So how long does it take to learn how to code and become a self-taught programmer? There are so many factors that come into play when you're trying to become a self-taught programmer that there's no one straightforward answer. And if you go online, if you go on YouTube, if you Google it, you'll find a lot of people will claim that they did it in three months, they did in six months, some people took a year. Some people got a job the next day, right after pressing play on their first tutorial. And that's why this is such a complicated question to have to answer. And when it comes to learning how to code, becoming a self-taught programmer and landing your first job, it's going to be difficult. And it may or may not happen quickly for you.
For me as an example, it took me almost a year. It took me like 10 and half months from when I started learning how to code and started my first programming tutorial all the way up until I got hired and I was sitting at a desk in an office writing code and getting a paycheck for it. I did do a little bit of freelancing work as I was learning, but most of it was not paid and then I did a little bit of volunteer work although I did learn from doing those things, I don't consider that real experience and I didn't consider those freelancing jobs my first job as a developer was my first when I actually went through the interview process and I got hired. So for me, it was almost a year. I know that there are people out there that have done it in three months. That's not normal.
Most people aren't going to learn how to code on their own in three months and get a job. Hell, there are a lot of boot camps out there that will claim that you can learn how to code through their program in three months and get a job, but the truth is, a lot of those people that complete those boot camps in three months don't get hired right away, and it's probably more realistic to think that it's still going to take you six months to a year after completing a boot camp to get hired and if you go to college, it's going to take you two to four years before you get out of there and get your first job.
Depending on if you decide to go for an associate of applied science, or if you try to go for a computer science degree, you're going to be putting in some serious time, and even after you graduate college, it's still going to take you some time to.Land their first job you might have to leak code grind. You might have to build projects. You might have to do all the same things that many self-taught people or people who go to boot camps are going to have to do so to put some random deadline on how long it's going to take you to self teach and become a programmer. It's almost impossible to do, but know that it is possible to do it in three months, and it's also possible to do it in a year or two years or even longer than that.
Everybody circumstances are different. When I was learning how to code, I was able to dedicate all my free time to focus on teaching myself how to code, but that's not the case for most people. Most people don't have that much free time. I was lucky enough that my circumstances allowed me to have a lot of extra free time, but If I had to learn right now, I wouldn't have that same kind of time because now I have a family and I have responsibilities that I didn't have when I was learning how to code. So the amount of time that I would be able to dedicate to learning every day, would be a lot less. And that's one of the biggest things. It really depends on how much free time you have to dedicate to learning. If you're 19 years old.
When you live at home with your parents and you don't have a job and you don't have to worry about paying rent and you don't have any responsibilities, you can literally wake up in the morning and start coding all the way up until you fall asleep. If you're 30 something and you're thinking of doing this as a career change and you have a family, you might only have a little bit of time before work in the morning. You might only have a little bit of time. After work in the afternoons, you might have to wait until your kids and your wife are asleep and do it before bed. That's just the reality of things, so you can't be too hard on yourself if you're in that position where you don't have as much time to dedicate, because at the end of the day, it's not how many months it's going to take for you to get that first job, it's how many hours in the day do you have to dedicate to learning honing your skills, picking up new skills, building those projects, building your portfolio, taking time on the weekends to go network, or try to pick up some freelancing gigs or volunteering your time to build websites for your local church or your local Community Center? Or businesses that are going to exploit you just so you can get a little bit of experience under your belt so you can build up the portfolio and you can get real-world experience. That's really what it's going to come down to.
Those are things that you have to incorporate when you start thinking about time, not how many months is it going to take and not how quickly you can get it done. Focus on how much time you have to actually dedicate to it and then just do it. Most people want to accomplish this quickly. Don't understand the kind of effort that goes into learning how to code and the kind of effort that it takes to get your first job as a programmer.
And most of those people that want to get this done quickly and want to get a job as fast as possible aren't going to survive in this industry because the truth is, this is an industry where you're constantly learning, and if you think that three months is going to be enough for you to learn. Everything that's not the case. You might get lucky and get a job in three months, but you're going to be learning for the rest of your career. I've been doing this for five years and I still learn something new almost every day. I'm happy that I learn how to code, and I'm not upset that it took me almost a year to do it. Had I learned in three months, sure, that would have been great, but I would still have. Gone through the same grind at my first job trying to improve me and trying to learn as much as I can.
Don't focus too much on how long it's going to take you to do this stuff. Know that you're going to be learning for the rest of your career and just focus on what you need to learn for you to get this done, so that's it. How long is it going to take for you to get a job and become a self-taught programmer? As long as it's going to take some people have better timing and some people have luck on their side and some people. It just takes a little bit longer. So stop worrying about how long it's going to take.
Conclusion
Focus on building all the things you need to build. Focus on networking, focus on getting your resume ready. Focus on applying for jobs and focus on what it is you're trying to accomplish by learning how to code and becoming a self-taught programmer. And eventually, you'll get there. Don't worry. About the timeline, because it doesn't matter at the end of the day, as long as you achieve it and you get to your goal and you get to where you want to be, that's the most important thing. Alright, with all that said, I'm done talking now. I hope this post was helpful.