The headlines are hard to resist. Salaries for programmers are said to be soaring. Annual paychecks for AI experts are topping $1 million. Why dream of winning the lottery when coding bootcamps are springing up with promises to teach everyone what they need to get a ticket on the gravy train?
The good news is that schools and camps often deliver enough knowledge to turn some people into great programmers. The bad news is that the lessons alone are far from enough. Programming isnt a least-resistance path to a more secure, better-paying, work-life balanced job. Its a difficult occupation that not everyone is suited for. If it were easy, everyone could do it—and then it wouldnt be as valuable.
The first steps are often seductively easy. You set one variable—call it salary—to 50000. Then you type “salary=salary*10”. Bingo. Youre coding. Its an exciting rush, and that experience might lead you to believe that you can become a professional developer with just a few more months of learning.
The basic information is out there, and you dont even need to pay very much to get it. There are plenty of good courses on Coursera and Udemy. Some high-end schools such as MIT even provide their lectures for free.
But before you jump into a bootcamp that will steal your evenings and separate you from your hard-earned money, there are several caveats you need to consider. Thats the focus for the initial sections of this article.
And if youre still interested, the second part is filled with advice for how to make the best of it. There’s also a lot of noise around the question “How do I become a coder?” Instead of another list of things to do, youll learn what not to do, which is equally important.
Have you been dreaming about making a career change into the lucrative and fast-growing tech industry? The good news is that with the right training, you can gain new coding skills and become a developer, even without a computer science degree One of the fastest ways is by attending an intensive bootcamp over the summer months
In this post, we provide an overview of the top full-time summer coding bootcamps across the United States. Whether you want to learn web development, data science, cybersecurity or other programming languages, these immersive programs can equip you with technical abilities and career preparation in just 8-12 weeks. Read on to discover how a summer coding bootcamp could help you kickstart an exciting new tech career.
Why Attend a Summer Coding Bootcamp?
Here are some of the key benefits of participating in a full-time summer coding bootcamp:
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Fast track into tech – Gain beginner to intermediate coding skills in just 2-3 months rather than 2-4 years for a CS degree
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Career support – Most bootcamps provide career coaching, resume help, portfolio reviews, tech interviews and more
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Up-to-date curriculum – You’ll learn the most in-demand languages and frameworks that employers are hiring for now
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Flexible schedules – Summer bootcamps allow you to focus full-time without conflicting with a current job
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Affordable tuition – Bootcamps cost a fraction of the price of a university degree
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Strong outcomes – Top schools report 60-99% of graduates get developer jobs within 6 months
Top Full-Time Summer Coding Bootcamps
Here are 12 of the best and most reputable full-time summer coding bootcamps across the United States:
[1] App Academy
- Locations: San Francisco, New York City, Online
- Course Duration: 12 weeks
- Course Focus: Full-stack web development
- Average Outcomes: $105k+ salary
With a rigorous curriculum and stellar job placement track record, App Academy is one of the most selective and successful coding bootcamps. Their summer program covers 1000+ hours of full-stack web development with Python, React, Node.js, and more.
[2] General Assembly
- Locations: Atlanta, Austin, Boston, Chicago, Los Angeles, New York City, Online
- Course Duration: 10-12 weeks
- Course Focus: Web development, data science, UX/UI design
- Average Outcomes: 80% employed in field within 180 days
For those looking for flexibility, General Assembly offers both in-person and online summer bootcamp options in web development, data science, digital marketing and UX/UI design. Their global alumni network provides strong career support.
[3] Hack Reactor
- Locations: Online, Austin, Los Angeles
- Course Duration: 12 weeks
- Course Focus: Full-stack web development
- Average Outcomes: $104k+ salary
Regarded as one of the most challenging programs, Hack Reactor’s software engineering bootcamp delivers over 800 hours of immersive coding education both online and in-person. Their curriculum focuses on full-stack JavaScript development.
[4] Tech Elevator
- Locations: Cleveland, Columbus, Detroit, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh
- Course Duration: 14 weeks
- Course Focus: Full-stack .NET and Java development
- Average Outcomes: 90% job placement with $60k+ salary
For those interested in .NET or Java, Tech Elevator offers a top-rated coding bootcamp teaching C#, .NET, Java, Spring and more. The program includes a 4-week971 pre-work component, adding to the total immersive experience.
