Skillshare Reviews 2,015

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1.8

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The app has technical glitches. It will not download some classes. Some it will, but the download is super slow, like hours to download. I reached out to support and when I tried everything they said and it didn't get any better they just started telling me to do all the exact same things instead of actually helping. I continued to ask for further help since their suggestions did not work and they just ignore my emails now. Then, I asked for a refund since their app doesn't deliver the services I paid for and they said, too bad, so sad basically. No refund. Don't get sucked in and waste your $$$.

I am extremely disappointed with Skillshare. I was charged for a one-year subscription that I did not want, and I am no longer subscribed. I reported the transaction to PayPal because I thought I had been scammed—every time I tried to access my ‘Manage Payments and Subscriptions’ page, it wouldn’t load. Then, I suddenly got charged for a full year.

Now, Skillshare is telling me they can’t do anything and that it’s up to PayPal. Meanwhile, PayPal is refusing to help because they claim the ‘merchandise was delivered’—but what delivery? It’s a digital annual subscription! I could understand being charged for a month, but an entire year? I cannot express how extremely disappointed I am with both Skillshare and PayPal.

I had a free trial, I received an email that it was almost up and I cancelled it the day before the renewal date and they still charged over $200 on my visa. You cannot find a phone number for them, and they just keep telling me I had to cancel within 7 days. I have the email saying I had to cancel by a certain date, which I did, and they refuse to refund me. If a company doesn't have a phone number, that is a red flag to me.

Absolutely terrible service. Charged £130 with no warning whatsoever, a charge that a I did not authorize. When I tried to dispute it they weren't having any of it.

If you learn anything from skillshare, its the art of theft.

Company details

Written by the company

Skillshare is an online learning community with thousands of classes in design, business, technology and more. The Skillshare community is comprised of over 5 million students and thousands of teachers, from 100+ countries, who come to learn cutting-edge skills, network with peers and discover new opportunities.

Contact info

35 E 21st St, Fl 5, 10010, New York, United States
help@skillshare.com
skillshare.com

1.8

Poor

2K reviews

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5 hours ago

Deceptive Billing & No Refund Policy – Beware!

I signed up for Skillshare expecting a 7-day free trial, as advertised, but they instead enrolled me in a 30-day trial without clear consent. When I attempted to cancel before being charged, their system failed to process my cancellation—yet, after I escalated the issue to PayPal, they suddenly canceled my subscription.

Despite never using the service, Skillshare refused to refund me and hid behind their no-refund policy, even though this was their mistake. Looking at other reviews, it’s clear I’m not the only one—many users have faced similar issues with unauthorized charges, failed cancellations, and misleading trial terms.

Skillshare’s business practices feel like a deliberate scam designed to trap users into unwanted subscriptions. I strongly advise against signing up, and if you do, be extremely cautious about their auto-renewal system.

Date of experience: March 03, 2025

A day ago

Glitchy App, Awful Customer Service, Ignores You

Date of experience: March 13, 2025

A day ago

I am extremely disappointed with…

Date of experience: March 13, 2025

Reply from Skillshare

A day ago

Hi Arlene,

Looks like one of our team members provided some clarity on your concern.

We're really sorry to hear about your experience — we understand how frustrating this situation must be.

Our free trial is a great way to explore Skillshare, but it automatically converts to a paid subscription at the end of the trial unless canceled beforehand.

We understand the trial period can go by quickly, which is why we make sure to inform subscribers of the exact billing date in the confirmation email sent upon signing up.

Also, when a payment dispute is filed through PayPal, they take over the review process and ultimately make the decision on whether a refund is issued. Unfortunately, this limits our ability to make any changes on our end while the dispute is active.

Feel free to let us know if there’s anything else we can help with, or if you have any other suggestions or recommendations.

A day ago

I had a free trial

Date of experience: March 13, 2025

Reply from Skillshare

A day ago

Hi Susie,

At this time, we do not offer phone support due to limited team resources. We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause and will certainly pass your feedback along for future consideration.

