Coursera
Headquarters
Mountain View, CAFounded
2012CEO / Founder
Jeff MaggioncaldaEmployees
1001-5000Funding
Public — $443.1MStock
COURProducts
1 product listedAvg. AI Score
7.7/10Website
coursera.org/
Profile updated
About Coursera
Coursera is an online education platform founded in 2012 by Stanford professors Andrew Ng and Daphne Koller, headquartered in Mountain View, California. The company partners with universities and corporations to deliver online courses, professional certificates, and accredited degree programs to learners worldwide.
Coursera's catalog includes individual courses, specializations, professional certificates, and bachelor's and master's degree programs. Content partners include institutions such as Yale, Duke, and the University of Michigan, as well as companies like Google, IBM, Meta, and Adobe. The platform serves individual learners, enterprises through Coursera for Business, and governments through Coursera for Government. As of its most recent public filings, the platform has reported over 100 million registered learners.
Coursera went public on the New York Stock Exchange in March 2021 under the ticker COUR, raising approximately $519 million in its IPO. Prior to its IPO, the company raised roughly $443 million in venture funding from investors including Kleiner Perkins, New Enterprise Associates, and GSV Capital. The company has made several acquisitions, including Rhyme (a cloud-based lab provider) in 2019 and Degree Analytics in 2021, to expand its product capabilities.
Specialties
Financials
Dated, source-cited figures. Estimates are marked.
Products by Coursera
All products by Coursera reviewed by our AI panel of experts.
How Our Review Panel Scores Coursera
Six independent reviewer personalities assessed Coursera's product on their own terms. They landed within 0.9 points of each other, an unusually strong consensus.
Averaged across 1 reviewed product in our catalog. Scores are out of 10.
Competitive Landscape
Who Coursera competes with, and how they differ.
Microsoft-owned, bundled into LinkedIn's existing professional network and Office 365 enterprise contracts, giving it a distribution advantage Coursera lacks; Coursera counters with university-accredited credentials and degree programs LinkedIn Learning does not offer.
1 product reviewed on TopReviewedFounded by MIT and Harvard as a nonprofit, now a for-profit subsidiary of 2U after its 2021 sale and 2U's 2024 bankruptcy restructuring; closest philosophical peer on the university-partnership MOOC model, but with a narrower catalog and higher post-restructuring prices.
1 product reviewed on TopReviewed
Narrower focus on short, project-based "Nanodegree" tech credentials versus Coursera's broad catalog spanning university courses, Professional Certificates and full online degrees.
1 product reviewed on TopReviewed
Narrower niche in interactive, browser-based data-science and analytics skill-building; Coursera competes with a much broader subject catalog and accredited degree pathways DataCamp does not offer.
1 product reviewed on TopReviewed
Narrower coding-bootcamp-style interactive lesson model without university-accredited degrees; competes with Coursera mainly at the entry-level developer-skills segment.
1 product reviewed on TopReviewedCompany Timeline
Key milestones in Coursera's history, with sources.
- Acquisition
Completes combination with Udemy
Coursera completed its combination with Udemy -- approved by both companies' shareholders on April 9, 2026 -- forming a combined platform reaching over 290 million learners across 18,000 enterprise customers; the platforms remain separate for existing users initially.
axios.com - Acquisition
Signs definitive merger agreement with Udemy ($2.5B all-stock deal)
Coursera and Udemy announced a definitive all-stock merger agreement implying a combined equity value of ~$2.5B; Udemy shareholders receive 0.8 Coursera shares per Udemy share (Coursera holders ~59%, Udemy holders ~41% of the combined company). The deal was expected to generate $115M in run-rate annual cost synergies.
highereddive.com - Milestone
Leadership transition: Jeff Maggioncalda retires, Greg Hart named CEO
After seven years as CEO, Jeff Maggioncalda announced his retirement; Amazon veteran Greg Hart (former head of Alexa and Prime Video) was named President and CEO effective February 3, 2025.
investing.com - Launch
IPO on the NYSE (COUR); closes first day at $5.9B market cap
Coursera priced its IPO at $33/share (top of its $30-33 range) for an implied $4.3B valuation, then opened at $39 and closed up 36% at $45, giving it a $5.9B market cap on debut. The company had booked $294M in revenue for the trailing 12 months.
cnbc.com - Founded
Founded by Andrew Ng and Daphne Koller; raises $16M Series A
Stanford computer science professors Andrew Ng and Daphne Koller founded Coursera after their free Stanford courses each drew 100,000+ students in 2011. The company announced a $16M Series A from Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers and NEA on the same day, with KPCB's John Doerr and NEA's Scott Sandell joining the board.
techcrunch.com
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