[5] Flatiron School
- Locations: Online, Atlanta, Houston, London, New York, Seattle, Washington D.C.
- Course Duration: 12-15 weeks
- Course Focus: Software engineering, data science
- Average Outcomes: 97% job placement rate
Earn aDiploma in Software Engineering or Data Science from Flatiron School by participating in one of their highly-ranked summer coding bootcamps offered both online and in select cities. Their programs thoroughly prepare students for developer roles.
[6] Fullstack Academy
- Locations: Chicago, New York City, Online
- Course Duration: 13 weeks
- Course Focus: Full-stack web development, cybersecurity
- Average Outcomes: $80-85k salary
Fullstack Academy takes an immersive approach, with over 900 hours of technical and career training. Their summer bootcamp options include full-stack web development with JavaScript as well as an accelerated cybersecurity program.
[7] Lambda School
- Locations: Online
- Course Duration: 6-9 months
- Course Focus: Full-stack web development, data science
- Average Outcomes: 85% job placement, $70k+ salary
Lambda School offers full-time online coding bootcamps that can be started during the summer. Their programs take 6-9 months to complete, so are longer than some alternatives. However, tuition is not due until you land a job paying $50k+.
[8] Thinkful
- Locations: Online
- Course Duration: 4-6 months
- Course Focus: Software engineering, data science, web development, UX/UI design
- Average Outcomes: 93% job placement
Thinkful provides flexible online bootcamps in high-growth fields like software engineering, data analytics, web development and UX/UI design. Programs take 4-6 months to complete, so summer starters can graduate by year-end.
[9] DevMountain
- Locations: Dallas, Lehi, Phoenix, Provo
- Course Duration: 12-14 weeks
- Course Focus: Web development, UX/UI design, software QA
- Average Outcomes: $60k-$75k salary
At DevMountain’s immersive on-campus bootcamps, students can focus on becoming web developers, UI/UX designers or software testers. The program curriculum covers today’s most used languages and platforms.
[10] Ironhack
- Locations: Miami, Mexico City, Amsterdam, Barcelona, Madrid, Paris, Online
- Course Duration: 9 weeks
- Course Focus: Web development, UX/UI design, data analytics
- Average Outcomes: 80%+ job placement
Ironhack coding bootcamps teach web development, UX/UI design and data analytics both on campus and remotely. Their intensive 9-week summer courses help launch tech careers quickly.
[11] Springboard
- Locations: Online
- Course Duration: 6-9 months
- Course Focus: Software engineering, data science, cybersecurity, machine learning
- Average Outcomes: 80%+ job placement
Springboard’s mentor-guided online bootcamps allow working professionals to upskill into roles like software engineer, data scientist, or cybersecurity analyst while keeping their day job. Programs take 6-9 months to complete.
[12] 4Geeks Academy
- Locations: Miami, Madrid, Mexico City
- Course Duration: 4 months
- Course Focus: Full-stack web development
- Average Outcomes: 90%+ job placement with $50k+ salary
4Geeks intensive web developer bootcamp provides hands-on coding experience and career preparation services. Summer enrollments can complete the program by November. On-campus locations are available in the US and Latin America.
How to Choose the Best Summer Coding Bootcamp for You
With new coding schools emerging each year, it can be tricky evaluating your options. Here are some key factors to consider as you select a summer bootcamp:
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Program focus – Make sure the curriculum teaches languages applicable to your desired career path
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Location options – Consider in-person vs. online bootcamps based on your learning style
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Duration – Can you commit to 8-12 weeks of intensive, full-time study?
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Cost and financing – Compare tuition rates and payment plans across schools
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Outcomes data – Review grad job placement rates and average salaries
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Teaching methods – Look for hands-on, project-based curriculums
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Career support resources – Check availability of career coaching, tech interview prep, and job networks
By comparing bootcamps across these criteria, you can find the ideal summer program to launch your new coding career.
Get Ready for an Exciting Career Change
Attending an immersive summer bootcamp can equip you with the skills and experience needed to land a lucrative job as a developer. Within just a few months, you can gain proficiency in languages like Python, JavaScript, and SQL that major tech firms hire for every day.
