Scrimba vs Hey Telo

About

Scrimba is an interactive coding education platform that revolutionizes how programming is taught in video format — enabling students to edit and run code directly within tutorial videos, transforming passive watching into active coding practice through proprietary screencasting technology. Founded in 2017 in Oslo, Norway and backed by Y Combinator, Scrimba raised $400,000 and grew to 120,000+ monthly active learners with $1.9 million in revenue as of October 2024, serving the global population learning web development and programming.\n\nScrimba's core innovation is the "scrim" — an interactive screencast where the code editor is embedded within the video. When a tutorial plays, learners can pause at any point and edit the code directly in the player, test their changes, and continue — creating a hands-on learning experience where the video content and practice environment are the same thing. This eliminates the context switching between watching a video, opening a separate code editor, and typing out examples that makes traditional video tutorials less effective for kinesthetic learners.\n\nIn 2025, Scrimba competes in the online coding education market with freeCodeCamp (free self-paced learning), The Odin Project (free full-stack curriculum), Codecademy, Pluralsight, and Frontend Masters for self-taught developer education. Scrimba's interactive format is a genuine differentiator — the ability to immediately practice within the video context produces better learning retention than passive watching. The platform focuses primarily on front-end web development (JavaScript, React, CSS) which represents the highest-demand entry point for self-taught developers. The 2025 strategy focuses on expanding the course library, growing the community features (student projects, peer learning), and converting free learners to the Scrimba Pro subscription through the demonstrated value of the interactive format.