10 Distance Learning Scholarships and Tuition-Free Online Degrees and Courses

You can get an international education without leaving home. Distance learning costs less than moving abroad because everything runs online. This list gathers online degree scholarships and free online courses so you can study for little or nothing. It covers awards that pay tuition for online Master's degrees and platforms that let you take courses at no cost.

If studying in your own country or anywhere else appeals to you, start with the options below.

Commonwealth Distance Learning Scholarships
These scholarships are for candidates from developing Commonwealth countries. They fund 30+ Master's degree courses, either run with universities in developing countries or delivered directly by UK institutions. The award covers tuition fees.

Edinburgh Global Distance Learning Scholarships
The University of Edinburgh offers 12 scholarships to citizens of selected developing countries. Recipients take one of the 30+ distance learning Master's programmes the University runs. Each scholarship pays the full tuition fees over three years.

University of the People Tuition Free Degrees
University of the People offers online, accredited, tuition-free American university degrees in business administration and computer science. Professors from universities such as NYU, Harvard and Oxford teach in small virtual classrooms. Students also get internship and mentoring programs with partners such as HP and Microsoft to build hands-on experience alongside their academic study.

edX Free Online Courses at Premier Universities
edX lets students from any country take free online courses from premier universities worldwide. Anyone with an interest in advancing their knowledge can enrol, whatever their background. Courses are free for everyone except professional education courses. Some courses charge a fee for verified certificates but stay free to audit.

Coursera
Coursera partners with top universities and organisations around the world to offer online courses that anyone can take for free. Topics span the Humanities, Medicine, Biology, Social Sciences, Mathematics, Business, Computer Science and many others.

Udemy
Udemy is the world's largest marketplace for teaching and learning. Over 50 million students in 200+ countries take its online courses to advance their careers and pursue their passions. More than 150,000 courses are available on demand, 24/7, via iPhone, iPad, Android and the web. See Udemy offers

Khan Academy
Khan Academy is a not-for-profit working to improve education by giving anyone, anywhere a free world-class education. Its library holds over 4,500 videos on subjects from arithmetic to physics, finance and history, plus hundreds of skills to practise. You learn what you want, when you want, at your own pace.

Academic Earth
Academic Earth holds that everyone deserves access to a world-class education. The platform collects free online courses from the world's top universities in one place.