React is one of the most widely used libraries for building web interfaces, and there is no shortage of courses on it on Udemy. The difficulty isn't a lack of options: the big React courses all look alike, and the course card tells you almost nothing about what separates one from another. This shortlist covers four React courses where the differences are visible — in length, rating, update date, and how much of your time they will actually ask for. Plus one thing worth doing before you buy any of them.
React starts with JavaScript
React isn't a language. It's a library on top of JavaScript, and every React course assumes you can already read JS without stumbling over the basics:
- arrow functions, regular functions, scope;
- object and array destructuring, the spread operator;
- array methods: map, filter, reduce;
- promises and async/await, calling an API;
- modules: import and export.
All four courses below are tagged All Levels on Udemy. That is not the same as "for people who have never programmed". The most popular of them puts a 1 h 42 min JavaScript refresher in its second section: the best part of two hours jogging your memory is not a course in the language itself.
If that list looks unfamiliar, the order is JavaScript first, React second. A month on the language saves two months of fighting the library — most of a beginner's "incomprehensible" React errors turn out to be misread JavaScript. Where to go: the shortlist of JavaScript courses for beginners and the JavaScript courses page.
A quick self-test before buying a React course: can you say what
[1, 2, 3].map((n) => n * 2) returns, and how await differs from
.then()? If both answers arrive without a search, you're ready to start.
Three big courses: all of React
The selection criteria are the ones from the Python course shortlist: a high rating across a large number of ratings, a recent update, and a curriculum built on projects. For React the weighting shifts, though — the update date decides. React code from 2019 and React code from 2026 look noticeably different: class components gave way to function components with hooks, and the standard approaches to state and routing changed with them. A course that hasn't been reissued in five years will teach you to maintain somebody's old project, not to write a new one.
The three courses below are the foundational ones: each has more than 70 hours of video, React from scratch, and everything usually bolted around it.
React - The Complete Guide (incl. Next.js, Redux)
Maximilian Schwarzmüller's course has the largest audience of any React course on the platform: 241,948 ratings at 4.6, carrying two of Udemy's badges at once — Bestseller and Highest Rated. It runs 71 h 21 min and was last updated 1/2026. Inside: React and hooks, routing, Redux and Next.js — not just the library itself, but the things real projects wrap around it.
The bigger the audience, the better the odds that a beginner's question has already been asked and answered in the Q&A before you get there. That's no guarantee, but small courses don't have the advantage at all.
Who it's for
Be ready to spend several months on it. This is the hard-to-get-wrong choice.
Modern React with Redux
Stephen Grider's course: 4.6 across 89,150 ratings, 75 h 33 min, updated 2/2026. It carries no Bestseller badge, but by review count it is second among React courses specifically, behind only Schwarzmüller's. The curriculum is organised around how an application is put together: hooks, Context, React Router, Redux, and styling with Tailwind CSS.
For almost the same runtime the range of topics is narrower — which means more time on each one.
Who it's for
Anyone who has poked at React through short videos and wants to finally see how the pieces connect.
The Ultimate React Course 2025: React, Next.js, Redux & More
Jonas Schmedtmann's course — the same instructor whose JavaScript course opens our shortlist for the language. Its 4.7 is the highest rating of the four, but it also has noticeably fewer ratings behind it: 26,972. It's the longest course here — 83 h 52 min across 40 sections.
Look at the update date, though: 5/2025. That's recent by the platform's standards, but it's the oldest of the four.
Who it's for
Anyone who got on with the same instructor's JavaScript course — you're buying a familiar format.
The short option: if you'll never finish 70 hours
The average course in the trio above is nearly 77 hours of video, and with practice, debugging and rewatching it realistically takes two or three times that. Plenty of buyers never finish a course that size, and it's more honest to admit that before paying than at hour twenty.
React JS Masterclass: Zero To Job Ready With 10 Projects
Shubham Sarda's course: 35 hours — less than half the length of any of the three above — and updated 7/2026, the most recent date in the shortlist. The curriculum is built around ten projects.
