Products · Product
Codecademy
Raised as a usability problem by 24 people on Hacker News over 11 years (2011–2021), in 10 threads.
No issue was raised by at least 3 people in 3 threads this year.
No issue was raised by at least 3 people in 3 threads in the last 5 years.
Every issue, all time, most people first
Errors give no explanation of what went wrong or how to fix itUnreviewed
20112026- Marks correct code as wrong without explaining why, and instructions are unclear2013-02-02
- Error prompts are too vague, so learners just copy the answer without understanding2012-06-19
- Errors give no explanation, so learners can't tell what went wrong or how to fix it2012-01-16
Unreviewed issues were grouped by machine: Claude Haiku labelled each comment as a usability complaint, named what it's about and summed up the problem in a line, and a small model grouped similar problems. Nobody has checked them by hand. Expect mistakes.
The newest 25 complaints
- On mobile, can't press accept when choosing only required cookies2021-12-23
- Deleting account loops back to sign-in, with no clear way to finish deletion2021-12-23
- Submit button doesn't work on React activities; interface is buggy and laggy2016-11-19
- Lessons remain broken and impossible to finish2014-04-23
- Marks correct code as wrong without explaining why, and instructions are unclear2013-02-02
- Can't figure out how to change the JavaScript of a card2012-12-24
- Error prompts are too vague, so learners just copy the answer without understanding2012-06-19
- Menus add friction and a learning curve before reaching courses2012-05-04
- Bolded instructions sit below the fold and the next-exercise link is hard to notice2012-05-04
- Can't find the week-by-week lesson list, must guess URLs2012-04-17
- Redesign throws too much on screen at once, overwhelming beginners2012-04-17
- Courses page layout changes each visit, so user must relearn it2012-04-17
- Cluttered page with too many options doing essentially the same thing2012-04-17
- Hard to tell where the last lesson left off2012-04-17
- Learning page lacks focus, with ambiguous language, too many colors and cluttered layout2012-04-17
- No visible hierarchy showing where the user is in the course2012-04-17
- Error message for incorrect input is more confusing than a generic retry prompt2012-01-17
- Gives no useful feedback, only a vague 'Oops. Try again' error2012-01-17
- Commenter says Codecademy has a serious design flaw that they tried to fix2012-01-16
- Errors give no explanation, so learners can't tell what went wrong or how to fix it2012-01-16
- Coding error messages are confusing to beginners and lesson directions are unclear2012-01-16
- Error messages are cryptic and give no context on what went wrong2011-08-19
- Clicking Get Started does nothing, so the site looks like a stub2011-08-18
- Sign-in prompt appears unexpectedly and feels like a roadblock with no way to dismiss it2011-08-18
- Generic error shown for any command not matching the next tutorial step, discouraging experimentation2011-08-18