In this Best Courses Guide (BCG), I’ve crawled the web to find the best Apache Groovy courses for both new and experienced programmers — trust me, it was hard. And unlike other articles that just throw in whatever courses they found into their ranking and call it a day, I’ve carefully handpicked mine, prioritizing high-quality and up-to-date courses for Groovy, be they free or paid. Also, I did not limit myself to the strict definition of online courses, since lots of places are valuable for learning.

Whether you’re interested in automating tasks with Jenkins, writing unit tests with Spock, or integrating Groovy into your Java projects for other purposes, here are my top picks for learning Groovy.

Click on the shortcuts for more details:

• Top Picks
• What is Groovy?
• BCG Stats
• Why You Should Trust Us
• BCG Methodology

Here are my top picks. Click on one to skip to the course details:

What is Groovy?

Introduced in 2003 by the Apache Software Foundation, Groovy is a powerful, optionally typed programming language based on the Java Virtual Machine (JVM).

Whereas other JVM-based languages were created to compete with Java, Groovy was designed to complement it. It’s so similar to Java, in fact, that you could change your .java file extension to .groovy and expect it to run. Thus, Java developers will find Groovy to be extremely familiar, making it easy to learn and use without any big learning curve.

But that begs the question — if Groovy doesn’t aim to be a better Java, why use it in the first place?

To put it bluntly, Groovy is amazing in areas where Java traditionally sucks at, such as in scripting or conciseness. That’s why in the vast majority of cases, Groovy is used in project automation and continuous delivery (see Jenkins) or unit testing (see Spock) where code tends to be repetitive and shallow — any developer would lose their mind if they had to write the same boilerplate over and over again. Groovy’s support for domain-specific languages, meta-programming, functional programming, dynamic typing, and other goodies (not to its syntactic sugar) is a godsend for cutting through the noise of more explicit syntax. Groovy is also used in web development frameworks such as Grails and Micronaut.

BCG Stats

• Four of the courses use the latest major version of Groovy (Groovy 4), while another 4 use the previous major version (Groovy 3). Meanwhile, one course uses a dated version of Groovy (Groovy 2).
• Five of the courses are free while the rest are paid.

Best Paid Old but Gold Course for Programmers (Dan Vega)

Reasons to Take

Uses Groovy 2 Comprehensive, with many example projects Experienced instructor Coding exercises and quizzes

The Complete Apache Groovy Developer Course stands out as one of the most extensive and highly regarded courses on Udemy for Groovy developers.

This paid course covers the basics of Groovy, like its syntax and how it differs from Java, all the way to its more advanced / esoteric features, like collections, closures, and metaprogramming. Furthermore, you’ll also witness Groovy’s scripting powers in action through various projects, such as a Markup Builder for HTML and XML, working with REST Services, and connecting to databases.

And while the course uses a dated version of Groovy, the principles and skills taught are timeless. Thus, experienced programmers should have no problem adapting what they’ve learned to the latest 4.0 Groovy version — just take a look at the many recent five-star Udemy reviews. But, if you’re not confident in your programming skills, then you might find this course challenging.

Dan Vega, a Spring Developer Advocate with over 20 years of software development experience, is your instructor for this course. You’ll learn through video lectures and code demonstrations, as well as coding exercises and quizzes to keep your hands and mind busy.

Provider	Udemy
Instructor	Dan Vega
Prerequisites	Prior programming experience in any language
Workload	13–14 hours
Enrollments	28K
Rating	4.5 / 5.0 (4.8K)
Cost	Paid
Exercises	Coding exercises and quizzes
Certificate	Paid

Best Paid Up-To-Date Course for Absolute Beginners (Saravanan Dhandapani)

Reasons to Take

Uses Groovy 4 Most up-to-date No programming experience needed Experienced instructor

No programming experience? No problem!

Apache Groovy 4 Fundamentals is the best and most up-to-date introductory course on the web, provided you have a paid Pluralsight subscription. Taught by Saravanan Dhandapani, a Solution Architect working in the financial domain, you’ll explore everything necessary to groove your way into coding.

With video lectures, coding demonstrations, and exercise files, by the end of the course you’ll be able to:

• Master Groovy language syntax and its unique features like closures, builders, and metaprogramming
• Utilize looping constructs for program flow control and manage complex data structures
• Open, read, and write files through file handling logic, including processing text, XML, and JSON
• Explore Groovy’s regex capabilities through basic pattern matching, extracting the matches, substituting, and translating text
• Connect to databases and perform data insertion and fetching tasks
• Adopt best programming practices, such as writing Object-Oriented code, for developing fast, secure, and portable code
• Seamlessly integrate Groovy into the Java ecosystem projects to enhance and simplify Java application development.