To be straight about the numbers: 2,594 ratings at 4.4 is two orders of magnitude fewer reviews than Schwarzmüller's course has. That doesn't make it a bad course, but the sample is small, so the rating is less stable. Calling it well known or much discussed would be untrue — its strengths are elsewhere: it's the newest and the shortest. Our usual floor is 4.5 across tens of thousands of ratings; this is the one pick in the shortlist where we dropped that floor on purpose — in exchange for how current the material is, and for a length people actually finish.
Who it's for
A short course you finish is worth more than a long one you abandon, and that isn't a compromise — it's a sensible choice.
The four courses in numbers
Figures taken from the course pages in September 2026 — ratings and rating counts on Udemy move daily, so check the course page before you buy.
| Course | Instructor | Rating | Ratings | Length | Updated |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| React - The Complete Guide | Maximilian Schwarzmüller | 4.6 | 241,948 | 71 h 21 min | 1/2026 |
| Modern React with Redux | Stephen Grider | 4.6 | 89,150 | 75 h 33 min | 2/2026 |
| The Ultimate React Course 2025 | Jonas Schmedtmann | 4.7 | 26,972 | 83 h 52 min | 5/2025 |
| React JS Masterclass | Shubham Sarda | 4.4 | 2,594 | 35 h | 7/2026 |
If you still can't decide, read the table like this:
- You want one course for the whole subject — Schwarzmüller.
- Understanding state and architecture matters most — Grider.
- You're choosing by rating and ready for the volume — Schmedtmann.
- Time is short and you need a result this quarter — Sarda.
React courses in Russian
If English is still a barrier, Udemy has React courses in Russian — the search with the language filter returns a full page of them: React in Russian, sorted by review count. Screen them on the same signals: a high rating, a meaningful number of ratings, a recent update date, and a curriculum with projects in it.
Comparing a Russian-language course with Schwarzmüller's on absolute review count is pointless — the audiences aren't comparable. Look at the rating, the update date, and what the instructor promises in the curriculum.
None of the four course pages above lists Russian among its subtitle languages. That list varies by account and country, so check it on the course page itself — if listening to English is hard work, that's a strong argument for a Russian-language course.
Buying and redeeming a course from Russia
Udemy doesn't take Russian-issued cards directly, but the course can still be bought officially — as a gift. Paste the course link into the form on the ForUdemy homepage, check the price in rubles, and pay by card, SBP or cryptocurrency: the gift code usually reaches your inbox within a couple of minutes. Every payment route, the do-it-yourself ones included, is compared in the guide to paying for Udemy from Russia.
One condition matters more than the payment itself, and buyers often learn it with the code already in hand: the key only redeems in a Udemy account that was not created in Russia. Paying needs no VPN; redeeming does. If your account is tied to Russia, set up a new one in advance — it takes a couple of minutes. Redemption errors, and what to do when a code is refused, are covered in how to redeem a Udemy gift code.
Check the account before you pay, not after. Sign in to the account you intend to use, open any paid course page in a browser (not the mobile app), and look at the currency of the price. Rubles mean the account is tied to Russia and the code won't work in it. Any other currency — dollars, euros, lira, zloty — shows no ruble tie. The account requirement is set out in full on the how to buy page.
What to do when the course ends
A course is material, not a result. Three steps separate a person with a course from a person with a skill:
- Your own project, with no hand-holding. Not an extension of the instructor's project — something of your own, however small and ugly. This is where you find out what you understood and what you merely watched.
- Reading other people's code. Open any open-source React project and work out how its components are laid out. A week of that and the structure of your own project improves on its own.
- The next tool, not the next React course. TypeScript and Next.js are the natural continuation — you'll regularly see them in job listings alongside React.
A second big React course after the first adds little; the curricula overlap heavily. That time is better spent on a project.
Every course in the subject, with descriptions and current prices, is on the React courses page — the same page will tell you what a specific course costs in rubles.
Buy Udemy Courses
Paste a course link → pay by card, crypto, or another supported method → get access in 2 minutes
Check Course Price
