When Ryder Carroll discovered a process to organize his thoughts, it was life-changing. Ryder had struggled with ADD for his whole life. So when he created a unique organizational process he calls bullet journalling, he knew he had to share it with others. His community, BuJo U, runs events and courses that teach others the process that Ryder found so effective for him.

Ryder managed to find a super unique topic for an online course, something he was a master at, and something that flowed from his own unique story. And the results have been amazing.

Online courses have now pretty much become a mainstay in out lives. So many of us have tried them, maybe as part of an online degree, on a course platform, or to learn from a creator. So maybe you’re ready to try your hand at creating some of the magic in an online course – either live or pre-recorded. But what if you’re fresh out of online course ideas?

In this article, we’ll try to fix that. We’ll talk you through some of the best online course ideas, categorized by online course topics that are in demand.

If you want more support in building your online course, come join OUR Mighty Community for free and meet other new and established community owners! We’d love to meet you. Join for free!

In this article…

How to validate an online course idea

First of all, how can you make sure an online course will sell? As you think through these online course ideas and which one is right for you, you can try the following steps to validate them with your potential students:

• Interview your Ideal Students to see what they’re looking for.


• Look around to see if there are similar courses (it’s a good thing if there are!).


• Consider preselling your course. You can even presell it before creating it, and teach it live as a cohort course.

168 Online course ideas

Here are some great ideas for an online course you could start building today!

Health & wellness online course ideas

We’re seeing a lot of health and wellness courses do really well on Mighty. A big part of this is because we’re entering an era when – let’s be honest – more and more of us are tapped into well-being. And that’s an awesome thing! On Mighty, we’ve seen creators like Adriene Mishler build communities and courses around the love of Yoga, or amazing communities like The Self Care Space, dedicated to getting young women access to mental health resources.

Here are some of the health and wellness course ideas we’re watching:

1. Basics of yoga


2. Learning mindfulness


3. Develop better sleep habits


4. Stretching for mobility


5. Nature bathing


6. Naturopathy and alternative health


7. How to reduce your stress

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Online business course ideas

Business courses are always hot, and the main reason is probably the real-world application. Most business owners know they can go to business school and learn things, but jump at the chance to learn from a practitioner – not necessarily a professor – who’s been where they want to go and can help them get there.

One of the sweet examples we love to highlight is the work Tiffany Johnson is doing with her community, Mind Cake Pop. Tiffany quit a corporate job and took a gig at a bakery, before realizing she was in love with one treat in particular: the cake pop. After building a successful cake-pop business, Tiffany started using her chops to teach others how to build their own cake pop empires.

Here are some ideas for online business courses:

1. How to start an X business (fill in the blank with your specialty)


2. Finding financing for your business


3. Learning the basics of product design


4. Bookkeeping for small businesses


5. Using social media to find clients


6. How to hire (and fire) people


7. How to form successful partnerships


8. How to scale a business


9. How to license a business


10. How to franchise a business


11. How to build wealth as a business owner


12. How to work on your business instead of in it

Food and nutrition

We talked about health and wellness, and often these are related to food. But there are a lot of great online course ideas built around what we eat! From dealing with disordered eating, to feeling great, to adopting a certain way of eating, courses around food and nutrition can be really successful!

For example, here on Mighty, we’ve got an awesome community – Plantstrong – built around the philosophies of Rip Esselstyn. Rip was an Austin firefighter who adopted a plant-based diet after he and his colleagues realized their cholesterol was too high. Plantstrong brings together almost 20k members to learn plant-based eating.

Here are some online course ideas for food and nutrition:

1. Eating for a specific illness or disorder (e.g. diabetes, cancer, celiac disease)


2. Eating for weight loss or gain


3. How to adopt a plant-based diet


4. How to eat for more energy


5. Specialty diets (keto, paleo, etc.)


6. Adopting a healthy relationship to food


7. How to eat well on a budget


8. How to help kids eat vegetables


9. Healthy eating for seniors


10. Cooking a specific type of food (e.g. Chinese, Italian, Spanish, Indian)


11. Becoming an awesome baker


12. Time-saving cooking (e.g. with pre-made or frozen meals)

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Love & Relationships

Relationships aren’t easy. And they’re changing. So if you’re a 45-y-o divorcee who wants to get back in the game, you can imagine that it’s changed a lot. What’s the deal with dating apps? How are people handling dating etiquette in the 21st century? And who gets the check?

Beyond romantic relationships, we have relationships all over the place that aren’t always simple to navigate. Most of us have relationships with our family, friends, neighbors, and colleagues, and sometimes they need help.

