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Skillshare

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3.9

Overall Score

LAST UPDATED: February 21st, 2024

Skillshare is an online learning community with thousands of creative and entrepreneurial classes to fuel lifelong learning. Students can access 100s of classes for free or upgrade to Premium to unlock access to the entire catalog of 20,000+ classes. Focusing on in-demand creative and entrepreneurial skills, Skillshare classes cover popular topics like design, marketing, freelancing, and more. Plus, classes include resources, projects, and community to provide a rich learning experience.

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The Good

  • Nontraditional Schooling
  • Free Trial
  • Premium Perks

Nontraditional Schooling

Skillshare is proud to focus on reinventing learning as it strives to break away from the "degree" mold and provide students with an innovating and intriguing training program to learn new skills. The online classes are full of creative online discussions and self-paced learning. Skillshare's training courses range from design to business to technology, and for a competitive price, users have unlimited access to thousands of interactive online courses and communication platforms to share projects and ideas. 

Each program offers short, on-demand video training from teachers who actually work in the subject field. The online classes are designed to help students complete their work on their own time, helping students progress at their own pace while still continuing to interact with other students and instructors throughout the duration of the class. Most instructional videos range from 45 minutes to an hour, which helps to hold the attention of the students and also provide significant time to complete assignments and projects while still maintaining a regular social schedule.

Free Trial

Skillshare also offers a free 2-month trial for new users that gives you unlimited access to Skillshare's course catalog of over 24,000 classes. If students like the material, they can then access classes anytime by paying $15 monthly or $99 for an annual premium membership. There is no contract so members can cancel their subscription at any time. In short, Skillshare is setting itself apart from the competition in three significant ways:

  • Charges a comparatively low monthly fee for unlimited access to the online learning platform
  • Provides offline learning for users on the go
  • Gives a 14-day free trial, also with unlimited access

Premium Perks

When signing up for a premium membership, members receive the following perks:

  • Unlimited access to over 24,000 classes
  • Ability to download classes within the app to watch later
  • No ads
  • Support Teachers
  • Scholarships
  • Get discounts on services and benefits*

*Annual premium membership only ($99/year) 

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The Bad

  • Traditional Education Seekers
  • Unclear Course Access

Traditional Education Seekers

For learners who are looking to have one-on-one contact with an instructor or teacher, who are wishing to be tested and quizzed on a regular basis, or who are hoping for a "typical classroom structure" Skillshare is not the appropriate option. 

This company also doesn't offer any proof of completing a course to be used in the workforce. Teachers and courses aim to help others learn new skills in their respective fields with an online learning community, not provide certification. 

Lastly, not all instructors are certified teaching professionals. Class videos can be taught by nearly anyone (this is not to discount the level of learning possible) and are not generated through Skillshare's internal company. This makes an traditional, instructor-led training even less likely.

Unclear Course Access

Skillshare offers those who are hesitant to sign up access to watch the beginning clip on thousands of their free classes. This gives potential members a feel for how the classes on Skillshare work. To unlock the rest of the course, Skillshare requires either a free or premium membership. 

However, if members only have the free membership, venturing beyond the free classes page can be frustrating since most of the classes require the premium membership to access the entire course. There is also no way to see which classes are a part of the premium membership. So members won’t know if they have access to the entire class until they click on it.

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The Bottom Line

For individuals searching for an online learning platform with affordable costs, endless class options, and independent, hands-on activities, Skillshare is a training provider that they should definitely look into. Customer reviews appreciate Skillshare's usability, the hundreds of free classes offered, and the quality of the short instructional videos. For many students, it seems to be the perfect training center. Furthermore, Skillshare offers packages for companies or teams hoping to include a large group of individuals in an instructional class.

However, potential members should consider and weigh the company's flaws to its strengths. The programs do not have direct instructor-led training, meaning students and instructors do not interact directly. Skillshare also does not offer any form of certification completion and they are not AICC or SCORM compliant, and many of the classes are locked unless you purchase the premium membership.

Nonetheless, Skillshare is a great online training site for those who are interested in a nontraditional way to gain experience in many different fields, expand their networking community, discover new opportunities and learn valuable soft and technical skills.