If you canceled your subscription before the renewal date and were still charged, that shouldn't have happened. We'd be happy to look into this for you.

If you have an existing ticket with us, please reply to our information request with your current ticket number. Rest assured, one of our team members will promptly follow up to provide further assistance.

A day ago

Absolutely terrible service

Date of experience: March 10, 2025

Reply from Skillshare

A day ago

Hi Alex,

We're truly sorry to hear about your experience. We understand how frustrating unexpected charges can be.

At Skillshare, we aim to provide a seamless experience for all our members. Our subscription policy states that cancellations must be made before the trial period ends to avoid being charged for the annual membership.

We would like to highlight that we provide various notifications including a renewal reminder, along with your membership sign-up confirmation, you can see more here: https://help.skillshare.com/hc/articles/13898861927437

We would like to address though that our system shows an email reminder was sent and delivered.

Should you need further assistance feel free to reach back out to our team.

Updated a day ago

Got charged 155 after trial and they…

Got charged 155 after trial and they won't refund even though I tried to cancel my subscription

" It looks like you were able to work with our support team to resolve this issue" => I did not resolve anything at all. These people are thieves

Date of experience: March 12, 2025

Reply from Skillshare

A day ago

Hi Frederic,

We’re sorry for your experience. It looks like you were able to work with our support team to resolve this issue. We always remain open to your feedback.

We strive to maintain transparency regarding any charges, which is why we make sure that charge details are indicated both on the checkout page and in the confirmation email.

We provide a full refund for memberships charged after a 7-day free trial if you get in touch with us within 7 days of the charge.

For more information on our refund policy, please check: https://help.skillshare.com/hc/articles/204536798

Also, as stated in our refund policy, we sent a reminder email about the upcoming charge, and members have the option to cancel their subscription at any time. Unfortunately, we did not receive a cancellation request before the payment was processed.

We genuinely value your feedback and will continue working to improve our communication and user experience. If there’s anything further we can do to assist you, please let us know.

4 days ago

Skillshare SUCKS

Skillshare SUCKS. They can take their “free” trial period and go to hell. This exploitive practice must STOP. Automatically charging $170 is obscene.

What a HORRIBLE business model. The offerings must be crap if they have to trap us into subscribing.

Date of experience: March 10, 2025

Reply from Skillshare

4 days ago

Hi Liz,

It appears that one of our team members is already assisting you with your issue.

We're sorry to hear that you feel this way. We strive to provide a valuable learning experience and be transparent about our subscription model. Our free trial is designed to give users full access before deciding if they want to continue.

As we're aware that the trial can pass quickly, we're careful to provide subscribers a dated reminder of when their card will be charged at the time they sign up, via their confirmation email.

Understanding the issue you've faced is important to us, as it doesn't meet the exceptional experience we aim to offer our members. Please reach out to us at help@skillshare.com; we're here to assist you.

Updated 4 days ago

Waste of time and money

Charged me for automatic renewal with no warning - i gave no authorisation? Requested refund within 4 days of charge to be told no refunds? No cooling off period for cancellation- major red flag! I have been in touch with them to be replied to with a generic automated answer. As for the product itself I found it pointless and wish I didn't sign up in the first place, especially experiencing them as a company. Waste of time and money. Skillshare claim they sent an email regarding renewal...interesting as Skillshare emails go to the inbox BUT the renewal email goes to spam/junk folder. How convenient. It looks like many people have experienced the same. If the product you were selling was genuinely useful you wouldnt impose automatic renewal and you would give customers an option to carry on or cancel - dont you think? Avoid at all costs this absolute time wasting scam.

Date of experience: March 09, 2025

Reply from Skillshare

4 days ago

Hi Daya,

Looks like one of our team members provided some clarity on your concern.

Please note that we do offer a full refund for memberships charged after a 7-day free trial, provided you reach out to us within 7 days of the charge. We do not offer refunds on renewal charges.