Here are some ideas for courses on love and relationships:

1. Getting back into the dating game at 30, 40, etc.


2. How to build a great dating app profile


3. How to be more vulnerable


4. Creating a happy, healthy marriage


5. Maintaining intimacy after kids


6. Learning to communicate in a relationship


7. How to spice up your sex life


8. Building friendships that last a lifetime


9. Dealing with difficult relationships with family members


10. Coping with the loss of a loved one


11. Dealing with toxic relationships


12. Healing from hurt

Parenting & family

Moving on from relationships with those around us or a significant other, how about relationships with your kids? Parenting is no walk in the park, and there are a lot of online courses out there helping you learn to be a better parent.

One great parenting community on Mighty is The Village by Happily Family. It was created by Cecilia and Jason Hilkey, who have the vision to teach modern parents how to build love and connection. Today The Village gives parents the resources to grow healthy relationships with their kids.

Here are some other ideas for parenting and family courses:

1. Raising emotionally strong kids


2. How to carve out time for the family


3. Dealing with screen addiction as a family


4. Parenting a special needs child


5. Getting through pregnancy and birth (e.g. Lamaze)


6. Sleep scheduling for newborns


7. Learning how to breastfeed


8. Navigating postpartum depression


9. Helping your child get into and go to college


10. Supporting a sensitive child


11. Online safety and cyberbullying


12. Co-parenting after divorce

Personal development

Let’s move from relationships to personal development. Maybe your thing is to help other people get the most out of their lives, to become the best they can be. Decades ago personal development was limited to a small group of people, but it’s gone mainstream.

And here at Mighty, we have some great courses and communities dedicated to personal development. For example, Lenéa Sims launched a community called Outer Work that creates intimate and impactful opportunities for education, reflection, and direct action around anti-racism.

Lenéa’s community is evidence of the need for personal development and education that deals with the impacts of systemic racism.

So whether devoted to your inner or outer life, here are some ideas for courses dedicated to personal development:

1. Dealing with negative thoughts and emotions


2. Manifesting your vision for the world


3. Learning to control anger


4. How to create a vision for life that pulls you forward


5. How to schedule your time for effectiveness


6. Goal-setting


7. Overcoming fear


8. Finding purpose and happiness in life


9. Master work-life balance


10. How to become a life-long learner

Marketing online course ideas

We talked about business above, and there could be online courses dedicated to a lot of different parts of business. But let’s talk about marketing. Since marketing is such a huge discipline, and virtually every business has a need for it, courses that teach the skills needed for marketing often do really well!

Here are some ideas for marketing courses:

1. Facebook ads for beginners


2. How to build an organic social following (on TikTok, Instagram, etc.)


3. SEO & lead generation


4. How to build web pages that convert


5. How to create a million-dollar sales funnel


6. How to make money selling digital products


7. How to sell an online course


8. How to grow an online community


9. How to do email marketing

Creative online course ideas

What if you’re a creative? We see a lot of great courses dedicated to creative pursuits, like ArtSnacks Mix, created by siblings Lee and Sarah Rubenstein to help people learn to use the boxes of art supplies that they sell through their Instagram business.

Creatives are always learning, and if you’ve got a cool creative skill like painting watercolors or graphic design, there’s a good chance you could create a course around it.

Here are some online course ideas for creatives:

1. Graphic design basics


2. Painting with watercolor


3. Landscape photography


4. Taking amazing pictures with your smartphone


5. Portrait photography basics


6. Travel photography made easy


7. Cartooning


8. Live drawing


9. Scrapbooking


10. Home decorating on a budget


11. Furniture recovering and restoration


12. Video editing


13. Film-making

Money

How about courses around money? We’ve got a lot of money-related networks on Mighty, and they’ve got some amazing stories. For example, the Wealth Builders Community, hosted by Ashley Fox. Ashley was climbing the ladder at Wall Street before she decided to quit and take financial education to people with low-to-moderate incomes. Her courses target beginning investors to teach them the basics of growing wealth in the market.

Money courses are ALWAYS in style. After all, money is something that everyone cares about, no matter who they are. Here are some ideas for money courses:

1. Personal finance basics


2. Managing a budget


3. Investing in real estate


4. Investing in the stock market


5. Building an income as a day trader


6. How to get out of debt


7. Managing money as a couple


8. How to build intergenerational wealth


9. How to retire early (FIRE)


10. How to talk to your kids about money


11. Managing your business taxes


12. Surviving on one income


13. Creating passive income streams


14. Re-selling on Amazon

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Sports & fitness

If you’re into sports or personal fitness, there’s a TON of room for courses in this area. Fitness is an especially popular niche.

Here are some ideas for courses having to do with sports and fitness:

1. Fitness boot camps


2. HIIT courses


3. Bodybuilding basics


4. How to get started running


5. Pilates for beginners


6. Getting started with cycling


7. How to rock climb safely


8. Basics of skiing

The list goes on and on. The more difficult or technical something is, or the more gear involved (like rock climbing), the more chance there is that people will be looking for help to know where to begin.

Career Growth

Career growth is an area where courses are booming. Consider this – LinkedIn has built a whole platform dedicated to career courses (LinkedIn Learning). And just because there’s a lot of people creating career courses doesn’t mean you don’t have something unique to offer.