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Star Rating

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2.4

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127 Reviews

Review Breakdown

5 grade

26%

4 grade

7%

3 grade

2%

2 grade

3%

1 grade

61%

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Patrick Hocking

People complaing about the Company charging them, Need skillshare more than anybody or atleast really need to educated themselves. Skillshare doesn't charged the customers, Google does. You have to cancel the subscribtion in the pla store. Complaining about not being able to keep track. because of a busy schedule, just means that you are a management horror and I truely hope you don't have a high posisition in your Company. regardless, now my review. Skillshare is great and very cheap in comparison to alternatives. You may stick to Udemy or decide to take up official Courses costing a couple of thousands. Apart from increasing my know how on photography, SEOs, Animation and some Adobe Programms, I have also learned a couple of extra things and find interest in new Hobbies.

6 years ago

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Reply from Skillshare

Hi Patrick — Thank you for your review! We're glad to hear you've been enjoying Skillshare. It sounds like you've been able to explore a wide variety of classes and try out new hobbies. Thanks for being such an active member of our community.

Oct. 11th, 2018

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Brittney Mac Gregor Louisville, KY

I recently signed up to Skillshare in order to test the waters and so far I have been please what I have experienced. There are many options of things to choose from when it comes to a new skill to learn. The instruction is delivered via easy to follow videos and in some cases extra downloadable content. I am enjoying my subscription to Skillshare.

3 years ago

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Susan New York, NY

I've taken a number of classes on Skillshare, primarily in art techniques (gouache, pastel) but also in entrepreneurship. I really like the offerings and the format. Most of the classes are brief and to the point. They're taught by people teaching from their own experience, and that's what's really great for my purposes. For example, I took a couple of classes on how to get into design-related businesses by people who have done just that themselves. They told their own stories and gave concrete, realistic advice. The pastel class was great, all I needed to get going.

5 years ago

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milk mom Macomb, MI

The best thing about SkillShare is that it has wide variety of courses in every field. The courses are really good and explanation by the instructor is makes the hard course seem easy. It also has a good mobile application, which makes the learning more accessible. It also provides really nice feature of assessing ones knowledge for free once you complete your course.

5 years ago

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Elaine

I joined Skillshare to enhance my painting capabilities and have found the on-line courses very informative and helpful. I have been using various mediums like Gouache, watercolour and acrylic paints and the advice and techniques have given me very useful advice. The tutors are very knowledgeable and their course content is brilliant, the walk through at the beginning of each course on how to use colours from faint to dense colours , plus brush techniques are extremely useful.

5 years ago

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Keila Diaz Opa-locka, FL

Since I joined Skillshare a couple of months ago I have improved my photography and photo editing skills significantly. As a photographer and small business owner it is important to me to improve my skills at a cost effective option. Skillshare is that cost effective choice. Teachers like Cat C, Tabitha P and Kate A have been essential in my development as a photographer as well as my branding and marketing skills. I would 10/10 recommend Skillshare to anyone who is looking to improve any skill!

5 years ago

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Michael Gordon Lawrence, KS

I really love skillshare and have learned so much from their great classes. I see a lot of people complaining about being billed, but it seems to me that Skillshare works pretty much the same way that every subscription in the world does (audible, netflix, whatever) where in exchange for a free trial you are responsible for canceling if you don't want to get charged. Seems pretty reasonable to me.

6 years ago

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Reply from Skillshare

Hi Michael — Thank you for your note! We're glad to hear you've been enjoying your classes, and hope you'll continue learning on Skillshare.

Oct. 11th, 2018

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Logan Boyd Evansville, IN

Classes: The classes that they offer are very much so varied. You will find some teachers that do an excellent job and obviously care about the videos that they put out, and then others who you feel like just are trying to join in on the online classroom and trying to make some passive income. But you can watch any class for the first 15-20 minutes and tell if the person knows what they are saying or not. Price: I signed up for a 2month free trial, and when you put in your information right next to the confirmation button you can choose if you want to be billed monthly or yearly after your trial period ends (it also states that you will be billed a few days before your trial period ends to ensure funds will be transferred in time for your trial to end), a lot of people that say that they are getting charged unfairly are not really reading into it or looking at the obvious button dropdown menu that says yearly after trial and I just changed it to the monthly fee instead. Also, for a years worth of membership its less than $100, which is a very good value to me, heck, I went and got my BS Degree for Graphic Design at a community college (one of the cheapest in my state too) and ONE credit hour was $150 for only one semester, so to get an entire years worth of really nice content (although there are some bad teachers too, you will just have to see) you can have lots of quality videos to watch to improve your skills and see what others are doing as well. Overall: It is a good platform, and is very cheap for online classes, and I would say 80% of the classes are much better than what you can find on youtube, and then the other 20% you can totally tell they are just "forcing" videos out to try to make an extra dime, which I avoid those teachers now that I learned about it. Never had to talk to customer support yet so can't comment on that myself.

