Coursera controls access to courses and certificates and can revoke them, with limited refund windows. It collects learning and personal data and uses arbitration in the US.
The clauses that could affect you the most. Read these even if you skip everything else.
You waive your right to a jury trial and class action lawsuits — all disputes must go through mandatory binding arbitration on an individual basis.
Anything you submit to Coursera (homework, posts, assignments) is licensed to them perpetually, worldwide, for free, and they can sublicense it to others.
Coursera's maximum financial liability to you is capped at just $20 or 6 months of fees, and you only have 1 year to file any claim.
Coursera can unilaterally change any terms, including the arbitration provision, and your continued use automatically means you accept the changes.
Subscriptions auto-renew, refunds are very limited, and Coursera has broad discretion to deny refund requests for multiple reasons.
Browse what the terms actually say — filter by severity or by topic.
Mandatory individual arbitration highlighted upfront
⚖️Forced arbitration💬 Right from the start, Coursera warns you that you cannot join a class action or group lawsuit against them. You must handle any dispute alone.
“YOU WILL ONLY BE PERMITTED TO PURSUE DISPUTES OR CLAIMS AND SEEK RELIEF AGAINST US ON AN INDIVIDUAL BASIS.”
Revocable license to use the platform
📄Claims your content💬 Coursera can revoke your access to the platform at any time, and you don't own any of the course content you access.
“Coursera grants a "limited, personal, non-exclusive, non-transferable, and revocable license" for personal, non-commercial use only. Users obtain no intellectual property rights.”
Account suspension or termination for violations
⛔Account termination💬 If Coursera determines you violated any of their rules, they can suspend or terminate your account, potentially losing access to paid content.
“Account violations may result in suspension or termination.”
Coursera can cancel or modify courses at will
📝Can change terms anytime💬 Coursera can change, cancel, or reschedule any course at any time, including altering how assignments are graded, even while you're in the middle of taking a course.
“Coursera reserves the right to cancel, interrupt, reschedule, or modify any courses and change assignment weights or values.”
No guarantee of academic credit
📌Other💬 Finishing a Coursera course does not mean you'll receive any academic credit, and other schools or employers may not recognize your completion.
“Coursera does not grant academic credit for the completion of Content Offerings. Completion doesn't guarantee recognition by other institutions.”
Extremely broad perpetual license to your content
📄Claims your content💬 Anything you submit on Coursera — homework, forum posts, assignments — Coursera can use, modify, share, and sublicense forever, for free, anywhere in the world, and they can transfer those rights to anyone else.
“Users grant Coursera a "fully-transferable, royalty-free, perpetual, sublicensable, non-exclusive, worldwide license" to use, modify, and distribute submissions.”
Unrestricted rights to your feedback
📄Claims your content💬 Any suggestions or feedback you give Coursera become theirs entirely — they can use your ideas however they want without compensating you.
“Users grant Coursera unrestricted rights to any feedback or suggestions provided.”
No responsibility for third-party content
🛡️Limits their liability💬 Coursera is not responsible for the quality, accuracy, or safety of content provided by instructors, other users, or linked third-party sites, even if it contains harmful material.
“Coursera disclaims responsibility for third-party content, including instructor materials, user posts, and external links, which may contain objectionable material or malware.”
Your learning data used for research without opt-out
📥Data collection💬 Coursera can use your activity data for research and may run experiments on you (like showing different course versions) without asking your specific permission first. They say they won't reveal your identity, but you have no clear opt-out.
“Coursera may use participation records for education research at aggregate levels. Personal identity won't be disclosed without express consent, though learners may be exposed to course variations for research purposes.”
Opaque fee allocation and location-based pricing
📌Other💬 Only 15% of what you pay goes to Coursera's platform; the rest goes to content providers. Prices can vary based on where you live and Coursera can change them whenever they want.
“Coursera allocates fifteen percent (15%) of the fees you pay as payment for access to the Coursera platform. The remainder covers content access. Fees vary by location and may change at Coursera's discretion.”
No guarantee of professional qualification
📌Other💬 Completing a Coursera program does not guarantee you'll be qualified or licensed for any job or profession.
“Coursera doesn't guarantee "licensure, certification or qualification for any profession or job."”
Services can be changed or removed anytime
📝Can change terms anytime💬 Coursera can add, remove, or suspend any feature or service at any time, which could affect content you've paid for.
“Coursera may add, remove, or suspend features and services.”
No warranties whatsoever
🛡️Limits their liability💬 Coursera provides everything without any guarantees — if the platform doesn't work properly or content is wrong, they aren't legally responsible.
“THE SERVICES AND ALL INCLUDED CONTENT ARE PROVIDED ON AN "AS IS" BASIS WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND.”
AI outputs provided without warranty
🤖AI training on your data💬 If Coursera's AI tools give you wrong answers or bad advice, that's on you. They take no responsibility for AI-generated content accuracy.
“AI-enhanced services are provided without warranty. Users must VERIFY ANY AI OUTPUTS THAT YOU USE IN YOUR COURSEWORK and use AI services per the Acceptable Use Policy.”
Broad liability disclaimer
🛡️Limits their liability💬 Coursera won't pay for any indirect harm you suffer, including lost profits, lost data, or reputational damage, no matter what goes wrong.