The schools profiled here have strong track records preparing beginners for success in fields like software engineering, data science, cybersecurity and more. Find the right bootcamp for your goals and learning preferences, then get ready to kickstart an exciting and prosperous career in the booming tech industry. The first step begins with applying today!
Be realistic about the length of training time you’ll need
Bootcamp students who come into programs as beginners are not prepared for a development job when they graduate.
Its possible that you might qualify for a junior developer or internship position after graduating from one of the more rigorous bootcamps, Farag said, “but its going to be very hard to stand out from the increasing number of bootcamp graduates and thousands of computer science graduates. You cant truly become a developer in three to six months.”
The problem comes when companies interview graduates and find that their programming skills aren’t fundamentally sound. Even though developer interviews have problems of their own, Farag said that a technical interviewer will eventually find out if you cant implement some of the most basic algorithms.
Many coding bootcamps dont spend much time on algorithms. And many courses focus on learning tools rather than on programming. Ken Mazaika, co-founder and CTO of the Firehose Project, an online coding bootcamp, also sees this trend:
Mazaikas view of the industry is particularly jaded, as the title of his post makes clear: “The Dirty Little Secrets about the Worst Coding Bootcamps Out There: 9 out of 10 Programs Are Outright Scams.”
Many of the top coding bootcamps teach frameworks, such as Ruby on Rails, that favor convention over configuration. That is, students learn the usage conventions for a specific tool, but not the fundamentals of how web development actually works across tools and technologies.
These frameworks give students just enough knowledge to start building simple web apps. After getting a handful of projects under their belts, many graduates believe they are ready to enter the job market. Unfortunately, they still lack a solid foundation.
Not everyone needs to learn to code
Soon after the learn-to-code movement arrived in 2012, the dont-learn-to-code movement followed. The backlash, from bloggers such as Jeff Atwood and “Uncle Bob” Martin, might have seemed mean-spirited, but some complaints about the programming profession raised legitimate concerns.
John Kurkowski, a user experience (UX) engineer at CrowdStrike, said programming isnt an inviting field because even the most mature technologies have been roughly cobbled together over the years, and developers often spend much of their time hacking together libraries that were never meant to be used together. Maybe in 10 years, he said, developers will have tools and platforms that work more elegantly and are easier to work with.
Mike Hadlow, a freelance C# developer with more than 20 years of software development experience, points out that development is harder than people think. Its one of the few highly skilled occupations that require no professional certification (although some believe it should), and it might just be the only highly skilled job where other workers in the industry give copious amounts of their free time and energy to help train people off the street. (And still, theres a huge mentoring gap.)
That free entry is both good and bad, because, as Martin, author of the Clean Code Handbook, points out, the industry usually doesnt benefit from hordes of novices, but instead needs carefully trained individuals. He compares good developer training to flight school, adding that not many bootcamps are that intense or require as many hours of training.
Despite these voices of caution, some foresee a blue-collar coding revolution on the horizon, while others, predictably, scoff at this idea, much like the learn-to-code critics.
There are many valid arguments on both sides, but Atwood, the co-founder of StackOverflow, perhaps sums it up best:
Coding Bootcamps 2023: Insights from REAL Graduates
What can a web developer do at a bootcamp?
Web developers can gain entry-level, intermediate, and advanced skills from coding bootcamps. Database administrators manage organizational data storage and privacy. They design databases, make upgrades, and oversee data permissions.
What is a software development bootcamp?
The software development bootcamp’s curriculum covers programming basics, JavaScript, web fundamentals, and Python. Other topics include data manipulation, web interface, NoSQL database design, and object-oriented programming. Designed for beginners, the program covers front-end and back-end technologies.
Where can I get a software engineering bootcamp?
Learners can also pursue in-person, online, self-paced, and hybrid course delivery models. Various organizations, including tech companies, nonprofit groups, and independent educational institutions offer software engineering and coding bootcamps. Others maintain affiliations with community colleges and universities.
Can a Summer Bootcamp help you learn to code?
If you’re a current student, teacher, or professional looking to learn to code, a summer bootcamp is a great opportunity to learn to code in a short time frame. Various coding bootcamps offer summer courses to help you launch a new career in tech. Check out the following courses to help you #learntocode this Summer 2023.