6 years ago

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Reply from Skillshare

Hi Logan — Thank you for your review! I'm glad to hear you've had a good experience with Skillshare so far and enjoyed a variety of classes. Thank you for being such an active member of our community!

Oct. 11th, 2018

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bridgit Brooklyn, NY

I've been a skillshare user for two years now and it's been really useful for me. I'm a freelance designer, and it allowed me to learn alot of specific skills i didn't learn in school in for a very fair price. each month there are new exciting things to learn. it is a subscription business, so you have to be aware of that if you start a trial, but i use several subscription services so this doesn't bother me.

6 years ago

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Ciaran Lyne

Be warned! Many reviews on this site for Skillshare contain the words "I forgot" when talking about the free trial. The fact that they forgot to cancel the trial even though it is very clearly stated that it will auto renew unless cancelled on the signup page. It's a shame really as the review scores are dragged down by this as, while not flawless, Skillshare and the majority of its courses are great. Just remember to take some of these reviews with a pinch of salt and the free trial is very much worth your time if you remember to cancel it (or let the payment go through if you enjoyed the courses as I have!).

6 years ago

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Navygem

Great for learning. I was offered the free trail for 2 months. BEFORE YOU START YOUR TRIAL you will see it has two payment options and explains that after the trial is over you get automatically charged onto the bank card you provided. Most people are getting charge $99 after the two months because they chose the $8/month and right under that it says $99 annually, meaning you get charged the whole annual cost at one sitting but it is cheaper in the long run. You aren’t getting scammed, you just don’t know how to read. Maybe take some english courses?

5 years ago

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Mila William Philadelphia, PA

I have been using Skillshare for over a year and I have found it an excellent resource for online art classes. A lot of my favorite designers and illustrators teach there, the variety of subjects is pretty staggering, and you always get feedback on your projects.

5 years ago

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TooBossy Franklin, TN

I received 2 free weeks of Skillshare through a promotion on a YouTube video, and I signed up for a paid subscription before it was up. The volume and variety of classes on Skillshare is amazing and constantly growing. I’m so glad to have a resource this huge, at such an affordable price.

5 years ago

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Ed Nurse Mobile, AL

I signed up for Skillshare in July, 2017 and have been a happy customer ever since. Their classes on graphic design and photography are significantly improved versus what is available on YouTube. I've actually been able to use the learning I had on Skillshare to succeed as a freelancer in graphic design!

6 years ago

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Reply from Skillshare

Hi Ed — Thanks for leaving this review! It's really great to hear that you've been able to use Skillshare to become a freelance designer. Happy learning!

Dec. 21st, 2018

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Lance Cornish Marietta, GA

I really like SkillShare. I believe the course material and the trainers are very good. I have quite a few of the training courses and have been impressed. I am currently in the middle of two others that I have found particularly valuable. I would like to to see some improvements to the UI, navigation and content discovery, but overall it's a great site and service.

6 years ago

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Reply from Skillshare

Hi Lance — Thank you for your review. I'm glad to hear you've had such a good experience with Skillshare classes and teachers so far. If you have any specific feedback about the site, please feel free to contact our Support Team at

Oct. 11th, 2018

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Jenny Eric Bethania, NC

Skillshare is the best too to get advanced knowledge and ideas for concerned industry and upgrade existing skills and expertise. I would strongly recommend Skillshare to all my colleagues.

5 years ago

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Tamanna Pande East Rochester, NY

I like the content of the tech courses provided by SkillShare. I consider the main benefit is having the course content. I think the content is relevant to our internal demand for up-to-date tech courses.

5 years ago

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Jesica Henry San Marcos, TX

I recommend Skillshare.com to anyone I come into contact with that works in the design field. It is an excellent platform for growth and the knowledge I have gained learning from some of my favorite designers is priceless!

5 years ago

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Eva Nar Lakeland, FL

All the courses I've done on Skillshare helped me develop my skill set and ultimately, grow my confidence in being creative without being too judgemental of imperfections of the creative process.

