Introduction to Spring Boot 2 and Spring Framework 5 (Udemy.com)
Build a Spring Boot Web Application
Created by: John Thompson
Last updated February 2020
Our take
Based on the ratings of 1,530 students, a sample of their written reviews and the syllabus, as the course stood in February 2020. No course pays to be reviewed.
A free, two-hour taster from John Thompson that walks through one small Spring Boot project: create it with Spring Initializr, add JPA entities on an in-memory H2 database, then show the data on a page with Thymeleaf. That's the whole course, 15 lectures in a single section with three assignments. It's built for Java developers who have never touched Spring and want to see what auto-configuration actually does before committing to a much longer course. Some 38,000 students have taken it and 1,530 have left a rating, which averages 4.4.
Reviewers like how clear and to the point Thompson is, and one says they finished with a working app they could keep building on. That same student, coming from Python, reported following along fine on Java 17 and Spring Boot 3, even though the videos date from early 2020. The complaints are about scope. The lessons are lifted from Thompson's much longer course, so a couple of 'we'll cover this later' references lead nowhere, and a Pet Clinic example gets mentioned but never appears. Others wanted less time on IntelliJ and Initializr and more on principles, or at least one REST endpoint.
Value is hard to argue with since it costs nothing. Treat it as a two-hour sample, not a course you learn Spring from; one three-star reviewer put it plainly, you'll need a lot of extra material to build a real app. If the sample clicks, CourseDuck lists it in the same category as Spring Boot 4, Spring 7 & Hibernate for Beginners and the Spring Framework Master Class.
Pros
- Free, and short enough to finish in an evening at 2.3 hours across 15 lectures
- Ends with a small working Spring Boot app that one student says they kept building on
- Instructor provides a code repository, and one reviewer followed along fine on Spring 3 and Java 17
- Thompson's explanations are clear and skip the padding, according to many four and five star reviews
Cons
- Cut from a longer course, so some 'covered later' references and a Pet Clinic example go nowhere
- Videos date from February 2020 and target Spring Boot 2, not the current release
- No REST endpoints, quizzes, or depth; several reviewers call it a very basic introduction
Fantastic intro to Spring Boot framework. Not too deep in the weeds and covers a wide range of topics, just as promised. Was able to follow along even with Spring 3/Java 17.
Beginner to Spring, not to Java. Basic Java is required, and one reviewer says the annotations are hard to follow without building something.
What you will learn
- Learn How to Create A Spring Boot Web Application
- Create a new Spring Boot Project
- Store and Retrieve Data with Spring Data JPA
- Use Thymeleaf to Display Data from a Database to a Web Page
Course content
1 section · 15 lectures · 2.3 hours of video 3 assignments
- 1Building a Spring Boot Web App 1 free preview15 lectures · 3 quizzes · 2 hours
Who it is for
The instructor says it suits
- Java Developers
- Anyone wishing to get started with Spring!
What you need before you start
- Basic Java knowledge is required
Course Description
This course a free introduction to Spring Boot 2 and Spring Framework 5.
Inside the course you will learn how easy it is to build a web application using Spring Boot 2.
You will learn how to create the initial Spring Boot project using the Spring Initializer.
Next is creating JPA Entities for persistence to a database using Hibernate.
Spring Boot will auto configure an in-memory H2 database, and you will see how to use Spring Boot with Spring Data JPA to initialize data into the database.
Finally, you are shown how to display data from the database on a web page with Spring MVC and Thymeleaf templates.
If you are new to Spring Boot, this is the perfect course to get you started!
Instructor Details
- 4.4 Rating
1,530 Reviews
John Thompson
Hi. I'm John.
I've been in the IT industry for over 25 years. Today, I specialize mainly in Java, the most successful and widely known programming language in use today. I also specialize with the Spring Framework, which the most popular open source application framework for building enterprise class applications on the Java platform. Just some of the organizations I've worked with include Visa, Kohls, Federal Home Loan Bank, and Belk Department Stores.
Through the courses I'm providing, I hope to leverage my years of experience to accelerate your learning of the Spring Framework. I'm not going to lie to you. The Spring Framework is a big framework. The environment for enterprise Java is even bigger. If you're new to Java, you have a lot to learn. I hope through the content on this web site I can accelerate your education of the Java and Spring landscape.