Provider	Pluralsight
Instructor	Saravanan Dhandapani
Prerequisites	None
Workload	≈4 hours
Rating	3.5 / 5.0 (15)
Cost	Paid
Exercises	Checkpoints
Certificate	Paid

Best Free Course for Absolute Beginners (Awais Mirza)

Reasons to Take

Uses Groovy 3 Introductory

A free alternative for complete beginners eager to learn Groovy programming is Awais Mirza’s Groovy Tutorial For Beginners. This course offers lectures and coding demos, ensuring that by the end, you’ll grasp the programming basics well enough to write Groovy confidently. Utilize Coding With Fun’s and TutorialPoint’s text tutorial, covering topics such as:

• Environment Setup with IntelliJ idea
• Basic Syntax
• Variables & Data Types
• Operators
• Conditionals & Loops
• Methods
• File I/O
• Optionals
• Data Structures
• Date & Time
• Exception Handling
• Object Oriented Programming.

Channel	Awais Mirza
Provider	YouTube
Instructor	Awais Mirza
Prerequisites	None
Workload	2–3 hours
Views	30K
Likes	277
Cost	Free
Exercises	Code demo
Certificate	None

Best Free Hands-On Tutorial with TDD for Programmers (Szymon Stepniak)

Reasons to Take

Uses Groovy 3 and and Spock 2 Framework Concise Good video presentation style Best for hands-on learners

Learn Groovy while getting your hands dirty at the same time with this interesting project — writing a Brainf**k interpreter!

Brainf**k is an esoteric programming language that’s infamous for being ridiculously hard to write (it’s in the name). In this free YouTube walkthrough, Szymon Stepniak will guide you on developing a Groovy program capable of reading and executing Brainf**k code.

Here’s a twist for any of you who has done this before: Rather than following the traditional imperative style characterized by mutable states, you’ll instead use recursive functions and immutable data structures for your interpreter. Does that sound like a challenge? By the course’s conclusion, you’ll appreciate the elegance and simplicity of implementing these concepts in Groovy.

Oh, and one more thing — Szymon embraces a test-driven development (TDD) methodology for this project, using the Spock framework for unit tests. So you’ll also get a taste of how Groovy is used in unit testing.

Channel	Szymon Stepniak
Provider	YouTube
Instructor	Szymon Stepniak
Prerequisites	Prior programming experience
Workload	<1 hour
Views	1.9K
Likes	74
Cost	Free
Exercises	Code demo
Certificate	None

Best Free Official Resource for Programmers (Apache Software Foundation)

Reasons to Take

Uses Groovy 4 Comprehensive Best for self-learners

For any programmer eager to dive into a new language, the official documentation should always be high priority. Fortunately, Groovy’s Documentation is a quick and simple way to pick up the language.

As expected of a language doc, it’s comprehensive covering everything, and I mean everything, about the language — including tooling! Self-learners rejoice, as the writing style is neat and tidy, and the code examples are plenty.

The official documentation is split into three sections:

• User Guides: Start here. It’ll get you quickly up to speed with the most common language features and tooling for everyday programming
• Groovy Language Specification: More suited for those who already have a grasp of the basics and are interested in a deeper understanding of the language’s design, syntax, and semantics
• Tooling: Similar to the last point, but for Groovy / JVM tooling. Useful, as the JVM ecosystem is extensive.

Institution	Apache Software Foundation
Provider	Independent
Prerequisites	Prior programming experience
Workload	N/A
Cost	Free
Exercises	None
Certificate	None

Best Paid Crash Course for Programmers (Benjamin Muschko)

Reasons to Take

Uses Groovy 3 Introductory and concise Experienced instructor Quizzes and exercises

Are you an experienced developer looking to quickly pick up Groovy for your job? Learning Groovy With Benjamin Muschko on LinkedIn Learning is just for you. This concise, hour-long crash course will equip you with everything you need to get started with Groovy.

By the end of this paid course, you will:

• Install and setup IntelliJ Idea and the Groovy runtime
• Understand and take advantage of the interplay between Java, Groovy, and the JVM
• Write your first “Hello World” Groovy project
• Master Groovy fundamentals, including variables, data types, classes, and exception handling
• Grasp advanced concepts like closures, collection API, and file management.