5 years ago

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UGO

A lot of course for a single subscription. Covering all the subject you want and courses are made by everyone. Courses are made by everyone, and are mostly made by non professionnal, content is mostly low quality, and in general just cover the surface of most subject they treat. A very bad point with skillshare is their subscription plan, their very inaccessible and well hidden option to disable your subscription. The difficulties to reach their customer support, and the most happy part, they will disable your access if your cancel your subscription even if your are in the middle of the month you have already payed.

5 years ago

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Reply from Skillshare

Hi there — Thanks for sharing your feedback. We're sorry to hear you haven't had the best experience with Skillshare. If you need to get in touch with our Support Team, please email , and someone should be in touch soon.

Dec. 21st, 2018

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melissa barrass

I think Skillshare is broad and inspiring. I love how I can touch up on my guitar skills and then learn something completely new on creative programs. I have finished 90% of classes feeling extremely satisfied.

6 years ago

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Reply from Skillshare

Hi Melissa — Thanks for your review! We're so glad to hear that you've been able to try out a number of creative classes on Skillshare. Thanks for being a part of our community.

Oct. 11th, 2018

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Sarah

I signed up for Skillshare as a free trial. The day BEFORE my trial was supposed to end I received an email from them thanking me for subscribing to Premium. Naturally, I was confused. It's normal for companies to offer free trials in hopes that you like the product enough to actually pay for it. What isn't normal is for the company to LIE to you and charge you the day before the free trial is supposed to even end, in effect tricking you and then stealing your money. I was furious. I looked online and after 30 minutes of digging I found a phone number for the company. (Red flag, what legitimate company does not have an easily accessible customer service number?). I called this number and it went directly to voicemail. The voice on the voicemail sounded like some stoned college kid, complete with "ums" and "likes". (Red flag number 2). At this point I was freaking out because I had just gotten scammed. The only option left to me was to write them an email through their website. This was over 3 months ago, and I have yet to get a response. I am appalled that they handle business this way. They stole my money without warning and are now unreachable. I went back on their website and even their advertisement for Premium is a lie. It clearly states that your Premium account is cancelable at anytime. What they actually mean is you can cancel it so that it won't renew at the next billing cycle (which is an entire year!!). They are crooks. If their content were any good, I would have happily continued using their services, but all their videos are things I can find on YouTube or other places for free. The only thing I an do now is save other people the hassle. DO NOT sign up for the free trial. Go to Lynda.com or YouTube. Please, don't make the same mistake I did, and stay away!! ***Update**** I wrote to Skillshare one last time, and it seems like in the past 4 months they have really upped their customer service game. I received a same-day response apologizing for my previous experience and with an offer to refund me all my money. This gesture was more than I expected, and I am grateful to know that people do actually work at this company, and it seems they are listening to the negative reviews and trying to create a better company. I still have a sour taste in my mouth, but I feel like after they ended up giving me all my money back I should update my review and give them more than one star.

7 years ago

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Joseph Horseradish Hren San Francisco, CA

The breadth of classes available is staggering. I'm impressed with just how far down I can drill into certain specialties. Well worth the monthly fee. I'm learning new skills in software animation, music recording, storyboarding, anthropology, and cooking, and I'm just getting started on my second month.

8 years ago

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Review Source

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roberto arcia Columbia, MO

Skillshare has been really great! I use it to learn about different things, mainly cooking techniques. I had never really cooked before I started living by myself, but skillshare allowed me to cook whole meals for myself. I would recommend skillshare to anyone looking for new ways to do daily-life tasks.

3 years ago

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Jennifer Boykin Richmond, VA

Zero stars. Classes were mediocre at best. I accidentally let my membership renew because I didn’t receive a reminder about it, and when I canceled it and contacted them minutes after I was charged, I was refused a refund. I found it overpriced, underwhelming, and customer service gave canned answers with no cooperation. I do not recommend.

8 months ago

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cloudy Santa Clara, CA

First of all, can I give them zero star? I registered skillshare three years ago, After the 14-day trial period ended, my account became a premium account without knowing it, and they keep charging me $141 annual fee in these 3 years. (I have not logged in in the past three years) When I finally realized this time and ask for refund , they answer me can't get any refund 7 days after the deduction. But I saw the credit card bill for more than 7 days, so this policy is simply unreliable. I was unable to check the bill while abroad for the first two years, I haven't received any emails about the bill ( that most companies do) and actually any email from skillshare, Ironically, since I cancelled my account, I have been receiving ad emails from Skillshare. Hahaha, so funny. What a terrible company this is! Friends remember 14-day trial IS A TRAP!

