Who should and shouldn't go to software engineering bootcamps (in 2025). No matter how good a bootcamp seems - or how much you want to do it, these things are DEAL BREAKERS you have to consider before even thinking about doing one.

Who should and shouldn't go to software engineering bootcamps (in 2025). No matter how good a bootcamp seems - or how much you want to do it, these things are DEAL BREAKERS you have to consider before even thinking about doing one. My background - since these are all opinions, you have to judge my background and consider them through that lens. I am a self taught coder at age 12 who did a general engineering degree in college (but took a LOT of CS courses) did software engineering internships, and then worked at Facebook from 2009 to 2017 (about 200 engineers to 10,000 engineers). Afterwards I started a tech company focused on helping experienced engineers prepare for interviews and have insights into almost all of the top companies hiring processes and hiring trends. Assume that I know a ton about most bootcamps, all the payment methods, job guarantees, all kinds of placement reports, etc... # Consider a bootcamp if you check off ALL of these boxes: 1. You can dedicate full time effort to becoming a SWE and you are able to take 2 years to get a job. Meaning you have the savings and life support in place to make this work. This applies even if you do a part time bootcamp because the time outside of your day job that it will take up will leave you with minimal outside time for 2 years. 2. You have several years or more of professional work experience already and are successful in that career. Think mechanical engineer, teacher, data analyst, lawyer, doctor, vet, etc... 3. You have already done 1+ years of programming as a hobby and you already can program pretty well on your own and are ready to get a job now. 4. You are totally fine if you pay $22,000 and don't end up getting a job (even if there is a job guarantee, be prepared to lose the entire cost). It won't be devastating financially and you won't feel demoralized, then go for it. 5. If you don't land a SWE job then you will be happy with a non software job, like a customer support role. # Whether you check off those boxes or not, if you meet ANY of these, DO NOT DO A BOOTCAMP: 1. 🚩 You don't like your current career and want to move to SWE primarily seems high paying, flexible, and possible to transition into without a college degree. 2. 🚩 Your friend did a bootcamp and has been constantly recommending you do it, you keep seeing more and more people do it and get great outcomes, and you feel like now is the time. 3. 🚩You saw an instagram ad/tiktok post that made it feel like you can learn programming too and that the bootcamp is 4. 🚩You took free/cheap/Udemy classes with/from a bootcamp out of curiosity and they made you feel like it's a good time to go into a bootcamp and they told you their outcomes are good right now so there is a good chance you will succeed. 5. 🚩 You don't have any professional desk-job work experience (e.g. line cook, fast food, cosmetology, plumber, nanny) 6. 🚩 You don't already know how to program OR you tried to learn and just don't understand it on your own and want a structured approach to learning it. 7. 🚩 You don't believe the 'ends justify the means' - it's very likely you will have to stretch the truth about your past experience and your bootcamp projects to get a job in the 2 year timeframe above. Happy to answer specific questions on specific scenarios or clarifications.

How much do you think? I meant it very loosely, like you started to code over a year ago.

Let's look at Codesmith for example. The schedule for part time is: 9 Months: Monday – Thursday: 8:00 pm–11:00 pm ET Saturday 12:00 pm–6:00 pm ET So if you work full time you have hardly any time for anything else. You can Sundays and Friday nights off I guess? Let's say you have two young children and normally leave at 7:30am to drop the kids off at preschool and then go to work. And then pick them up and come home at 6pm and then cook dinner and then go to class and spend otherwise ZERO time with your family. Like you need a support system. A partner who can help out significantly to support you. It's really not at all easy. I've heard it both ways. People who have savings and a support system think part time can work, others thing it only works if you are single and unattached. Either-way, the longer and slower you do it part time, the longer it will take you to eventually get the job, so you could do it with less support and maybe 3 to 5 years?

Good question, but it's funny how the ones that do tend to be the ones that succeed and they are taking a pay cut to do the transition. I don't think many would and it's another reason why bootcamps are closing left right and center now, I'm trying to dispel the myth that people making minimum wage as a line cook will go to a bootcamp and make $100K afterwards even though the advertising comes across that way.

Oh ok yeah for sure, people can also get temporary jobs too, I'm just seeing right now people who don't go all in on SWE for the entire job search time having a harder time - it's such a difficult job search that people are just going back to their old jobs. Talking Codesmith again since I know them so well, they had a huge spike in placements that 'ghosted' and their placement was verified by their LinkedIn instead of officially. This is a sign of people giving up and going back to their old job or a tangential old job and giving up and not reporting it back as a placement because it's not a full blown SWE job.

If you area already a developer and want to switch adjacent then my arguments don't apply If you are a custodian at a high school and you saw an add for SWE and for cyber and want to choose one then this applies. The reason is if you aren't in the industry and choosing between them then you are not committed enough to SWE to become a SWE. If you choose SWE and learn programming for a year then you might be able to check off the boxes in the future, but you don't right now.

A few reasons: \- For flag 7 - when it comes to exaggerating your experience, you'll commonly see things along the lines of. like a hotel marketing manager who ran their website -> "Web Developer". Mechanical Engineer -> "Systems Engineer". Accountant -> "Data Engineer". Account manager -> "Project Manager" For grads at places like Codesmith the vast majority reframe their non-technical experience as experience and it's a key part of the high outcomes in the past and if you can lie like this, you won't be getting those mid level jobs with zero experience that they love to advertise without telling you how it happens. If the job was at a big company and some kind of information-related job, this is a lot easier to do without completely flat out lying. \- If you don't want to lie to that degree and hope for the best, then more generally - there are more transferrable skills in "desk job"s than in hands on jobs. In the past I would say a plumber has to problem solve like crazy and that should be super applicable to SWE! But right now as you can see at places like Codesmith - emphasizing "communication" and the "empathy" if you've had a desk job where you are communicating project plans and working on product teams or running programs, etc... those skills are more directly transferable (and even required) in SWE jobs.

I replied a bit for #2/5 here: [https://www.reddit.com/r/codingbootcamp/comments/1lnns0z/comment/n0hxrk7/](https://www.reddit.com/r/codingbootcamp/comments/1lnns0z/comment/n0hxrk7/) Degrees aren't a deal breaker so I zoomed out more to the professional experience aspect instead. And yeah things have changed in the past 2 years and they have been gradually getting worse and worse if you don't meet the criteria and go anyways. You might be "the one" who gets a job, but have to be realistic.

You sound like the type of person that would have gotten a $100K job in 2021. Unfortunately it's not that time anymore. Even if you don't meet the criteria, you might be the exception case so who am I to judge, but good luck - you'll need it because the drive isn't enough..

I'm not trying to encourage or discourage, each person is case by case. I do think in 2025 more people than not will not meet the criteria to go to a bootcamp, but that some people will and they should go to a bootcamp.

Well if you have the facts to back up your claims then you should have infinite courage because the truth should always win at the end of the day. Codesmith isn't accepting the facts and is trying to gaslight me about them and I'm not having it. The people there have no integrity in my opinion and am not backing down until they acknowledge the truth, make changes, and apologize.

Pivoting from anything that's not technical is not easy right now no. But you might be able to pivot into solutions engineer or sales engineer which are good jobs at big tech. And then maybe over a longer period of time become a SWE. And I do think it's possible to pivot to those roles.

Depends on where. FAANG recruiters probably picked up both a strong network and some of the insider info of how engineering works to have a leg up. If you have a strong natural affinity to coding then you could make the switch. But it might take a very long time.and I would expect a number of steps to get there. The other path would be like recruiting at a hot AI company like OpenAI because there is a lot of room to step up and apply coding and AI tooling to the problem and it might be interesting work nonetheless.