Provider	LinkedIn Learning
Instructor	Benjamin Muschko
Prerequisites	None
Workload	≈1 hour
Enrollments	14K
Rating	4.6 / 5.0 (219)
Cost	Paid or Subscription
Exercises	Quizzes and exercises
Certificate	Paid

Best Free Course for Spock (IntelliJ IDEA)

Reasons to Take

Uses Groovy 3 and Spock 2 Concise and focused Has complementary text version

Are you a Java developer who dreads writing unit tests in JUnit? Why not switch to Spock instead, an awesome testing and specification framework that simplifies writing and organizing tests thanks to Groovy. And don’t worry — Spock plays nicely with your existing Java codebase.

By the end of this free less-than-an-hour long YouTube tutorial from JetBrains, you’ll firmly understand that using Groovy + Spock makes writing unit tests less annoying than Java + JUnit.

You’ll learn about making your tests flexible, using Spock’s special features, and handling errors. You’ll also cover how to test with different sets of data, use fake components for testing, and simplify test code with helper methods. Finally, you’ll learn how to prepare for and clean up after tests, and how to use tests as a way to document what your code does.

Prefer reading to watching? Here’s the written version of this tutorial.

Channel	IntelliJ IDEA by JetBrains
Provider	YouTube
Instructor	Trisha Gee
Prerequisites	Java programming experience
Workload	<1 hour
Views	47K
Likes	905
Cost	Free
Exercises	Code demo
Certificate	None

Best Paid Course for Jenkins (Chris Behrens)

Reasons to Take

Uses Groovy 4 Comprehensive and focused Experienced instructor

Already familiar with Jenkins, but are looking to automate and streamline Jenkins tasks  for Continuous Integration (CI) and Continuous Delivery (CD).?

Automating Jenkins with Groovy will teach you all the Groovy you need to take advantage of this powerful automation server. By the end, you’ll be able to tackle advanced Jenkins topics like administration, software deployment, and advanced pipelines with your newfound Groovy and Jenkins skills, some of which include:

• Groovy fundamentals and its interface with Jenkins
• Automating Jenkins tasks using Groovy scripts
• Automating plugins and credentials in Jenkins
• Sharing code between scripts and pipelines
• Leveraging Groovy to move builds into version control.

This paid Pluralsight is part of the Continuous Integration with Jenkins learning path.

Provider	Pluralsight
Instructor	Chris Behrens
Prerequisites	Experience with Jenkins
Workload	≈2 hours
Cost	Paid Subscription
Exercises	Code demos and exercise files
Certificate	Paid

Best Free Coding Exercise Platform (Exercism)

Reasons to Take

Uses Groovy 4 High-quality and fun coding problems Free mentoring

So you’ve gotten some experience with Groovy under your belt. Let’s put your Groovy programming skills to the test with Exercism, a free coding platform for developers, by developers.

Their coding exercises are fun and intriguing, suitable for all kinds of programmers, be they new or experienced. You can submit your solutions and Exercism will automatically grade them for you with unit tests, and if they pass, your solutions will be submitted to the publicly available leaderboard. But valuable hands-on experience is not all you’ll get from Exercism — you’ll also have the opportunity to get your solutions reviewed by a human coding volunteer for free.

With exercises in over 60 programming languages, Exercism’s goal is to help everyone get really good at programming, regardless of their background, share the love of programming, and help people upskill as part of their upward social mobility.

At the time of writing, there are about 60 Groovy exercises of easy and medium difficulty in total.

Provider	Exercism
Prerequisites	All levels
Workload	N/A
Enrollments	3K
Cost	Free
Exercises	Autograded coding exercises
Certificate	None

Why You Should Trust Us

Class Central, a Tripadvisor for online education, has helped 60 million learners find their next course. We’ve been combing through online education for more than a decade to aggregate a catalog of 200,000 online courses and 200,000 reviews written by our users. And we’re online learners ourselves: combined, the Class Central team has completed over 400 online courses, including online degrees.

Best Courses Guide (BCG) Methodology

I built this ranking following the now tried-and-tested methodology used in previous BCGs (you can find them all here). It involves a three-step process:

1. Research: I started by leveraging Class Central’s database with 200K online courses and 200K+ reviews. Then, I made a preliminary selection of Apache Groovy courses by rating, reviews, and bookmarks.
2. Evaluate: I read through reviews on Class Central, Reddit, and course providers to understand what other learners thought about each course and combined it with my own experience as a learner.
3. Select: Well-made courses were picked if they presented valuable and engaging content, fit a set of criteria and be ranked according to comprehensive curriculum, affordability, release date, ratings and enrollments.