Where is the Best Place to Take Painting Lessons?
Painting is a beautiful, creative, artistic outlet. It gives you the ability to see a stunning nature scene and recreate it, use your own style to capture a moment in time, or pour your emotions into a project and make a visual representation of what is inside of you. It's one of the most calming and soothing hobbies you can take part in, leaving your mind and body grounded.
Finding someone who teaches painting in-person is much harder than finding a piano teacher or a dance class, so quite a few companies have created online programs for you to do from home. It's significantly less expensive than in-person lessons would be and you can go at your own pace, pause, or rewind different sections to hone in on a technique you're struggling with. You can do a few minutes at a time or spend hours on a masterpiece - it's up to you.
Thursday, March 20th
2025 Painting Lesson Reviews
The Virtual Instructor
The Virtual Instructor offers on-demand and live art lessons for students. You can subscribe for just $13.30/month or $67.90/year to access all the drawing and painting lessons available here or buy single courses outright. There are options for beginners and intermediate/advanced painters with hours of material and ebooks to help cover all learning styles. The Virtual Instructor offers a 7-day free trial of their platform and a 30-day money back guarantee to ensure you are happy with your courses. People say that it's well worth the money to access painting lessons from this site, so The Virtual Instructor has earned our top spot.
Udemy
Udemy hosts a broad range of skills and topics that people can sign up for and learn from home. The amount of content and learning opportunities here are nearly endless, which is truly exciting. They have thousands of painting lessons that you can purchase at a one-time cost and have lifetime access to. Most courses are a few hours long with 15 or so lessons that you can explore before signing up. Udemy offers a 30-day money back guarantee if you're unhappy with whatever purchase you make. Unfortunately, many people have experienced frustration with their customer service, so it may not be easy to actually get your money back or deal with technical issues if they arise. But, since the individual course ratings are high and we like the format and options here, Udemy has still earned one of our top ratings.
Painting Lessons with Marla
Painting Lessons with Marla provides a variety of opportunities for people to improve their painting skills. You can do a monthly subscription with access to new lessons on different subjects and skills, or pay for lifetime access to workshops with hours of content with a variety of mediums and subjects. We like that you have a lot of options here, all of which are reasonably priced. You could also try out Marla's free mini-lessons before paying for anything else to see if you like her teaching style. This platform has been rated highly by students, so we recommend giving it your consideration.
My Painting Club
My Painting Club is a website based around the instruction and works of Richard Robinson. He has created over 150 videos with hours of instruction to help students paint things they are interested in. With a monthly membership, you get full access to everything or you can pay per class and have lifetime access instead. Videos are not downloadable, but they're accessible with an internet connection. You can do a 7-day trial here before signing up and even get your money back on a membership later if you're unsatisfied. My Painting Club allows you to find your own way along your painting journey, so it's not strictly structured but provides solid content. Their reviews are few and far between, so this is probably not the most popular place to turn for painting lessons, but a free trial could give you insight to whether or not it's the right place for you.
Learn & Master
Learn & Master has valuable teaching materials for people trying to learn a variety of new skills. Their painting lessons include over 20 lessons with instructional videos and a workbook. It's designed for beginners who want to take their training in oil painting to the next level. This painting course is a one-time purchase and is mailed to you on DVDs. The quality is a little grainy and out of date since these were filmed so long ago, but the content is impressive and you get it all for a one-time cost of $249. If you don't mind the format of Learn & Master, there is a lot you can learn here. They also offer a 60-day money-back guarantee. However, since this is oil-painting specific, it may not cater to everyone and some people might prefer new, more modern lessons, so Learn & Master has earned an average rating.
Artist's Academy
Artist's Academy has tons of videos on different skills and techniques needed for learning how to paint or draw. But, unless you pay extra (on top of your membership fee) for a specific class, you'll be shuffling through jumbled videos that all seem disconnected and random. It's hard to know which videos match your skill level, so Artist's Academy would be a really hard starting place for new painting students. Their $8/month membership fee seems like a steal of a deal, but people complain that after your first year, prices go way up and they make it difficult to cancel or get refunds. We don't feel like Artist's Academy gives any solid direction, so we can't recommend their painting lessons.
Online Art Lessons
Online Art Lessons has hundreds of paid and free art lessons. Each of the videos can be hours long and cater to beginner painters, with some for more advanced ones as well. The pricing is extremely confusing and a little contradictory in some places too. You'll get ads for random products on this site, and it's clear that the company needs a lot of organization help. However, there are a lot of free videos here, so rather than trying to figure out membership details, we recommend using Online Art Lessons as a supplement to your other training and taking advantage of the free videos they offer.
Online Painting Lessons
Online Painting Lessons by Katie Jobling Art is a website that Jobling uses to sell her artwork, offer some free workshops in return for your name and email, and drive traffic to her social media accounts and videos where she makes most of her money. Jobling provides insights that are useful for beginner painters, but there is no official course offered and nothing for you to purchase. If you're looking to follow step-by-step lessons that will improve your painting skills, that's not what you will get here. This is why Online Painting Lessons is the lowest-ranked option on our list.
Continued from above...
Painting is great for people of any age to take part in. Whether you've got a finger-painting toddler or you're a retired professional exploring new hobbies, painting suits everyone. If you're like most of us, the majority of your artistic "training” and painting experience came through the classes you took in school while you were growing up.
Some of these may have even been mandatory, so you might not have appreciated them at the time. Unless you took extra painting credits, dove deep into all the episodes of Bob Ross you could get your hands on, or found a private studio that teaches classes, you may have hit a dead end in your training and are wondering what your options are.
Online painting lessons are as convenient as it gets. The class you choose can reflect the style you're interested in learning. If you're wanting to learn to draw people rather than nature scenes, you could find a class for this. Maybe you're interested in acrylics, watercolor, or oils specifically. There's a class for that too. With our help here, you'll be able to match yourself to online painting lessons that fit your experience level within just minutes. Before getting started, you'll likely be given a list of materials you need so that you can get your own in-home studio set up and ready to go.
We've done a lot of the important research regarding some of the best online painting classes available to you and recommend keeping the following things in mind when you're looking around:
- Art style. Are you looking for general education on painting so you can discover the type you like best? Do you want to dabble in all different styles and learn the basics of each? Or are you looking for something in particular? Explore the styles taught in the online classes and choose the one that piques your interest.
- Price. Although you're spending pennies on the dollar compared to private painting lessons, the cost is still a big consideration. Does the company offer a program with a one-time cost that you'll have lifetime access to? Or is there a subscription fee to continue your education month after month?
- Instruction type. Do you like the idea of a live masterclass that adds a personal touch to your training? Or do you prefer separate video lessons that you can progress with, pause, or reflect back on if you need to? Consider your preferred way of learning when choosing a painting program so that you get the most out of the lessons.
- Reputation. What have others said about the painting program? Does it have glitches or is it always running smoothly? Is customer service easy to work with if you need to cancel a subscription or have an issue with your account? What do students have to say about different instructors and what they've learned from them?
The experts at Top Consumer Reviews have researched the most popular online painting lessons available to you. We hope this information helps you find a company that accelerates your painting skills and gives you a relaxing, enjoyable experience!
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