For more detailed information about our refund policy, please refer to: https://help.skillshare.com/hc/articles/204536798

We would like to address though that our system shows an email reminder was sent and delivered.

As for your feedback on the platform itself, we truly appreciate your honesty. We’re always looking to improve both our content and customer experience, and your insights help us do that.

We're eager to understand the issue you've encountered, as it doesn't meet the standard of experience we aim to provide for our members. Please don't hesitate to contact us at help@skillshare.com.

5 days ago

Rip off! Don’t sign up…

The idea of the platform is ok, but most of the lessons are really basic. Not worth the money.
The customer service is terrible. I believed I had cancelled my account last year when I was charged as I requested this as I gave no access to the email I used to sign up. I have now just been charged again this year, they have refused to refund even though I saw the payment on my account before it was even processed and contacted them. I explained my current financial hardship & they weren’t interested as they had their money.
I have paid for another year for a service that I haven’t used for a year. Unreasonable policies, no compassion. As the platform isn’t great they rely on people signing up without intention or forgetting to cancel. Please don’t sign up!

Date of experience: March 09, 2025

Reply from Skillshare

5 days ago

Hi Andrea,

Thank you for taking the time to share your feedback. We're truly sorry to hear about your experience, and we want to address your concerns with transparency.

At Skillshare, we aim to provide value through our platform and ensure our members have access to diverse and enriching content. we regret to hear that our lessons did not meet your expectations, and we genuinely appreciate your input as it helps us improve our offerings.

Regarding your account and the charges, we understand how frustrating this situation must be, especially during a time of financial hardship. Our refund and cancellation policies are outlined to ensure clarity for our members. However, we recognize that losing access to your email may have complicated the process for you. We’re committed to assisting with such challenges, and we're sorry if you felt unsupported during this time.

As part of our policies, we send reminder emails prior to renewal to provide members with the opportunity to cancel if needed. Additionally, our platform allows cancellations at any time through the account settings. A complete refund is not feasible based on our established policies.

Your feedback is important to us, and we've shared your concerns with the relevant teams to help us enhance both our platform and our support processes. If there is anything else we can assist you with or clarify, please don’t hesitate to let us know.

Thank you for your understanding. We hope to have the opportunity to provide you with a better experience in the future.

6 days ago

I had a 30-day free trial at Skillshare…

I had a 30-day free trial at Skillshare via Adobe CC. After 30 days, this would be converted to a 1-year subscription for €77.94 for the first year. To check my account, they debited €0.01 and refunded it properly. After 45 days, nothing has been debited and I have been put back to a free account. Now I pay for Adobe CC with which I wanted to learn all the apps via Skillshare. I have now sent an email and created a ticket, but have not received an answer or solution yet. If it is not resolved within a few days, I will go back to Udemy.

Date of experience: February 21, 2025

Reply from Skillshare

6 days ago

Hi Daniel,

We understand how important it is for you to access your premium membership as part of your learning journey and we're sorry for the inconvenience you’re experiencing.

After reviewing your issue, it has been escalated, and one of our specialists will reach out to you shortly.

Thank you for your patience, we apologize for any inconvenience caused.

6 days ago

This is a scam platform!!

Forgot that i signed up for skillshare, and i didnt get a warning that my free trial was coming to an end ( it was in spam email folder) then got charged for 170 or something dollars for an annual subscription. How is this legal??!!!

Date of experience: March 08, 2025

Reply from Skillshare

6 days ago

We understand how frustrating it can be to receive an unexpected charge, and we'd be happy to help clarify this for you.

When you signed up for Skillshare, our free trial includes an automatic renewal to a paid subscription unless canceled before the trial ends.

Regarding your experience with the renewal charge, we're sorry to hear that our emails went to your spam folder. This can often be at the discretion of your email provider - we recommend following our guide to ensure that our users receive our emails (https://help.skillshare.com/hc/articles/20972156545165).

