getting into tech as a career and not just a hobby (If you're a hobbyist, I would say Udemy might be a better option because you can buy 1 course and learn it over a year at a very slow pace).

Overall, I'd say you definitely should sign up to Zero To Mastery and give it a go. At the same time, I would sign up for a free trial of Codecademy too. The only reason being is that to me, Codecademy's interactive learning makes it a lot easier to learn code. The only downside is that because Codecademy makes it so easy to learn code in the browser, you never learn any of the important tech skills that you will need in a job like managing the desktop environment.

So, if you have the cash to splash, I'd sign up for ZTM first, do their free career path quiz. Then based on what you get, I'd start the ZTM course. If you find yourself struggling to understand the code or you're not remembering things very well, I'd sign up for Codecademy's free trial and give it a go. You might be like me and find it's easier to learn the code with Codecademy, and then use ZTM for learning the real life skills and full application development knowledge you'll need to land a job.

However, that being said, if you're on a budget and you had to choose between ZTM Academy and Codecademy, go with ZTM. It's cheaper, you get more courses, you get more of the skills needed to actually land a job and you get access to their awesome social aspects too.

Time To Take Some Action

The biggest step when learning a technical skill, is to just get started. Take action. Get going. And thankfully Zero To Academy has a 30 day refund policy and Codecademy has a completely free trial, so you might as well sign up and get stuck in.

Start it now, don't wait and think "oooo, maybe this other course would be better" or "ooo, maybe I should learn how to become a clown on Udemy instead" (No, seriously, Udemy has a course for that...)

There's no risk involved in getting started. Codecadamy has the free trial, and ZTM Academy has the 30 day, no questions asked refund policy. Click the buttons below and sign up and take your first step to mastery! (Don't forget to set a reminder on your phone for the 30 days though, just in case you do decide on a refund - I really don't see anyone getting a refund because of the quality though, maybe because of some other life circumstances, which can happen! It's nice to know that if something bad did happen that meant your attention has to be elsewhere, you can get that money back.)

Find Your Best Career Path Now

Take the ZTM Tech Career Path Quiz
Sign Up To ZTM Academy Now
Use code FRIENDS10 and get 10% off!

Not Ready To Buy Just Yet?

I’ve encouraged you to go for it, but everyone’s circumstances are different. If you’re still in the “maybe” phase, not sure about things. Perhaps you’re just researching with no intent of getting started at all? (Don’t get stuck there!) That’s fine too.

I check every day to find the best special offers for all the programs we review, including Zero To Mastery & Codecademy. Sign up below to get notified whenever either of them has a sale on – and you might just get it for half price at a time when you’re more ready to commit!


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    Jeremy Kallowitz

    I have a passion for online education, I've managed to build a successful career without even finishing high school by learning using a wide variety of online resources. I love to share information and learn from others!
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