One of our favorite examples on Mighty of someone who’s killing it with career courses is Aliza Licht. During her time as the SVP of global communications at Donna Karan, Aliza racked up 1.5 million followers on Twitter by sharing career advice for young professionals. This would evolve into a book: Leave Your Mark: Land Your Dream Job. Kill it in Your Career. Rock Social Media, a podcast, and eventually a free community: Leave Your Mark. In this community, Aliza hosts career boot camps for young professionals.

If you’re looking for an idea for a course dedicated to career excellence, here are some options:

1. Finding your first job


2. Negotiating salary


3. Getting a promotion


4. Networking basics


5. Building a career as (identity, background, etc.)


6. Building a career in X industry


7. How to use LinkedIn


8. Building a professional portfolio


9. Creating a winning resume


10. Deciding what career to pursue


11. Helping your kids find a path


12. Planning for retirement


13. Managing people


14. Getting your first executive role

Professional Communities & Certifications

One of the lesser-known areas where courses do REALLY WELL is with professional communities and certifications. Of course, these aren’t as universal as many of the courses on this list. But there’s riches in niches as they say, and there’s no better niche than a professional community. For example, pick a group of people in any given profession. Let’s say accountants. They all need to use the same software (e.g. bookkeeping software), pass the same tests, and hold the same credentials.

That means that there’s huge opportunity for courses in pretty much any professional field. One great example built on Mighty is QPractice, a community dedicated to helping people pass the National Council for Interior Design Qualification (NCIDQ) exam.

It’s IMPOSSIBLE to be exhaustive here. Look at your industry and see what it needs!

But here are a few ideas for online course ideas dedicated to some different professional communities:

1. Advanced bookkeeping


2. Bookkeeping for SAAS companies


3. Dealing with workplace conflict (HR)


4. Creating a DEI hiring strategy (HR)


5. Managing stress as a nurse


6. Supporting women in childbirth


7. Setting up an independent legal practice


8. Consulting as a registered dietitian


9. How to pass the X exam (insert your field’s qualifying exam)


10. Starting your career as a paralegal


11. Becoming a doctor entrepreneur


12. Opening a consulting business in X field

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Tech skills

Even if your field doesn’t have requirements like licensing exams or specific professional organizations, what about skills? Nearly every job category has some type of skills that need to be learned. And most work requires some sort of tech skills.

While most people think of tech as an industry, virtually every workplace is being transformed by tech – and maybe there’s an opportunity for you to harness your teaching chops here. And – bonus – if these are B2B, companies will often pay for their employees to learn them!

Here are some online course ideas for tech:

1. How to harness employee management software


2. How to use Excel, Word, etc.


3. How to use Adobe Illustrator, InDesign, etc.


4. How to use project management tools


5. How to create a content schedule


6. Scheduling social media


7. Best practices for document storage and sharing


8. How to use human resource tools


9. How to create employee training


10. Workplace internet safety

Workplace success

And doing well in the workplace isn’t just about having the right skills. The modern workplace is a complicated place, with new challenges being thrown at workers all the time. Whether working from home, hiring Gen Zs, or incorporating new theories for organizational development, our workplaces are changing. And courses can help us manage it.

Here are some ideas for workplace success courses:

1. Managing employees remotely


2. Dealing with employee conflict


3. Creating a workplace that’s safe for everyone


4. Secrets of an engaging presentation


5. How to create boundaries at work


6. Harnessing your soft skills


7. Stakeholder communication basics


8. Public relations basics


9. Media training


10. How to write a memo


11. Communicating confidently


12. Sales strategies


13. Business development

Religion and spirituality

Closing this out with something completely different, let’s talk about courses dealing with religion and spirituality. One awesome community built on Mighty is Sadie Robertson Huff’s LO sister app, which helps young women grow in their faith. Live workshops have been an important part of Sadie’s brand.

Courses dedicated to religion and spirituality are popular. Who isn’t willing to spend time and money to answer the big questions like: Why am I here? What is the purpose of life? Or, how can I connect to something bigger?

So here are some ideas for religion and spirituality courses, no matter what you believe:

1. Meditation for beginners


2. Contemplative prayer


3. Text studies for beginners (e.g. Bible, Torah, Quran)


4. Finding purpose in life


5. Spiritual healing


6. Embracing your inner goddess


7. Hinduism for newbies


8. How to take a pilgrimage


9. Using crystals


10. Reiki healing

Conclusion

So there you have it! Those were 168 online course ideas. We hope they sparked something in you, and that you’re inspired to bring your course to the world!

And if you’re looking for a great place to build and sell your course, come try Mighty! Our cultural software platform lets you bring together courses with community, content, and commerce. And our flexible Spaces mix in live streaming, live events, discussion forums, chat and messaging, and more!

Sell courses in 135 different currencies or even with token gating. And your students can access their courses through our awesome app, which works on every device.