Build apps with LLMs
Ship an app that uses an LLM API, retrieval and evaluation
Plan it around your week
This path is roughly 36 hours in total. Tell us how much time you actually have.
About 6 weeks.
Based on our own estimate of the path, not the providers' figures. Most people need a bit longer than they think.
How long does it take?
| Courses | 2 |
|---|---|
| Weeks | About 6 |
| Hours a week | 6 |
| Total hours | About 36 |
The steps, in order
Why this step: The most direct route to working with transformer models in real code.
You're ready for the next step when: You can load, run and fine-tune a pretrained model.
Why this step: Understanding what's inside a GPT makes debugging LLM apps far easier.
You're ready for the next step when: You understand tokenisation and attention well enough to reason about failures.
What will you build along the way?
| Project | Brief | Done when |
|---|---|---|
| Ship a small RAG app | Build a retrieval-augmented app over a document set you care about. |
Where to go next
- All free AI learning paths
Every path, with who it suits and how long it takes.
- All free AI courses, rated
Filter the whole catalogue by level, topic and certificate.
- AI engineer (LLM apps) roadmap
The fastest route from writing code to shipping an LLM-powered product.
- NLP engineer roadmap
From tokens to transformers to a working NLP system.
- AI learning path for non-coders
Explain how modern AI works and use it well at work
- Use AI tools well at work
Prompt, evaluate output, and automate everyday tasks safely
- Python for AI, from zero
Write the Python every AI course assumes
- Machine learning foundations
Train, evaluate and explain classic ML models
- The maths ML actually uses
Enough linear algebra, calculus and probability to read ML courses without panic
- Deep learning, hands-on
Build and train neural networks for vision and text
- Become an ML engineer
Deploy, monitor and maintain models in production
- From data analysis to AI
Move from spreadsheets and SQL to ML and AI
- Is Hugging Face Learn worth it?
Our review of Hugging Face Learn, where steps on this path are hosted.
Want the bigger picture?
Roadmaps show every skill in a field, in order, so you can see where this path fits.

