If you’re learning to code or exploring other tech topics, you may have come across Pluralsight. This learning platform offers assessments, learning paths, and courses authored by industry experts in subjects such as software development, security, data, machine learning, and more.
So, is Pluralsight worth it? This Pluralsight review will cover topics like what Pluralsight is, some pros and cons, topics taught, how much Pluralsight costs, the main features of the platform, content quality, tips for use, what past students think, etc.
Disclosure: I’m a proud affiliate for some of the resources mentioned in this article. If you buy a product through my links on this page, I may get a small commission for referring you. Thanks!
What Is Pluralsight?
On the Pluralsight learning platform, you’ll find thousands of video courses, guides, interactive courses with in-browser coding challenges (only for Premium users), paths (curated collections of courses), hands-on projects (Premium only), assessments, webinars, and much more.
Pluralsight’s content covers a wide variety of tech topics, from software development to data to cybersecurity and more. Courses on the platform are created by 1,500+ industry experts and partners (e.g., Google, Adobe, Microsoft, and Oracle).
Before you decide to take a course, you can check if you’re ready by taking a 20-question test that tells you if you’re beginner, intermediate, or advanced in a particular skill. That way you’ll know if a Pluralsight course is the right one for you.
With a Premium membership, Pluralsight can help you prepare for industry certifications, including CompTIA, ITIL®, PMP®, and more (with curated certification paths, Kaplan certification practice exams, and certificates of completion that you can use as continuing education credits). When you’re considering if Pluralsight is worth it, that’s certainly something that sets them apart!
In 2018, the company went public on NASDAQ (stock ticker PS). If you choose to learn tech skills with Pluralsight, you’ll be in good company: 70% of Fortune 500 companies use Pluralsight to train their teams, including The Home Depot, HelloFresh, VMware, etc.
Pluralsight Review: the TL;DR
Pros of Pluralsight:
- Large variety of courses: 6,000+ courses with an average of 80+ new courses added monthly
- Mobile and desktop apps that allow for offline viewing
- Short, self-paced quizzes to test retention
- Unique features for Premium users and above, including prep materials for professional certifications and in-browser coding challenges and projects with guided feedback
- Taught by expert instructors
- Lots of ways to organize your learning experience
- Community feature you can draw support from as you learn
Cons of Pluralsight:
- No lifetime access: if you stop paying, you lose access
- Since it’s a subscription pricing model, you can’t buy just one course
- No refunds
Note: Pluralsight has some beginner courses, but it is aimed more at intermediate/advanced users, which can be either a pro or a con depending on what you’re looking for!
Topics Taught on Pluralsight
Pluralsight’s resources span dozens of tech topics, including but not limited to:
- Software development
- IT ops
- Data analysis/science
- Information and cybersecurity
- Software architecture
- Machine learning/AI, cloud computing
- Manufacturing
- Creative topics (e.g., 3D animation, game dev, VFX)
- Business skills (e.g., podcasting, management, communication)
Browse their course library here to see all the skills and programming languages you can learn on Pluralsight.
Pluralsight Pricing
Please note that pricing listed below may change in the future!
Pluralsight is a subscription-based service. Personal plan options offer monthly or annual billing:
- Monthly = $29/month
- Annually = $299.00/year billed annually (works out to $24.91/month)
- Premium = $449.00/year billed annually (works out to $37.41/month)
There are also Professional and Enterprise plans for businesses that pay for their teams to take courses. Ask your employer if they’ll consider getting a team subscription or pay for yours to level up your tech skills! (Pro tip: sell them on how it will help the company.)
Features of the Pluralsight Platform
Cross-platform support: Courses are available on any desktop and mobile device — even in offline mode.
Course discussions for each course so you can interact with other students, ask and answer questions, and find a community.
Practice exams: To help you prepare for professional certifications (Premium, Professional, Enterprise)
Hands-on coding challenges, projects, and guided feedback (Premium, Professional, Enterprise only)
Certificates of completion: If you have 100% completion for a video course, you can generate a certificate of completion. These certificates can be submitted as CEUs (continuing education units) or CPE (continuing professional education) credits to CompTIA, PMI, ISACA, and (ISC)2.
Short quizzes and tests: To help you practice while you learn, see if you’re ready for certain courses, and validate your skills.
Visual Studio Code (VS Code) extension: When you’re working through a coding problem, odds are you’ll run into a roadblock and not know what to do. With this extension, you can find code-specific content recommendations ( video clips, paths, courses, and guides) without having to google to find an answer.
Free access to Qwiklabs (when you take Google Cloud-authored courses): You’ll get temporary credentials to Google Cloud Platform and Amazon Web Services, so you can learn the cloud using the real thing – no simulations.
