IoT-For-Beginners
A 12-week, 24-lesson beginner course on Internet of Things, built around hands-on projects.
- Stars
- 17.2k
- Forks
- 2.9k
- Licence
- MIT
- Language
- Jupyter Notebook
- Last update
- 5 months ago
- Type
- Learning resource
What it is
This is a free, open-source curriculum from Microsoft teaching the basics of Internet of Things (IoT), where small connected devices sense and respond to their environment. It is organized as 24 lessons over 12 weeks, each with quizzes, written instructions, a solution, and an assignment. The projects follow food from farm to table, covering farming, logistics, manufacturing, retail, and consumers.
- Work through the lessons in order, starting with the pre-lecture quiz and then the lecture
- Build the food-from-farm-to-table projects covered in the course
- Use the lesson template to create your own IoT lessons
- Follow the teachers' suggestions to run the course in a classroom
Great for
- Students who want a structured, project-based introduction to IoT
- Self-learners who prefer working through lessons with quizzes and assignments
- Teachers looking for a ready-made course outline
- Developers new to microcontrollers and Raspberry Pi
Not ideal for
- Readers wanting a short reference rather than a 12-week course, since it is designed as a full curriculum
- People who want only finished code to copy, because the README encourages building from the lessons rather than copying solutions
- Experienced IoT engineers, since the material is aimed at beginners
How to get it
- 1
Clone and build from source
Clone the repository
git clone https://github.com/microsoft/IoT-For-Beginners.gitClone without translations (Bash / macOS / Linux, sparse checkout)
git clone --filter=blob:none --sparse https://github.com/microsoft/IoT-For-Beginners.git - 2
Run it
- Clone the repository or fork it on GitHub first
- Open the README and pick the first lesson
- Complete the pre-lecture quiz, then read the lesson
- Work through the project activities and assignment
- 3
Get the most out of it
- Join the Microsoft Foundry Discord to ask questions while learning
- Form a study group with friends and go through lessons together, as the README suggests
- Use the /solutions folders to check your work after attempting the projects
- Explore the recommended Microsoft Learn collection for further study
Downloads
Strengths
- Free and MIT-licensed, so it can be reused and adapted
- Project-based structure with quizzes, solutions, and assignments in each lesson
- Available in 50+ translations
Trade-offs
- The README does not state which hardware kits are required, so you may need to check each lesson for device needs
- The repository is large due to translations, though the README gives a sparse checkout option to reduce download size
- Installation and setup details are not described in the README excerpt provided
How it compares
| Project | Stars | Type | Level | Updated | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| IoT-For-Beginners (this) | 17.2k | Learning resource | beginner | 5 months ago | Students who want a structured, project-based introduction to IoT |
| C-Plus-Plus | 34.8k | Learning resource | intermediate | 1 months ago | Students learning algorithms and data structures in C++ |
| modern-cpp-tutorial | 25.9k | Learning resource | intermediate | 29 days ago | Experienced C++ developers who want a quick overview of modern features |
| raspberry-pi-os | 14k | Learning resource | advanced | 2.6 years ago | Students who want to understand how operating systems work at the lowest level |
| cmake-examples | 13.1k | Learning resource | beginner | 2.7 years ago | C++ developers who are new to CMake |
| Web-Dev-For-Beginners | 97.1k | Learning resource | beginner | 5 days ago | Complete beginners who want a structured, self-paced path into web development |
Stats synced from GitHub. The assessment above was drafted with AI from the project's README on 2026-10-29 and may miss recent changes — check the README before relying on a command. MIT licence: free to use, modify and distribute, including commercially, as long as you keep the copyright notice.