3 years ago

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ea CanBow Southport, QLD

I wish I had of read these reviews before signing up. Signed up for free trial. Did not receive any emails welcoming me or anything. I tried to log into my account and was locked out, despite entering the correct details. The forget password also did not work. So now they have my credit card details and I am not able to log into the account to cancel the trial. They also don't have a phone or chat contact and you can only contact them via their website (they also don't have an email contact). I had to cancel my credit card to prevent any charges. I really wish youtubers would stop promoting this site! PLEASE DO NOT IGNORE THESE REVIEWS --> SKILL SHARE IS A SCAM!!!

3 years ago

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Verified Customer with Skillshare Chicago, IL

I was able to get a Premium membership with a discount code and paid $69.30 via Paypal on 5-30-20. Today, (7-2-20) I found that I was billed AGAIN for the full $99.00 directly to my credit card, which was NOT authorized in any way shape or form. Both charges were verified thru my account and both are for the annual service. The only thing I can think of is their app somehow was able to get access to my banking info via my phone which has my card info as I NEVER typed this in on their site. And, btw, There is NO customer support at all via phone. You have to email them thru their contact page. At this point, I don't care about how accidental this was with their app. I never authorized the charge and never went into any settings or toggled any buttons to authorize this charge. And to have to be dependent on whenever the heck they decide to respond to the web page/email is totally unacceptable. Period.

4 years ago

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Ginny Prosch Tuscaloosa, AL

Like other reviews on this site, I had an awful experience with Skillshare Customer Service when I asked for a refund. I signed up for a free trial. I tried it out for about 10 minutes, wasn't super impressed, and figured I would try again at some point. Well, lo and behold, my free trial ends- because it was a two month trial and I was never notified of when it would expire. I got billed the monthly price (thank goodness) and the DAY that it showed up on my bank account I contacted Skillshare for a refund. I had not used the service and did not plan to for the foreseeable future. I figured this owuld be super easy, since I have never had trouble asking companies to refund me for forgetting to cancel a subscription. Just days before, Amazon refunded me over 100 dollars for a Prime membership that I wasn't planning on renewing, because it went unused- and that isn't even the only example! Like I said, I figured it would be no trouble. I really wish I could post the exchange between me and the customer service rep. It is embarrassing that they adhere to these kinds of business policies. He kept telling me that they were very transparent with the refund policy, and that I was emailed 3 days before the trial ended. I cannot find any such email, not even in my spam folder. I repeatedly told the rep that I did not use the service, was not notified when the trial would end, and could not see myself using Skillshare because of this experience. He had the nerve to offer me a 40 percent discount on a premium membership. I will NEVER use Skillshare because of this experience, and I mean it when I say I would have considered re-subscribing at a later time. Now there is not a chance. They can keep my 20 dollars and enjoy all of the negative pr. I certainly hope that 20 bucks was worth it.

4 years ago

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KFR Santa Monica, CA

Skillshare took my money and refused a refund just like everyone else here. I contacted my bank to reverse the charge. I have them all of the details: canceled my account a long time ago, didn’t agree to auto pay, never received an email to tell me they would be charging me, etc. The bank did an investigation and then refunded my money. Do it. Tell them about this site, and the Better Business Bureau website where they have an F rating and a lot of customer complaints. Skillshare has to cough up the money PLUS a service charge to the bank. They are just hoping you won’t. If enough people do this then they’ll have to change their policy. Unless, of course, their whole business model is to defraud people.

4 years ago

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Lindsay Gavine

I signed up to Skillshare for the free trial. All of the tutorials looked very bland and basic, the kind of thing you could find on youtube for free. I wasn't interested at all. I forgot to unsubscribe to the service and since then they've been charging me £84.00 a year. They did this twice until I noticed a few days ago. they only agreed to send me the last payment and not the first one. I want ALL of my money back. I never watched a single one of their videos! If I had automatically been assigned a monthly plan the impact would not have been so devastating and I would have been able to notice sooner but they took all of this money at once which really hurts me, I think they assign the annual plan for this reason. Skillshare, give me back my £168.00!!!!!