Your satisfaction is our top priority, and we're committed to resolving any issues you may have encountered. If you already have a ticket with us, kindly respond to our information request with your current ticket number. One of our team members will promptly get in touch to offer further assistance.

Mar 7, 2025

They want their money and nothing else

They want their money and nothing else. offer a free trial, and refuse any refunds. My fauly for not putting down to cancel on my calendar, but one whole years worth was a lot of money for a platform that is not that good. I guess they know it, hence the no refund policy.

Date of experience: January 01, 2025

Reply from Skillshare

7 days ago

Hi Heather,

Our trial promotion offers an excellent chance to explore a Skillshare membership. However, please note that it will automatically convert into a paid subscription at the end of the trial period unless you cancel in advance.

When you sign up for a Skillshare trial, we send a confirmation email with the date of the first subscription charge and amount. Then, you are able to see your upcoming charge date on your Membership & Payments page in your Account Settings and cancel at any time.

We provide a full refund on memberships charged after a 7-day free trial if you contact us within 7 days of the charge.

Should you need further assistance feel free to reach back out to our team.

Mar 6, 2025

Why I'm Removing My Courses from Udemy and Skillshare!

I'm announcing the removal of all my courses from Udemy and Skillshare. I've learned firsthand that these two platforms, despite being the largest in the industry, operate in a way that I consider detrimental to instructors. It's truly disappointing. I began noticing some concerning rules and behaviors, including low fees, options to give away courses for free, and the prevalence of bot-run fake accounts. It appears these platforms prioritize their own profit, often at the expense of instructors, especially those just starting out and lacking an established audience. They effectively capitalize on the hard work instructors put into their courses, while the instructors themselves earn very little.

My advice to anyone starting out is this: even if it seems challenging, avoid uploading your courses to Udemy or Skillshare. Don't contribute to their profits while you earn mere pennies. Instead, I recommend setting up on a free platform like Google Classroom and focusing on self-promotion. It's completely free, and you retain 100% of the benefits.

Date of experience: March 06, 2025

Reply from Skillshare

7 days ago

Hi Patrick,

Looks like one of our team members provided some clarity on your concern.

Thank you for sharing your thoughts and experiences. While we’re sorry to hear that you’ve decided to remove your courses from Skillshare, we appreciate your feedback and take instructor concerns seriously.

At Skillshare, our goal is to provide a platform where educators can reach a global audience and share their knowledge in a way that benefits both instructors and students. We understand that our revenue model may not work for everyone, and we’re continuously looking for ways to improve the experience for our teaching community.

Regarding some of the concerns you mentioned:

Instructor Earnings: Our subscription-based model is designed to reward engagement, and many instructors find success by building an audience over time.

Free Trials & Promotions: We offer free access to new users as a way to drive visibility and long-term growth for courses, with the goal of increasing overall engagement.

Platform Integrity: We take fraudulent activity seriously and have dedicated teams working to identify and remove fake or bot-run accounts.

That said, we understand that every instructor has unique goals and needs, and we respect your decision. If you have any additional feedback or suggestions on how we can better support our instructors, we’d love to hear it.

Wishing you the best with your future courses and platforms.

Mar 5, 2025

Maybe it's a bad policy when 1000 people tell you it's a bad policy.

SkillShare does not care about sharing skills. It is simply a subscription cash grab. Despite the incredibly common occurance of people not ever using their free trial and trying to cancel the day of, SkillShare deliberately takes advantage of this by parsing different free trial conditions to prevent any culpability on their part, even when users cancel the day of, which is apparently too late. If one tries to get a refund, they respond with a predetermined AI generated response, which demonstrates the lack of thought and care put into each of these cases. If this company operated in good faith, they would not have to rely on these tactics. I encourage everyone to support individual creators over this business that leverages content from others.

