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6 Genius Ways to Showcase Your Coding Projects

04/24/2023
5 minutes

Completing a coding project is hugely rewarding, and then comes the daunting part: sharing your project with other people. Opening up your hard work to other people’s criticism feels both exciting and vulnerable. You might be thinking, what if people aren’t into the idea, find bugs, or can’t get the code to work?!

The thing is, getting your work in front of other people could be the stepping stone between an important opportunity, like being discovered by a tech recruiter, or connecting with a co-founder who can make your game-changing app idea a reality. Not to mention, coding is a very collaborative process, so you should get comfortable sharing your work, receiving (and giving) feedback, and getting input from other stakeholders. 

Need some ideas for sharing your coding projects? Here are six creative ways you can proudly share your projects and ideas with other devs and the world, as well as simple tips to start building something on your own.

Make a portfolio website

Whether you’re actively job seeking or maintaining your personal brand, you should have a website with your resume, contact information, and links to projects you’ve worked on. It’s a good idea to write a few sentences that provide details about the role you played in each project, the issue or problem you solved, the languages and frameworks you used, and screenshots or relevant visuals (more on that later). 

Your portfolio website is kind of like a case study for your work as a developer — it’s tangible evidence of your skills in action. If you want to learn how to code a tech portfolio website, we’ll walk you through how to build one with HTML/CSS in the video below. You can also follow this video tutorial to learn how to make your website interactive using JavaScript. 

Still working on your web development skills? Our course Build a Website with HTML, CSS, and GitHub Pages will teach you the basics to create your own website from scratch.

Organize your GitHub repository

Your GitHub account is a great place to show off passion projects that you’ve finished or contributions you’ve made to other people’s projects. 

If you’re posting projects on your GitHub because you want them to get discovered, you’ll want to write a detailed README file that explains what your project does and why you built it. The README is the first thing someone will see when visiting your repository. (Check out these other tips for how to customize your GitHub repository.)

Learn something new for free

Never used GitHub or contributed to open-source projects before? Our beginner-friendly course Introduction to Open Source will teach you how to read and write READMEs, and get you ready to contribute. In Learn Git & GitHub, you’ll learn how to integrate Git and GitHub, and manage versions of your projects using Git branches — essential skills for becoming a GitHub pro. 

Post about them on social media

A quick search of the hashtag #BuildInPublic will open your eyes to the massive community of programmers and code enthusiasts who are making projects and sharing them on social media. Posting about your project — whether it’s completely finished or still a work in progress — can help you get feedback, share ideas and tricks that helped you, and connect with developers who are also learning to code.

On Twitter, folks often share screenshots and screen recordings of themselves coding projects. Get creative, and don’t forget to chronicle the (smaller but meaningful) milestones that you reach — whether it’s making a satisfying UX tweak or learning a new framework that levels up the features. Or you could make a vlog for TikTok about your process, complete with voiceover explaining what you’re doing (check out this TikTok account for inspiration).

In addition to posting about your work on social media platforms, you should also include links in your profile and bio so people can easily discover them. For example, you could add a line to your Twitter bio that says: “Currently building [your project name]” and includes a URL to your project. Here are some more tips for networking on social media.

Use GIFs and videos

Beyond static screenshots, you can make your own demo videos or GIFs so that people can see how your project works in action. You can record your screen as you code in an IDE to give a behind-the-scenes look at your programming chops, or capture yourself using the finished product. These videos can be cut into smaller GIFs and clips that you can add in your portfolio or share out on social media. 

Write about your projects

Blogging or vlogging about your experience working on a project is a cool way to track your progress, learn “in public,” and share your work with a broader audience. In a blog or vlog, you can go in-depth about each step of your process, and reflect on what you learned along the way. Writing about your projects is also a simple exercise that can help you review material and comprehend concepts. Plus, your blog could end up in front of a recruiter and help you land a job.

Another place where you should write about your projects is in a cover letter. For lots of people trying to break into tech without previous work experience, projects are a way to showcase that you have the skills needed for a job. Adding a brief sentence about the projects you’ve created could be a way to stand out to potential employers and get them to check out your work. Read this blog to learn more about what to put in a cover letter.

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