“Coursera disclaims liability for indirect, incidental, special, consequential, or punitive damages; loss of profits; data loss; or goodwill.”
Damages capped at $20 or 6 months of fees
🛡️Limits their liability💬 Even if Coursera causes you significant harm, the maximum they'll pay you is $20 or whatever you paid them in the last 6 months — whichever is more. For many users this could be a tiny amount.
“Coursera's liability is limited to the greater of $20 or total fees paid in the past six months.”
Shortened statute of limitations to 1 year
🛡️Limits their liability💬 You only have 1 year to file a legal claim against Coursera, which is significantly shorter than the typical 2-4 year statute of limitations in most jurisdictions.
“ANY CAUSE OF ACTION RELATED TO THE SERVICES MUST COMMENCE WITHIN ONE (1) YEAR AFTER THE CAUSE OF ACTION ACCRUES.”
Users must indemnify Coursera
🛡️Limits their liability💬 If someone sues Coursera because of something you did or posted on the platform, you have to pay Coursera's legal costs and any damages.
“Users indemnify Coursera against third-party claims related to policy violations, legal violations, or user content infringement.”
California law and venue for U.S. users
📍Jurisdiction💬 If you're a U.S. user, any court disputes must be handled in Santa Clara County, California, which could be far from where you live and expensive to travel to.
“California law governs; disputes go to Santa Clara County courts (except small claims).”
Mandatory binding arbitration
⚖️Forced arbitration💬 You give up your right to go to court. Instead, all disputes must be resolved through private arbitration, where the decision is final and cannot be appealed.
“Users and Coursera agree to binding arbitration for all disputes under NAM (National Arbitration & Mediation) rules.”
Class action waiver
🚫No class action💬 You cannot join with other users in a class action lawsuit, even if thousands of people are affected by the same issue. You must fight alone.
“EACH OF US MAY BRING CLAIMS AGAINST THE OTHER ONLY ON AN INDIVIDUAL BASIS AND NOT ON A CLASS, REPRESENTATIVE, OR COLLECTIVE BASIS.”
Jury trial waiver
⚖️Forced arbitration💬 You give up your constitutional right to a jury trial. All disputes go through arbitration instead of the court system.
“YOU AND COURSERA HEREBY WAIVE ANY CONSTITUTIONAL AND STATUTORY RIGHTS TO SUE IN COURT AND HAVE A TRIAL IN FRONT OF A JUDGE OR A JURY.”
Confidential arbitration proceedings
⚖️Forced arbitration💬 The details of any dispute you have with Coursera will be kept secret, which prevents other consumers from learning about patterns of problems.
“Arbitration proceedings remain confidential.”
Coursera can change arbitration terms
📝Can change terms anytime💬 Coursera can change the arbitration rules at any time and simply notify you. If you keep using the service, you're automatically agreeing to the new terms — even if they're worse for you.
“Coursera may modify this provision with notice; continued service use constitutes acceptance.”
Unilateral right to revise all terms
📝Can change terms anytime💬 Coursera can change any part of the Terms whenever they want. They'll give you notice for big changes, but if you keep using the platform, you've automatically agreed.
“Coursera may revise Terms at any discretion. Material changes receive reasonable notice. Continued use constitutes acceptance.”
Third-party beneficiaries can enforce terms against you
🔗Shares with third parties💬 Coursera's partner universities and service providers can directly enforce parts of these Terms against you, even though you didn't sign an agreement with them.
“Content providers and integrated service providers are third-party beneficiaries who may enforce relevant provisions.”
Prohibition on scraping and AI training by users
🤖AI training on your data💬 You're not allowed to scrape Coursera's data or use platform content to train AI models, but notably Coursera's own terms don't restrict what they can do with your content for AI training.
“Content, data, or text scraping (manual or automated) ... Data mining or training AI/machine learning models on platform content”
Auto-renewing subscriptions with limited refund rights
🔄Auto-renews💬 Your subscription will automatically renew and charge you, and getting a refund is very difficult — Coursera can deny refunds for many reasons including misconduct or completing graded content.
“Subscriptions auto-renew unless cancelled. Refunds unavailable except where required by law, for upgrades, or in limited promotional cases.”
No refunds on Guided Projects
📌Other💬 If you purchase a Guided Project and don't like it or find it unhelpful, you cannot get your money back.
“Guided Projects: No refunds offered.”
Coursera can deny refunds at discretion
📌Other💬 Coursera has broad discretion to deny your refund request for many reasons, including if you've previously asked for refunds or if you've completed any graded content.
“Coursera may deny refunds for Terms violations, misconduct, repeated requests, chargebacks, or after graded content completion.”
Pricing can change with just advance notice
📝Can change terms anytime💬 Coursera can raise prices on existing plans — they just need to give you some advance notice, with no specified minimum notice period.
“Coursera reserves right to change pricing and plans with advance notice.”
No refunds for honor code violations
📌Other💬 If Coursera determines you violated their Honor Code, you lose access to your courses and won't get any money back, even if the determination is wrong.
“Non-Degree Products: No refunds issued for violations.”
Note: The Terms of Use do not explicitly mention rights to deletion, access, portability, opt-out, or objection. European users are noted to have mandatory consumer protections under Dutch law, but specific data rights are not enumerated in this document. A separate privacy policy likely addresses these, but it is not included here.