6 “Best” Chatbot Courses & Certifications (April 2024)

Chatbots are a fundamental part of today’s artificial intelligence (AI) technologies. If you have any connection to modern technology, you have encountered chatbots at some point. They are used for a wide range of applications across industries, including online banking, retail and e-commerce, travel and hospitality, healthcare, media, education and more. 

The world’s largest tech companies, such as Amazon and Apple, are pouring millions of dollars into AI-powered chatbot development with technologies like Siri and Alexa. While these chatbots are voice-powered, there are many different types. 

But what exactly is a chatbot? 

A chatbot is a computer program that relies on AI to answer customers’ questions. It achieves this by possessing massive databases of problems and solutions, which they use to continually improve their learning. 

Any business that wants to secure a spot in the AI-driven future must consider chatbots. They enable companies to provide 24/7, personalized customer service while also being scalable. Think of how different this is when compared to human customer service representatives. A single chatbot can carry out the work of many individual humans, saving time for both the company and customer. 

While there are many chatbots on the market, it is also extremely valuable to create your own. By developing your own chatbot, you can tune it to your company’s needs, creating stronger and more personalized interactions with your customers. 

Thanks to the explosion of online education and its accessibility, there are many available chatbot courses that can help you develop your own chatbot. 

Here are the 7 best chatbot courses: 

1. Conversation Design Institute (All-Course Access)

Topping our list is Conversation Design Institute, which offers an impressive range of online conversation design courses aimed at teaching you how to develop natural dialog for chatbots and voice assistants. The All-Course Access provides full access to all CDI course materials. 

This chatbot course is especially useful if you want to possess a resource library that can be referenced when building your own chatbots or voice assistants. You can also use it to build virtual beings and other types of AI assistants. At the same time, it is also a great option if you want to become well-rounded in various skill sets within the field of conversational AI. This also helps individuals decide which role is best for them within the field. 

With the all-course access, you gain access to all CDI certification courses and learning materials, which includes over 130 video lectures. These lectures are constantly updated with new ones added regularly. You will also receive hands-on advice, quizzes, downloadable templates, access to CDI-exclusive live classes with industry experts, discounted admission to CDI events, access to the CDI alumni network, and much more. 

Here are some of the main highlights of this course: 

• Wide range of courses
• Full access to CDI course materials
• Resource library that can be referenced when developing chatbots
• 130+ video lectures
• Hands-on advice

Conversation Design Institute's all-course access is the best option for anyone looking to get into the development of chatbots. 

You can also receive a 25% discount by using our discount code: Unite.AI 

2. How to Build a Chatbot Without Coding

Another one of the top chatbot courses is “How to Build a Chatbot Without Coding.” This course offered by Coursera aims to teach you how to develop chatbots without writing any code. 

Following the conclusion of the course, you will know how to plan, implement, test, and deploy chatbots. You will also learn how to use Watson Assistant to visually create chatbots, as well as how to deploy them on your website with a WordPress login. Another great part of the course? If you don’t have a website, it will provide one for you. 

This course was created by Antonio Cangiano, a Software Developer at IBM Developer Skills Network. 

Here are some of the main highlights of the course: 

• No coding required
• Learn about Entities and their features
• Build user-friendly chatbots
• No experience or expertise needed

3. Create Your First Chatbot with Rasa and Python

Another top choice for beginners is “Create Your First Chatbot with Rasa and Python.” This 2 hour project-based course teaches you how to create chatbots with Rasa and Python. The former is a framework for creating AI-powered, industrial grade chatbots. It is used by many developers to create chatbots and contextual assistants. 

The course covers the most fundamental basic aspects of the Rasa framework and chatbot development, enabling you to create simple AI powered chatbots. The course is specifically aimed at programmers looking to begin chatbot development, meaning you don’t need any machine learning and chatbot development experience. With that said, it’s recommended that you are familiar with Python. 

Here are some of the highlights of this course: 

• Beginner level
• 2-hour long project-based course
• Learned skills include contextual assistants, Python, chatbot development, and Rasa
• Create simple AI chatbots

4. Use SharePoint & Power Virtual Agent to Create Smart Chatbot 

If you are at the intermediate level in chatbot development, a good option is “Use SharePoint & Power Virtual Agent to Create Smart Chatbot.” Lasting 1.25 hours, this guided project teaches you how to create a SharePoint site and list, create a Power Automate flow, and create a Power Virtual Agent chatbot. 

You start by creating the SharePoint site and list before adding data to it to create a Power Virtual Agent chatbot. This chabot can then automate the information flow from your company to the employees. This enables your employees to have easy conversations with the chatbot rather than other employees. 

The project relies on Office 360 services, so it's important to have access to a Microsoft account and a Microsoft 365 Developer Program subscription. 

Here are some of the highlights of this course: 

• SharePoint site and list
• Power Automate flow
• Power Virtual Agent chatbot
• Microsoft Office 365 services

5. Create a Lead Generation Messenger Chatbot using Chatfuel

Yet another beginner-friendly course, “Create a Lead Generation Messenger Chatbot using Chatfuel” is a free guided project lasting 1.5 hours. It teaches you how to create a Messenger chatbot that can take bookings from customers, get ticket claims for events, and receive customer messages. 

With this course you’ll also learn how to automate the chatbot through Email automation and Google Sheets integration. Following the course’s conclusion, you will have developed a fully functioning chatbot that can be deployed to your Facebook page to interact with customers through Messenger in real-time. 

Here are some of the highlights of this course: 

• No programming knowledge needed
• Interactive, flow building interface from Chatfuel
• Hands-on experience
• Build lead generation chatbot

6. Build Incredible Chatbots

The last chatbot course on our list is “Build Incredible Chatbots,” which is a comprehensive course aimed at chatbot developers. The course will teach you how to build and deploy chatbots for multiple platforms like WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, Slack, and Skype through the use of Wit and DialogFlow. 

Following the completion of the course, you will possess all of the knowledge, concepts, and techniques necessary to develop a fully functional chatbot for business. You start out with chatbot platforms that require no code before moving on to a code-intensive chatbot that is useful for specialized scenarios. 

Here are some of the highlights of this course: 

• Highly comprehensive course
• Build chatbots for multiple platforms
• Start with no code before moving on to code intensive
• Chatbots for specialized scenarios