4 years ago

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S Ballston Spa, NY

After the end of a free trial period I was charged when I got no notice of the end, not a big deal as usually that'd be a MONTHLY fee which you can notice that first time, chalk up as oh well my mistake, and go and cancel. Not a full yearly fee. I noticed the charge, which happened on the 13th, on the 14th when I wasn't able to pay a bill. I found the transaction on paypal and sent an email to the address on the transaction. Supposedly a support email. I got No response. Not a one. Not even a form message saying we've got it and will get back to you. But I gave it what seemed like a reasonable amount of time for them to respond, a week, and then went to find another contact method. Only, this time I did get a response. Telling me well shucks darn if only you'd contacted us earlier as there's only a week to cancel and ask for a refund. We're afraid you can't do that. Such a shame you're three days past the deadline. Not that I was only past the deadline because they didn't respond to their supposed support email that was on the paypal transaction or anything. I know these sorts of businesses live and die hoping people will mess up, because they exist to take money and wish you never remember to cancel a subscription. Like a gym. But one that prays largely on young people who watch youtube. I wasn't even asking for a full refund, i was willing to accept my responsibility in not cancelling things immediately, I was happy for them to keep a monthly amount. It's downright skeevy that after a free trial it jumps immediately to a yearly fee.

5 years ago

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Amyra James Phoenix, AZ

It has been almost 2 years as a premium member of skillshare. It is a good source for creative learning. There are plenty of courses that matched my interest.

5 years ago

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Nena Gomez Keyes, OK

If you love learning something great & in a short time, like me :) Skillshare is an amazing platform to learn new skills in short and very effective classes.

5 years ago

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Jesica Austin, TX

SkillShare is focused on many topics such data analysis, machine Learning, open-source web technologies and artificial intelligence, which are useful in my future job.

5 years ago

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Lisa Krause Cincinnati, OH

SkillShare gives lots of knowledge to colleague which benefits business. I learned Javascript, JAVA and much more programming technology through SkillShare learning platform.

5 years ago Edited September 14, 2021

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Lucia6

I have used this for Public Relations, Marketing, social media engagement and several other business classes to help me improve my business knowledge and ethics.

5 years ago

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Brian

Got billed automatically with limited notice Nevertheless named to get in touch via email within a few minutes. They issued refund via my payment method PayPal

5 years ago

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Sonia Graham The Lakes, NV

It's very convenient. The free trial period allowed me to get a feel for the platform and quality of the courses. I thought all in all it was a very good investment.

5 years ago

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Bill Steve & Gate Jobs South Berwick, ME

I had promo code for skillshare 2 month premium trial so I go to link my PayPal which is an option but it doesnt accept my paypal unless I give them one of my bank cards also? What a huge scam skillshare is pulling trying to be sneaky with wanting not only my paypal but a bank card on top of it? I'll tell you why skillshare wants your card so bad is because they know they can over draft your account if you have no money in your account and also its harder to get the bank to reverse their transactions. Skillshare gives start up companies a bad name trying to pull scams like they are pulling. Skillshare dont have anyone answering their customer service line but they have someone answering everyone of these posts trying to undo the damage they probably wont be able to bounce back from. Thus the reason why they havent changed their scamming ways over the years because they know their company is horrible. I feel bad for anyone who gets taken by this company skillshare.

