1. University and Courses
CodeGym isn’t just a programming course — it’s a real interactive environment for mastering IT professions. Everything here is carefully designed: from your first steps in “Quests” to community support, IDE plugins for professionals, and even a dedicated mobile app 📱.
Now you’ll learn how the platform is built from the inside: where to find theory, how to work with tasks, what “dark matter” 🖤 is, why surveys are needed, where to get help, and how to keep learning even when you’re away from your computer. But let’s start with the basics :)
On CodeGym, there are two main formats of learning:
- 📚 Courses — self-paced learning;
- 🎓 University — group learning with a mentor.
Currently, you have access to 3 professions in the University format:
- ☕️ Java Fullstack Software Engineer
- 🐍 Python Fullstack Software Engineer
- 🌐 Frontend Fullstack Software Engineer
And also 6 interactive self-paced courses:
- ☕️ Java Core — Java course
- 🐍 Python Core — Python 3.12 course
- 🎨 Web Core — Web: HTML, CSS, JavaScript
- #️⃣ C# Core — C# 14 and .NET 10 course
- 🐳 Docker+Linux — basics of Docker and Linux
- 🗄️ SQL+PostgreSQL — SQL and PostgreSQL course
2. Modules and Quests
If a course is very large, it’s further divided into smaller courses. In CodeGym University, these parts are called modules, and in self-paced courses — quests.
All quests (and modules) of your current course are shown in the Quest Map 🗺️:
Examples:
The Java Course for self-study consists of 4 quests:
- Quest "Java Syntax"
- Quest "Java Core"
- Quest "Java Collections"
- Quest "Java Multithreading" 🤹♂️
The Python Fullstack Software Engineer course consists of 6 modules:
- Module "Python Core"
- Module "Python Fullstack"
- Module "Python Django"
- Module "Python FastAPI"
- Module "Python Final"
- Module "Career Center" 🏆
3. Active Course
You can take multiple courses simultaneously, but only one can be active at a time.
You may be enrolled in several courses at once, but only one will be marked as active. To switch to another course, you need to explicitly change it in the "My Learning" section:
If you want to switch back to a previously taken course, select it from the list and click the "Resume Learning" button. Then it will become your current course.
Clicking the "Continue Learning" button will take you to the last opened lecture of the active course 🚀.
4. Levels and Lectures
Each course on CodeGym is divided into levels, and levels consist of lectures. Lectures contain tasks and quizzes.
Clicking on a quest (or module) in the Quest Map will redirect you to the personal page of that quest. On this page, you’ll see the description of the quest and a list of its levels. Example:
The status of a level changes depending on how many lectures you’ve completed: "Unavailable", "In Progress", and "Completed" ✅.
From this page, you can also quickly jump to the last opened lecture of the quest — the "Continue" button on the right side of the image.
5. Level Lectures
Clicking on a level’s name will open the full list of its lectures:
In the image above, you see all lectures of Level 4 of the SQL Course. The last open lecture is 4.1.
You can reset the filter settings to see lectures from any other course you have access to:
6. Gamified System
All lectures are initially locked. To unlock the next lecture, you need to spend a few units of "Dark Matter" 🖤. You can earn dark matter by practicing: solving tasks, watching videos, and taking quizzes.
Many (but not all) lectures contain tasks. Usually, a lecture ends like this:
Here you see two practical tasks where you need to write code. Solving each correctly grants you two units of dark matter.
You don’t have to solve tasks immediately. If you prefer, you can postpone solving them and continue reading lectures. To open the next lecture, you’ll need to spend 1 unit of dark matter. But tasks still need to be solved — the mechanics of CodeGym are designed so that you can’t just read theory and ignore practice.
7. Tasks
If you missed some tasks or want to revisit them later, you can always find them in the Tasks section in the left sidebar:
It has three tabs:
- All Tasks — all tasks from the course
- My Tasks — tasks assigned to you (in your open lectures)
- Unsolved Tasks — your tasks that are not yet solved
Some days (or nights 🌙) you just want to solve tasks. You don’t even need to open lectures for that. Just go to the Tasks section, select "Unsolved Tasks" in the menu, and enjoy.
If you want more details about tasks, there’s a dedicated lecture about Tasks on CodeGym.
8. Help Section
The Help on CodeGym section is a very powerful tool. Our pride 🥇.
Here, you can ask questions about any of your tasks, and your question will automatically include:
- 📝 The condition of your task
- 📂 Files of your solution
- 📊 List of task requirements and their statuses.
The person who reads your question will have a special IDE where they can review your solution. Example:
This question format greatly increases the chances of getting a quality answer. Sometimes, entire discussions unfold under certain tasks from forum regulars.
If you’re interested in more details, there’s a dedicated lecture about Help Section.
P.S.
We also have a mobile app and awesome IDE plugins, but they deserve their own lectures.
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