jQuery Course

jQuery is a JavaScript library built to make DOM manipulation, event handling, and AJAX requests short and consistent — it was, for most of the 2010s, the default way the web wrote client-side JavaScript. This course assumes you already know plain JavaScript (see the JavaScript Course if you don't) and shows you jQuery's own syntax and idioms directly on top of that.

What you'll learn

You'll start by loading jQuery and writing your first selection and event handler, then move through the library's core areas: selecting elements with CSS-style syntax, handling events, reading and changing the DOM, updating CSS and classes, and running effects like fades and slides.

The last two lessons cover AJAX — jQuery's original claim to fame, long before fetch() existed — and finish with an honest look at where jQuery still earns its place in 2026 versus where plain JavaScript or a framework is now the better default.

Lessons

  1. Introduction
  2. Selectors
  3. Events
  4. DOM Manipulation
  5. CSS & Styling
  6. Effects & Animation
  7. AJAX with jQuery
  8. jQuery in a Modern Codebase
Where to start: begin at Introduction and go in order — later lessons assume you're comfortable with the $() selection syntax from the earlier ones. If you're only here to understand code you've inherited, Selectors, Events, and DOM Manipulation will cover most of what you'll actually run into.