5 years ago

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Bryana C. Elmhurst, NY

I'm so relieved I'm not the only one who fell for this baloney. I used a promo code for Skillshare from a YouTuber I watched because the site seemed like it was a very good, reliable resource to learn new skills or brush up on old ones. Perhaps it is, though I also see reviews that say otherwise but I'll chalk that up to those users being unable to find courses that they're interested in. Like many other reviewers, I was also charged $99 for an annual Premium Membership. When I signed up for the free trial using the code, I recall seeing the check box asking if I allowed the site to charge me once the trial time was up and I remember explicitly leaving that box UNCHECKED, which should be an indicator to the company I did NOT want to be charged. On December 18th, however, I received an automated email thanking me for the $99 payment and welcoming me as a Premium Member (though my bank statements stated the payment was still pending from December 17th). I did not have money for a $99 charge (and, again, I told the site NOT to charge me after the trial) and immediately sent in a ticket stating this payment was done in error and that I would like a refund. I expected a response within the same day, as that is usually the case with other sites, but received none. "Alright," I thought, "these sites always say it may take 24 hours for customer service to respond. I'll give them time." A whole day and a few hours go by (maybe about a day and 5 or so hours), no response. I sent in another ticket since my bank account still showed the charge as pending. I was still up late last night/early this morning and received an email from my bank that I was charged an additional $34 for insufficient funds on a $99 charge. What?! I checked my account and sure enough the $99 payment patched through. I was furious, sent yet another ticket to Skillshare about the payment error and also sent a message to my bank, whom responded a couple hours later with a telephone number to speak with a bank clerk. It was late, so I decided to just go to bed and deal with it when I wake up. When I woke up this morning, I immediately called the number I was given; unfortunately, the bank was only able to refund the $34 they charged and they currently can't do anything about the $99 charge until 5 or more business have past before they can make a case to the company on my behalf. I was slightly annoyed the bank couldn't help me right away, but at least I knew they would be willing to help me, so I let it go. However, when I told my mother about the situation, she showed me a review from this site with a young woman who had the same exact problem. I check for myself and see my incident wasn't an isolated one, and I even saw a couple reviewers state Skillshare has a no refund policy. I don't recall seeing that ANYWHERE on the trial sign-up, and, if it was, it must've been very, VERY fine print because I did not see it. Should I have paid more attention? Yes. Am I completely at fault? No, I don't believe so. As many other reviewers have pointed out, I too did not receive any email or notification of any kind warning me my trial was ending soon nor one asking for clarification if I still wanted to upgrade to become a member (though the answer to the latter was obviously "no" because I left the would-you-like-to-be-charged-after-your-trial box unchecked). Even if they're short-handed on customer service staff, the fact I'm sending in THREE tickets should've indicated to them this is an emergency, and from the looks of it I'm not the only one who sent in multiple tickets and heard nothing (I believe there were a very small handful of reviewers who said they received a response, some even relatively quickly, and got their refund...and good for them). Again, I'm sure Skillshare is great, but the way they go about their payment methods and customer service is atrocious! Bottom line: If you have the money to be paying for an annual-$99 membership and want to learn new skills, by all means give this site a go and see how it works out. If you just wanted to check it out through a trial and/or you don't have the time nor, more importantly, money to actively put this site to use, avoid Skillshare; you're better off looking up information on Google or YouTube for free or just looking elsewhere for a cheaper online learning program. EDIT: Skillshare finally got back to me. I sent an email to help@skillshare.com and received a response within the hour (just as fair notice, I DID give them an...let's just say ultimatum should they not refund my $99). I'm not sure if it was my "charisma" or sending an email to that email address, but I will say you may be better off sending a direct email to help@skillshare.com and skipping the support center on the site since sending a ticket via that system seems unreliable.

5 years ago

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Nishita McLean, VA

I am an instructional designer and I can tell that they are trying really hard, their quality of courses and presentation is good, the content is well thought through. I understand the frustration that people have.. it is more to do with the administrative end. However, there is a huge room for improvement.

5 years ago

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Reply from Skillshare

Hi Nishita — Thank you for your feedback. If you'd like to share more with our Support Team, please feel free to reach out at .

Dec. 21st, 2018

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pcampagna Indiana, PA

This site is HORRIBLE. Especially if you try and search for anything, or want to view all the videos. I type in 'premier pro 2018' and Excel classes come up?? Not to mention every other version of Premier pro come up which are meaningless and a waste of time trying to find the correct version. Plus photoshop classes come up and as mention freaking excel?? I try to view more videos and when I click on "Show all" I get 15 videos and that's it?? So the search doesn't work worth crap, the video are irrelevant for what I want, or search for, and what is 'recommended' doesn;t have any relevance to me and the list of things I selected when I created the account. . The worst part is you can't see all the videos available. Then when you do find something that looks like it would help, some guy who can barely speak english is teaching it. That's fine if I wanted to struggle to understand someone for 4 hours, but no thanks. Horrible site and just avoid it. Youtube has a million times better content for free. They woulld have to pay me to use this site. Worthless.

6 years ago

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Tony Lake Villa, IL

I didn't watch any classes during my trial, though I would have loved to. 1 star is because of their bogus no-notification policy for charging your bank account when your trial ends. You sign up for a trial, then check a little box that says you're okay with them charging you for premium after your trial ends and also you're okay with their no refund policy and (unstated) no notification policy. Therefore, unless you want premium, you better have your calendar(s) marked to cancel your membership before it's too late or you'll be screwed out of 99 dollars. They won't give you any heads up beforehand, just a little email in your promo thanking you for choosing premium and notifying you that your card has been charged. I understand that if I paid more attention this wouldn't have happened, but it's truly a disgusting way to treat your customers.