Date of experience: March 01, 2025

Reply from Skillshare

Mar 6, 2025

Hi Rex,

We appreciate you sharing your concerns, and we're sorry to hear that you’re disappointed with your experience. Our goal at Skillshare is to provide access to a wide range of educational content from talented creators, and we regret that our subscription model did not meet your expectations.

We know trial periods fly by, so we make it a point that our users are aware of the charge date upon signing up and in the confirmation email.

You can find more information on various notifications including a renewal reminder and a membership sign-up confirmation here: https://help.skillshare.com/hc/articles/13898861927437

Please note that we do offer a full refund for memberships charged after a 7-day free trial, provided you reach out to us within 7 days of the charge. We do not offer refunds on renewal charges.

For more detailed information about our refund policy, please refer to: https://help.skillshare.com/hc/articles/204536798

If you have any further questions or need assistance in the future, please feel free to reach out. We're here to help!

Mar 5, 2025

Legally, It's Not a Scam. Functionally, however...

There's no phone number for customer service (they claim to be too small of a company for it) and only one email address if you need any support at all. Your email or ticket is initially directed to a bot. Eventually, if you manage to reach an actual human, they'll ignore anything you say that isn't easily answered and keep going between the same handful of scripted replies.

They only offer refunds if you're auto-renewed after a 7 day trial (if you tried 14 or 30 day trials you're out of luck). They don't send you email reminders and charge you for the yearly membership. It's also auto-renewed in perpetuity, and you're not able to cancel through their site, you need to do so through Paypal.

It's not technically a scam because they do host content you have access to, but the platform runs on money taken without active consent from people who don't want or use the website.

Date of experience: February 14, 2025

Reply from Skillshare

Mar 6, 2025

Hi Pyra,

We currently don't offer phone support due to our small team and limited resources. However, we value your feedback and will take this suggestion into account as we plan for future improvements.

When you sign up for a Skillshare trial, we send a confirmation email with the date of the first subscription charge and amount. Then, you are able to see your upcoming charge date on your Membership & Payments page in your Account Settings and cancel at any time.

We provide a full refund on memberships charged after a 7-day free trial if you contact us within 7 days of the charge.

We would like to address though that our system shows an email reminder was sent and delivered.

Regarding our support system, we aim to assist every customer as efficiently as possible. While we do not currently offer phone support, our team is always available via email, and we strive to respond to inquiries as quickly as possible. If you have any remaining concerns about your account, we’d be happy to assist in any way we can.

Mar 4, 2025

Never refunded me after canceling my subscription

This website and their policy is an absolute joke. I signed up for a year and only used for 1 month. I completely forgot about the application and all of a sudden was charged $99 for a renewed subscription. I was charged on a Saturday emailed them on Monday as soon as I saw the charge come through my bank account. I told them I did not intend on using their services anymore nor did I want it to automatically charge my account to renew. You can see in my account I haven’t even used any of their classes besides the 1 month 11 months ago. They refuse to give me a refund and said they only give refunds for 1 week trials. This is such a scam that so many websites carry. I tried to dispute through PayPal and they still refuse to refund me. This is straight up just stealing from people who forget to cancel a membership. I hope they feel good about taking $99 of my hard earned money for a service I won’t be using at all. I will never use or recommend Skillshare to anyone.

Date of experience: February 23, 2025

Reply from Skillshare

Mar 6, 2025

Hi Damaris,

We completely understand how frustrating unexpected charges can be, and we appreciate you taking the time to share your concerns.

Our trial promotion is a great opportunity to try out a Skillshare membership, but it does automatically transition into a charged subscription at the end of the trial period, unless you've cancelled beforehand.

As we're aware that the trial can pass quickly, we're careful to provide subscribers a dated reminder of when their card will be charged at the time they sign up, via their confirmation email.

Please be assured that it was definitely not our intention to catch you off guard with your subscription charge. Our system is set to automatically renew at the end of all membership packages.

We provide a full refund on memberships charged after a 7-day free trial if you contact us within 7 days of the charge.

Let us know if we're able to help with anything else!

