C++ Tutorial for Complete Beginners (Udemy.com)

A free, 18-hour introduction to C++ from John Purcell, a former contractor turned full-time trainer, spread over 82 lectures in 11 sections. It starts with basic syntax and works through functions, classes, pointers and memory, and inheritance before spending nearly five hours building a particle fire simulation with a taste of game development. Around 709,000 students have enrolled and it holds a 4.5 rating from about 47,000 reviews. It is aimed at people who can use a computer but have never written code, though the course page itself warns that C++ is tricky and asks for patience.

The praise centres on Purcell's delivery. One reviewer singles out his soft, clear voice and a pace that is slow without dragging, others call the lessons simple and easy to understand, and one describes it as feeling like a paid course. Another student likes the exercises after lectures and coding along in their own programs. The complaints are specific. The course was last updated in December 2019, so expect nothing on what has been added to the language or its tools since then. One learner finds the pace too slow. Two recent one-star reviews complain about ads appearing in lessons, and one non-English speaker was put off by the lack of auto-translated captions.

For a first look at the language it is hard to argue with free. It is a no-cost alternative to the beginner courses it sits beside, and a sensible first stop before either of the Unreal Engine courses in the same list. There are no quizzes, coding exercises or certificate, so if you want practice built in or current standards, plan on pairing it with something newer. As a gentle on-ramp to a hard language, the reviews say it does the job.