6 years ago

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Reply from Skillshare

Hi Tony — Sorry to hear about this. If you haven't contacted our Support Team about this yet, please send us a private message here with your email address and we'll make sure someone reaches out ASAP.

Dec. 21st, 2018

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Nathan Claeys Mesa, AZ

I fell into the enticement of 2 months for .99$ I went through a few tutorials on HTML and CSS. The content was bad, but I actually found better tutorials and content for free on a variety of other sites including YouTube. I payed for 1 additional month @ 15$ becuase I forgot to cancel in time. Looking at my bank statement 3 months later I saw they they had continued charging me 15$/month. Apparently my cancellation didn't take, which admittedly may be my fault, as I was unable to locate the cancellation confirmation email. After actually cancelling I saw that you have to submit through several pages to finally cancel, and I still did not receive a cancellation confirmation via email. Like a typically salty ex-customer I requested a refund for the months I was charge for a service I did not use. I have been told to expect one months refund in 10 or so business days. They track your usage on the site so it looks like I was charged 60.99$ for 3.5hrs of tutorials.... College was cheaper...

6 years ago

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Marika Mkheidze

Long story short: I signed up to the premium package of the skillshare and I forgot to cancel it by the time the trial period expired. Why is that? alongside with the fact that most of us is busy to keep track of all the websites we tend to sign up to, I found the classes quite dissatisfying and soon forgot about them at all. However, I was gullible enough not to check the refund policy offered by the site - they offer no refund. My suggestion is as follows: unless you change said policy, please, be considerate enough to send out emails after the expiration of subscriber's trial period to make sure that they are willing to continue learning through your sources. Otherwise, you may come across as yet another money-hungry corporation, rather than friendly, educational community. Please, don't get me wrong - it's not (only) about the money, it's about trust and respect of the business you choose to cooperate with/learn from.

6 years ago

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Nevin Cole Saint Augustine, FL

Gonna be honest, I can't say much about the quality of the stuff they offer, because I never even got that far. I got a free trial via a link from a youtuber and I even found a class I would have been interested in, so the trial would have been perfect. But here comes the tricky part - before you can even start to use your "free trial" they want your credit card information, which kind of alarmed me. But I thought "Oh well, I can always cancel before the time runs out", since I really only had 1 class I was interested in. BUT since I use a so-called "prepaid credit card", they don't even let me sign up. In hindsight that probably saved me some cash (knowing that now after reading the other reviews), but it still stinks that something trivial as which type of credit card one has decides if someone gets access or not. I turned my back to skillshare and probably won't ever look back

6 years ago

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saki

So i just realized that skillshare does not remind you when the trial is about to end, so I've payed almost 100 dollars for this. Looked up if I could get a refund, and apparently 'they don't do refunds.' Figuring I might as well use it anyways since I've already paid and cant do anything to get it back, I decided I'll just cancel and I'll still be able to use it for the rest of the /payed/ year, only to find out that there's a setback to this in access to videos??? Very convinced that skillshare only profits from forgetful people and keeps them in by giving them less access if you cancel, only for the same people to forget to cancel a few days before the next billing date again. What a cycle, it's almost funny now realizing it... Bottom line, please know what you're getting into. If you're forgetful and only doing it for the trial, don't do it. Bad idea :(

7 years ago

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Emaad Eatontown, NJ

First off, Skillshare provides a good service, but i did not find it particularly useful so after a few months of the trial, i cancelled my membership, but was still charged $96 Reading most of the reviews, and how people changed their credit cards after this ,etc had me very worried. I sent Skillshare a request for refund,and Skillshare was good enough to respond in 24 hours, and provide a full refund! So they may have upped their customer support game. Good on them. Be careful with the site though, cancelling memberships seem to be a recurring problem.

7 years ago

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Jake Smiles

I have a very similar experience to many other people writing before me. After the free trial expired, they, without any notification, just started to take my money every month. I've never received any bills or any reminder that my next month's fee is dued. I haven't even been using their site after the first few weeks. I noticed the stealing after months, by total accident. When I contacted them, nobody even bothered to answer. I got an automated message saying that they are sorry to see me going, but my account still looks exactly the same. So I had to get my bank card distroyed and had to apply for a new one because I was worried that they would not stop taking my money. (Of course, my bank also should have double checked with me about authorization, which they didn't.) I would not recommend this site. The content is not worth the hassle. There's a lot of other online studying option out there.

7 years ago