I’ve become concerned about my tendency to watch whatever the YouTube algorithm puts in front of me. Shorts, especially, are prone to be devoid of meaningful life-enriching content.
To alleviate this, below is a list of YouTube channels that will educate and entertain — edutainment, you might say.
Crash Course
| At Crash Course, we believe that high-quality educational videos should be available to everyone for free! Subscribe for weekly videos from our current courses! The Crash Course team has produced more than 45 courses on a wide variety of subjects, including organic chemistry, literature, world history, biology, philosophy, theater, ecology, and many more! We also recently teamed up with Arizona State University to bring you more courses on the Study Hall channel. |
They break down complex topics into easy-to-understand lessons, making learning enjoyable.
Choose a topic from any of their playlists and start learning!
Skillshare
| Skillshare is an online learning community for creatives. |
Most classes are under 60 minutes so you can learn new skills quickly. Skillshare is best for gaining skills you can put into action right away.
Choose a topic from any of their playlists and start learning!
Y Combinator
| Videos to help you build a successful startup. Subscribe for startup advice, founder stories, and a look inside Y Combinator. What is Y Combinator? We invest $500,000 in every startup and work intensively with the founders for three months. For the life of their company, founders have access to the most powerful community in the world, essential advice, later-stage funding and programs, recruiting resources, and exclusive deals. Visit ycombinator.com to learn more. |
“Learn to move at the speed you need to.” It features interviews with successful entrepreneurs who share their experiences and tips for starting and growing a business.
The videos cover business strategy, fundraising, product development, leadership, and more.
Their most useful content comes from startup school, where you can find details on how to turn an idea into an actual company.
MIT OpenCourseWare
| A free and open online publication of educational material from thousands of MIT courses, covering the entire MIT curriculum, ranging from introductory to the most advanced graduate courses. On the OCW website, each course includes a syllabus, instructional material like notes and reading lists, and learning activities like assignments and solutions. Some courses also have videos, online textbooks, and faculty insights on teaching. Knowledge is your reward. There’s no signup or enrollment, and no start or end dates. OCW is self-paced learning at its best. Whether you’re a student, a teacher, or simply a curious person that wants to learn, MIT OpenCourseWare (OCW) offers a wealth of insight, inspiration, videos, and a whole lot more! Get the full picture on the OCW website at https://ocw.mit.edu. |
This YouTube channel offers free online courses from MIT, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
You can access video lectures, assignments, labs, exams, and more from over 2,400 MIT courses.
They cover a wide range of subjects for free. Impress your friends by casually saying someting like, “Oh yeah, I remember that from an MIT lecture”.
TED-Ed
| “TED-Ed’s mission is to create lessons worth sharing. Feed and expand your curiosity with our award-winning animated shorts – published on YouTube and available with supplemental learning materials on ed.ted.com.” |
This YouTube channel has a wide range of educational videos on various topics.
Their videos are typically under 5 minutes and explain topics in imaginative ways that stick.
TED-Ed is a great way to discover new knowledge that will make you think.
Talks at Google
| Talks at Google is a leader in the corporate interview series space, providing a platform for influential thinkers, creators, makers and doers to tell us about their work, their lives and what drives them to shape our world. We host talks virtually and physically across 30+ Google offices worldwide, and often record and release these talks publicly. Subscribe to our audio-only “Talks at Google” podcast everywhere podcasts are found via https://linktr.ee/talksatgoogle. |
They cover various topics like finance, technology, and personal development.
Watching these gives you a fascinating look at new ideas.
Khan Academy
| Khan Academy is a nonprofit providing a free, world-class education for anyone, anywhere. Our interactive practice problems, articles, and videos help students succeed in math, biology, chemistry, physics, history, economics, finance, grammar, and many other topics. Khan Academy provides teachers with data on how their students are doing so they can identify gaps in learning and provide tailored instruction. We also offer free personalized SAT and LSAT practice in partnership with the College Board and the Law School Admission Council. Our resources have been translated into dozens of languages, and 15 million people around the globe learn on Khan Academy each month. Want to extend your learning beyond YouTube? Practice what you’ve just discovered for free: www.khanacademy.org |
The videos break down topics into digestible chunks, making it easy to learn difficult concepts.
This YouTube channel has a huge collection of educational videos.
freeCodeCamp
| Learn to code for free. |
This YouTube channel is perfect for those interested in learning how to code.
It has a variety of tutorials and lessons on various programming languages and web development.
Their community forums are also helpful for getting questions answered.