More courses by John Thompson
Spring Boot Microservices with Spring Cloud Beginner to Guru (2026)
4.6 (5,706 Reviews)
Provider: Udemy
Time: 42.5h
$18.99
More Java Spring Framework courses
Spring Boot Unit Testing with JUnit, Mockito and MockMvc (2026)
4.8 (4,042 Reviews)
Provider: Udemy
Time: 9.9h
$84.99
Spring WebFlux Masterclass: High-Performance Reactive APIs (2026)
4.8 (1,920 Reviews)
Provider: Udemy
Time: 13.3h
$84.99
Kafka MicroServices with Spring Boot, Docker, Kubernetes, AI (2026)
4.7 (6,864 Reviews)
Provider: Udemy
Time: 27.2h
$11.99
Domain Driven Design & Microservices for Architects (2023)
4.7 (3,982 Reviews)
Provider: Udemy
Time: 12.7h
$10.99
Microservices with Spring Boot, Spring Cloud, Docker & Kafka (2026)
4.7 (3,777 Reviews)
Provider: Udemy
Time: 42.1h
$94.99
Spring Boot Course: Learn Spring Boot & Build Web APIs (2025)
4.7 (3,377 Reviews)
Provider: Udemy
Time: 11.9h
$109.99
Reviews
By Agustín Crespo Valencia on 12/16/2024
Explica muy bien y va al grano. A veces es necesario una explicación más en profundidad para entender todo cómo funciona, pero por el momento para un vistazo rápido y ver las capacidades viene muy bien.
By Dimitrios Stefanos Velissariou on 9/29/2024
This course is a snippet of a much longer course by the same author. Some information that "will be shown later" is not shown because it is in the other full course. In the end, the tutor mentions a "Pet Clinic" example, but it is never mentioned in this course. This smaller course could have been much better, even as a brief introduction to Spring Boot. I have tried the main course, and due to many updates, I found it to be too disjointed. I suggest that the author make a new full course from scratch. I also suggest less time spent on tools such as IntelliJ and Initializr and more on principles, concepts and examples.
By Aleisha Matlock on 8/23/2023
Fantastic intro to Spring Boot framework. Not too deep in the weeds and covers a wide range of topics, just as promised. Was able to follow along even with Spring 3/Java 17. Ending the course with my own working Spring application that I can continue to build on now that I have a basic understanding is very valuable. I'm transitioning from data engineer to software engineer with a lot of python experience but no java. My new job is building Spring applications and it's very hard to understand what all the annotations and concepts mean without jumping in and building things. Now I have a sandbox to play in when I want to try things out. So thanks, Guru!!!
By Marcos Paulo Silvestri on 1/14/2023
This is the nitty-gritty for starters on Spring with JPA and Thymeleaf, and it's essencial for the ones who wish to have a brief look on how things work and then decide whether diving deep into it or not.
By Giridhara Siva Chintada on 11/21/2021
It's a very brief window to get started on various concepts and yes its a preview. I like the way the CRUD ops are mentioned in a small time frame and we can actually use this brief to start working on it! That way it felt really amazing. Enrolling for the Spring5 course in the coming week for sure. Thank you for this introduction.
By Mouad Benkirane on 5/30/2021
For an introduction course, it is just an overview of what you'll have to learn in the full course of Spring Boot and Spring Framework, what i appreciate here is that it gives you an idea on what to expect, however it is not a course designed to make you a Java/Spring developer right away ... once this overview finished i strongly suggest to head over his full course !
By Gabriella Frykhamn on 4/28/2021
A great teacher with pedagogics top of mind! Have bought more courses by him. The only thing keeping this for a solid 5 is that Spring Initializer is now offered as part of Intellij so several steps where superfluous.
By Ricardo Andrés Vargas Martínez on 4/2/2021
It's an excellent course. I like the way John explains every concept about spring. There's only one thing that could improve regarding the font-size editor. There were moments when I couldn't see clearly.
By Woj S on 4/7/2020
Since there is no other way to contact John, I'm using the rating to actually ask a question. I really did like this course, I like the hands-on approach with explanations and references to the key concepts. But it seems that this course is just a first chapter to a much bigger course, there was a reference to future modules that will cover some concepts in more details. John, did you mean your other courses or is the full course deriving from this one still in production and if so when it will be released?
By Pablo on 2/22/2020
Is a good idea to start with the basics but in a really really introduction level. For sure you will need a lot of extra info to create a basic app.
Quality Score
No CourseDuck member has rated this course yet. Taken it? Give each part a thumbs up or down.
Overall Score : 88 / 100












