The computer science school for students who demand intellectual rigor and depth

Our program integrates a world-class curriculum, personalized mentorship, and infamously rigorous assessment system. We've created a reliable way for hard-working, intellectually curious people to unlock their long-term potential.


Start learning with our intro course for just $99. After that, apply to join our selective membership program, which is $299/month.


Learn from instructors that are great programmers and great teachers

Gordon Zhu

Gordon is the founder and lead instructor. At Google, he worked on AdWords, TalkBin (a YCombinator startup acquired by Google), Maps, and the Engineering Education team. He studied economics at the University of Pennsylvania.

Lily Gentner

Lily joined Watch and Code in 2022 as an instructor. She worked as a software engineer at Uber, doing iOS development on the UberEats and Driver applications, and at Square, where she helped build and launch the Square for Retail application. She studied statistics and computer science at Harvard.


Our students work at

  • Airbnb
  • Amazon
  • CrowdAI
  • Electronic Arts
  • Google
  • Kapwing
  • Microsoft
  • Mutiny
  • OneLogin
  • Opendoor
  • Replay
  • Salesforce
  • Stripe
  • Zeal
  • And more...

A curriculum focused on better thinking, not knowledge

Teaching today is too reliant on knowledge and memorization. This is a mistake when real power comes from being great at discovering answers on your own, such that you can solve any problem. Our curriculum is deliberately designed to help you develop this ability to discover solutions through thoughtful exercises, walkthroughs, and discussions.

Personalized mentorship

We're fully invested in enabling your success. If you need help, you can get live, individual assistance from an instructor. Sessions are available Monday through Friday by appointment.

Infamously rigorous assessments

Every assessment you submit is meticulously hand-graded for technical correctness, time complexity, space complexity, and overall design. Through this process, you will learn not just how to write correct and performant programs, but you will also learn how to thoughtfully design and structure them. When the time comes for you to tackle interviews (especially algorithms heavy ones), you will be exceedingly well prepared.

Self-paced to ensure mastery

Since we truly want you to master each concept before moving on, we give you the time you need to learn and do things the right way. Fixed deadlines create the need to rush and superficially memorize; this is detrimental for real learning.

A school that grows with you

We're unusual in that ~60% of our student body is looking for their first programming job. The remaining ~40% are already professional software engineers and use the program to continue to grow in their roles.


Start learning with our intro course for just $99. After that, apply to join our selective membership program, which is $299/month.


FAQ:

Why Watch and Code?

You should choose us if you care deeply about mastery and want to be held to a high standard throughout the learning process. With our quizzes, assessments, and individualized feedback, you'll know that you're on the right track each step of the way. The rigor of our quizzes and assessments will allow you to reliably master skills and concepts to a degree that would not be possible otherwise.

How is the learning structured?

First, you'll see conceptional explanations and worked examples. Next, you'll be forced to apply these ideas to real problems through quizzes and hand-graded assessments. At the end, you'll be encouraged to reflect so that you can identify areas for improvement. We provide materials that facilitate this reflection. For example, for a given problem, you'll see how we think about it, various worked solutions, mathematical proofs, and even live sample answers, where we demonstrate how we'd solve the problem ourselves.

How does this compare to self-study?

As far as we know, there is no other curriculum that takes our problem-solving obsessed approach. Even if you were to find a curriculum like ours, you would not be able to simulate the feedback that you get from the quizzes and assessment reviews. This gives an apprentice-like aspect to the program, as over time, you'll begin to learn how we actually think.

How does this compare to a bootcamp?

We're opposites. In a fixed-length bootcamp, students are shuttled along whether they've mastered the material or not. This leads to shallow, breadth-based learning rather than deep, introspective study.

How does this compare to a university?

A typical university program would be midway between Watch and Code and a bootcamp. That's because universities are essentially longer bootcamps. Because of that, universities similarly cannot guarantee mastery, as degree programs still uses a fixed-length, assembly-line approach. If you get a D in a class, should you really move on?


Free live workshops

Sign up to get info about our next live workshop. The next one is titled: "Finally Mastering Big O Notation". We'll also share insights behind our unique approach to teaching.


The author remembers the time when he was a student himself, a somewhat ambitious student, eager to understand a little mathematics and physics. He listened to lectures, read books, tried to take in the solutions and facts presented, but there was a question that disturbed him again and again: “Yes, the solution seems to work, it appears to be correct; but how is it possible to invent such a solution? Yes, this experiment seems to work, this appears to be a fact; but how can people discover such facts? And how could I invent or discover such things by myself?”