The Great Courses
| The Great Courses makes lifelong learning and personal enrichment accessible to anyone, anywhere with video lectures delivered by the world’s most fascinating and engaging professors and experts. With course topics ranging from astronomy to zen, The Great Courses covers a broad collection of categories, including courses on history, science, economics, literature, philosophy, religion, music, and mathematics. Enrichment education categories include travel, professional development, health, food and wine, and hobby and leisure topics. Learners get more than just access to classes; they have the opportunity to gain detailed knowledge and get unique perspectives on the topics that interest them most. The Great Courses include unique learning experiences that aren’t available anywhere else, such as a course that studies the events of a single year and focuses on how those events shaped the world—a history buff’s dream! |
Kurzgesagt – In a Nutshell
| Animation videos explaining things with optimistic nihilism since 12,013. We’re a team of illustrators, animators, number crunchers and one dog who aim to spark curiosity about science and the world we live in. To us nothing is boring if you tell a good story. |
CGP Grey
History, geography, culture.
Veritasium
| An element of truth – videos about science, education, and anything else I find interesting. |
3Blue1Brown
| My name is Grant Sanderson. Videos here cover a variety of topics in math, or adjacent fields like physics and CS, all with an emphasis on visualizing the core ideas. The goal is to use animation to help elucidate and motivate otherwise tricky topics, and for difficult problems to be made simple with changes in perspective. For more information, other projects, FAQs, and inquiries see the website: https://www.3blue1brown.com |
Deep Look
| DEEP LOOK is a science video series that explores big science by going very, very small, from KQED and PBS Digital Studios. We use macro photography and microscopy in glorious 4K resolution, to see science up close … really, really close. |
PBS Space Time
| Space Time explores the outer reaches of space, the craziness of astrophysics, the possibilities of sci-fi, and anything else you can think of beyond Planet Earth with our astrophysicist host: Matthew O’Dowd. Matt O’Dowd spends his time studying the universe, especially really far-away things like quasars, super-massive black holes, and evolving galaxies. He uses telescopes in space to do it. Matt completed his Ph.D. at NASA’s Space Telescope Science Institute, followed by work at the University of Melbourne and Columbia University. He’s now a professor at the City University of New York’s Lehman College and an Associate at the American Museum of Natural History’s Hayden Planetarium. Previous host Gabe Perez-Giz is an astrophysicist who studies black hole physics. He received his Ph.D. from Columbia University and also hosted PBS Infinite Series. |
Be Smart
| Be Smart is created and hosted by Joe Hanson, Ph.D. We give you deep answers to simple questions about science and the rest of the universe. |
SciShow
| SciShow explores the unexpected. We delve into the scientific subjects that defy our expectations and make us even more curious! |
SmarterEveryDay
| I explore the world using science. That’s pretty much all there is to it. Watch 2 videos. If you learn something AWESOME, please subscribe if you feel like I earned it. |
Computerphile
| Videos all about computers and computer stuff. Sister channel of Numberphile. |
Numberphile
| Videos about numbers and mathematics. |
AsapSCIENCE
| Making science make sense. |
Half as Interesting
| Education-y explainer videos that are almost good enough to watch. |
Wendover Productions
| Wendover Productions is all about explaining how our world works. From travel, to economics, to geography, to marketing and more, every video will leave you with a little better understanding of our world. New videos go out every other Tuesday. |
Vsauce
Curious questions and interesting facts.
| Our World is Amazing. Vsauce was created by Michael Stevens in the summer of 2010. |
Real Engineering
| The home of innovation. |
Lectures by Walter Lewin
| This channel contains the complete 8.01x (Physics I: Classical Mechanics), 8.02x (Physics II: Electricity and Magnetism) and 8.03 (Physics III: Vibrations and Waves) lectures as presented by Walter Lewin in the fall of 1999, spring of 2002 and fall of 2004. The 8.01x and 8.02x edX lectures are high resolution (480p) versions of the more commonly seen OCW versions. Some edits were also made by Lewin. 8.03 is the OCW version, also in a 480p resolution. Links to lecture notes, assignments/solutions and exams/solutions are added. Playlists with Help Sessions for 8.01x, 8.02x and 8.03 are also available. They are “mini lectures”. The problems discussed in these videos should be apparent after watching the first few minutes. Other playlists show Lewin in various appearances and his Bi-Weekly Physics problems/solutions and several excellent lectures by Feynman and others. Published under a Creative Commons (BY-NC-SA) License. The material is neither affiliated with nor endorsed by MIT. |
Stand-up Maths
| I do mathematics and stand-up. Sometimes simultaneously. Occasionally while being filmed. (It’s quite the Venn diagram.) Principle channel supporter: Jane Street https://www.janestreet.com/ http://standupmaths.com |
GreatScott!
| Awesome Electronics Tutorials, Projects and How To´s |
Welch Labs
| Math, Science, and Machine Learning resources. |