Mar 3, 2025

Fraudulent

When I wanted to cancel the free trial, it said that there were something like 2 days left, so I waited to cancel, then when I went back, it said I had 4 days left, only to discover that I had been charged for a years' subscription. I did receive a credit, finally, but Customer what-was-supposed-to-be Service took so long to communicate with me over email, and now I have to wait several days for my refund to post. I indicated in one of my emails that the fastest way to credit me was to send a payment to my PayPal account vs. refunding me, but I was refunded, which takes much longer. It wasn't my fault that the website didn't give me the correct information nor customer service taking too long to respond.

Date of experience: February 21, 2025

Reply from Skillshare

Mar 3, 2025

We're sorry for the frustration and inconvenience you’ve experienced with our service. I completely understand how disappointing it must be to deal with unexpected charges, especially after trying to manage your free trial.

When you cancel your Skillshare Membership, you’ll lose access to your class videos and any downloadable material provided by teachers at the end of your current paid period (or promo period, if you cancel within a promotional trial).

As for the refund, we only have the ability to process refunds back to the original payment method,

We sincerely apologize for the delays in our response time and completely understand your frustration. We strive to provide timely and helpful support to all our members, and it’s clear we fell short in this instance.

We are committed to providing the best service, and I truly appreciate you bringing this matter to our attention. Please don’t hesitate to reach out if there’s anything else we can do to assist you further.

Thank you for your understanding.

Updated Mar 3, 2025

They don't care

Somehow I got signed up to a free trial which I didn't know about, I kept getting emails and then went to the company. They charged me £124 and refuse to refund although I have never accessed any of their classes or their so called free trial. They are utterly reprehensible. They can tell I've never accessed a single thing they are offering . UPDATE they have offered a partial refund. Their emails went into my spam so I didn't see the 14 day thing.

Date of experience: March 02, 2025

Reply from Skillshare

Mar 3, 2025

Hi Sue,

We’re incredibly sorry for your experience. It looks like you were able to work with our support team to resolve this issue. We always remain open to your feedback.

Our trial promotion offers a fantastic chance to explore a Skillshare membership. However, it will automatically convert to a paid subscription at the end of the trial period unless you cancel beforehand.

Rest assured, it was never our intention to surprise you with your subscription charge. Our system is designed to automatically renew all membership packages once the trial ends.

Let us know if we're able to help with anything else!

Feb 28, 2025

I got charged over $50

I got charged over $50, no reminder was sent prior to the charge. I tried to get in touch with customer service three times and nobody replies!

Date of experience: February 24, 2025

Reply from Skillshare

Feb 28, 2025

Hi Alejandro,

Looks like one of our team members provided some clarity on your concern.

We provide a full refund for memberships charged after a 7-day free trial if you get in touch with us within 7 days of the charge.

We've made sure that our policy on refunds is readily accessible to you in our Help Center: https://help.skillshare.com/hc/articles/204536798

We can confirm that an email reminder was sent. If you're unable to find it, there can be a few reasons why which can be identified in our guide: https://help.skillshare.com/hc/articles/20972156545165

If you need further assistance or have any other concerns, please don't hesitate to reach out. We're here to help.

Feb 27, 2025

I sent them the ticket to solved why my…

I sent them the ticket to solved why my account got signed out and cant be signed in on any device, right after I submitted a project to my class, and they kept ticked the Solved button, but not inform me anything. It's been 4 days and I still can't log into my account, and no one from the CS team replied to me.

Date of experience: February 23, 2025

Reply from Skillshare

Feb 28, 2025

We’re truly sorry to hear about the frustration you've experienced with your subscription. This is not the experience we strive to provide, and we fully understand your concerns. Rest assured, we take these matters very seriously.

We’re committed to resolving this for you. Your case has been escalated to our team, and we’re reviewing everything to find the best solution.

Thank you for your patience as we work through this. If you have any further information or questions, please don’t hesitate to reach out.

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