Role IQ: With this feature, you pick a role title, complete the relevant skill assessments, and Pluralsight will tell you how proficient you are at your role and recommend learning opportunities to fill any skills gaps. AKA test for strengths and weaknesses.
Free 10-day personal trial so you can see if the platform is right for you.
Pluralsight’s Ease of Use
The platform’s interface is relatively user-friendly. Let’s quickly go over some key navigation features.
From the home page, you can browse through courses by hovering over the Courses tab in the menu. There, you can browse by topic (e.g., software development, IT ops, data professional), and click through to view all Pluralsight learning paths, courses, and assessments.
You can also search for specific keywords in the search bar to find courses matching your criteria. When using this method, you can filter by courses, blog, resources, authors, skill level, and roles. One downside is that you can’t filter or sort courses based on ratings.
When you click on a course, you’ll be able to see basic course info, a course description, author details, and what you’ll be learning.
Actually watching the course videos takes place in an interface similar to YouTube, with the video on the left and a playlist of lessons on the right.
Pluralsight also offers channels to help organize your learning journey. These are essentially your own custom playlists of videos and courses.
There’s also a Skills profile where you can keep track of your progress, connect social media profiles, and set an avatar.
Bottom line: Browsing through the many options can seem overwhelming at first, but the platform is clean, professional, intuitive, and easy to navigate. There are tons of ways to organize and personalize your learning as well.
Pluralsight Content Quality
Pluralsight says that on average, they only publish three out of every 1,000 content proposals they receive, because they only publish content that meets their high quality standards.
Courses created by Pluralsight are produced in-house, which means they’re high-quality videos with clear audio. All instructors are subject-matter experts, so you’re getting great learning material taught by people who know what they’re doing.
My Top Pluralsight Course Recommendations
1. JavaScript Core Language
With this learning path, you’ll dive into JavaScript while learning the basics of arrays, collections, and functions. You’ll also learn advanced topics such as promises and asynchronous programming. Requires knowledge of HTML/CSS, but is otherwise beginner-friendly!
2. Git Fundamentals
This course teaches you how to create a local repository, commit files, push changes to a remote repository, fix errors in your commits, and much more. A great real-world skill for aspiring software developers to learn.
3. Understanding Machine Learning
For complete beginners, this course teaches you the programming language R and shows you how to train and test a machine learning model. A great intro to machine learning, which is a highly lucrative career (the average salary for machine learning engineer is over $143,000!).
Start coding now
Stop waiting and start learning! Get my 10 tips on teaching yourself how to code.
What Past Students Think
“There is not much I cannot find on Pluralsight. It has been my resource for gaining the skills I need to maintain relevance. All the courses I have taken have been relevant, informative, and intuitive which promotes a great learning experience. Would highly recommend this service to anyone that is a self-motivated, eager learner, that wants or needs to gain new skills to keep moving forward in their career.” – Robert Fitzgerald
“Pluralsight is the ‘Netflix’ of streaming technology videos. The quality of its offering, leaves the competition in the dust. What I love most is the skills IQ test. It gives me good feedback on what I already know and what I should focus on. The instructors know their stuff and are renowned in their disciplines. My cons for Pluralsight is their bias towards Microsoft technologies and the speeding up of sections of videos that explains the code. I find myself rewinding several times to grasp what is being taught.” – Faithman Nartey
“If I had to give my review of Pluralsight in one word, I would say…Awesome! There are so many options of courses available to help get that specific certification you are looking for. Depending on the plan that is chosen, there are excellent practice exams available that definitely help to ace that exam! If I was asked if I plan on renewing my subscription, I would say absolutely!” – Cris C.
“I used to have no idea where to start learning a new technology. Hopefully Google or YouTube would pop up something useful, but it would take hours to vet and usually the results didn’t get me past beginner level. PluralSight does all that for me so I can just sit down and learn whatever I need to in as much depth as I want. As a software engineer, PluralSight has helped me quickly jump between niches.” – Michael Buchoff
Who Pluralsight Is Recommended For
Pluralsight is recommended for anyone who wants to learn tech skills, no matter their skill level. There’s tons of content for beginners, intermediate learners, and those with advanced skills/experience. However, it’s important to note that many Pluralsight subscribers say that content is aimed more towards those who already have some level of professional tech experience.
The Premium membership is also a good option for anyone who is looking to get a professional certification (e.g., CompTIA, ITIL®, PMP®) and needs guided prep materials and practice exams.
If you already have a CompTIA, PMI, or ISACA cert, Pluralsight is authorized as a continuing education provider, so you can take courses and obtain continuing education credits.
