Lua is a small, fast scripting language that powers Roblox, World of Warcraft addons, Neovim configs, and the LOVE2D game engine. These free courses, tutorials, tools, and communities will take you from your first script to shipping a real project.
A free, self-paced interactive course covering Lua basics, variables, conditionals, and functions right in the browser.
A free beginner-friendly Lua course built around Roblox Studio and game development fundamentals.
A free guided project that walks you through building your first game with the LÖVE2D framework.
Harvard's rigorous, free game development course teaches Lua through LOVE2D by building Pong, Breakout, Flappy Bird, and more, with a free certificate track.
A fully free track with over a hundred exercises, automated feedback, and optional human mentoring to build real Lua fluency.
An 11-hour free course that teaches Lua fundamentals then builds two complete games in the LÖVE2D engine.
A fast-paced single video that covers Lua from data types through metatables and object oriented programming.
A free video lesson from Harvard's CS50 game development course, rebuilding the classic Breakout game in Lua and LOVE2D.
A free multi-hour playlist teaching Lua scripting essentials specifically for Roblox Studio, no prior coding experience needed.
A free walkthrough of basic Lua syntax paired with the World of Warcraft API for building your first addon.
The official Lua.org page for installing Lua and running your first script on any platform.
A dense, single-page tour of Lua syntax written entirely as runnable, commented code, perfect for programmers coming from another language.
A concise, well-loved quick-start guide that covers the whole core language in one sitting.
A structured, chapter-by-chapter free tutorial suitable for both first-time learners and programmers wanting a refresher.
The community wiki's entry point tutorial, written for newcomers and cross-linked into dozens of deeper topic pages.
A suggested reading order through the community wiki's full set of tutorials, from core functions to inheritance and optimization.
The official Neovim documentation for using Lua to configure and script the editor, useful for developers who already use Neovim.
A widely used community guide that explains Lua fundamentals specifically in the context of writing Neovim plugins and configs.
A free guide that teaches Lua from zero specifically for writing World of Warcraft addons.
A free reference explaining how Lua is used inside the WoW UI and addon system, with links to deeper API docs.
Roblox's official free documentation hub for learning Luau scripting from basics through advanced systems.
Over a hundred free practice problems with automated test feedback, ranging from Hello World to algorithmic challenges.
The official Lua.org in-browser interpreter for pasting and running small snippets with zero setup.
A free browser-based Lua 5.4 environment with stdin support, handy for working through practice problems.
A free online Lua interpreter with code sharing and example snippets, good for testing tutorial code as you read.
A free browser playground for Luau, the Lua dialect used by Roblox, useful for practicing Roblox-flavored scripting.
The classic introductory book written by Lua's chief architect, made freely available online for personal use by Lua.org.
The authoritative, free technical definition of Lua's syntax, semantics, and standard library, kept online by Lua.org.
The official jumping-off page linking every free Lua manual, book, and paper published by the language's creators.
A curated directory linking multiple free and legally shared Lua books and lecture notes in one place.
A free, lightweight, open source Lua IDE with debugging, live coding, and support for every major Lua version.
A free open source language server that gives Lua autocompletion, diagnostics, and hover docs in any editor that supports LSP.
The most widely installed free VS Code extension for Lua, adding completions, linting, and signature help.
A free, open source 2D game framework for Lua that runs on Windows, macOS, Linux, Android, and iOS.
The official free wiki page for setting up your first LÖVE2D project folder and main.lua file.
A free hour-long episode dedicated to Lua's design and use cases, part of a long-running programming languages podcast.
A free, regularly updated topic page collecting every Changelog network episode that touches on Lua.
A free, dense one-page reference covering functions, tables, string operations, and control flow.
A free two-page printable cheat sheet covering core syntax, data structures, and common gotchas.
A free single-page quick reference for Lua 5.4 syntax and standard functions.
A free companion cheat sheet summarizing the basics module of Codecademy's Lua course.
A long-running, free community wiki packed with sample code, tutorials, and discussion of Lua idioms.
A free, active forum thread and community hub where Roblox developers share Lua scripting guides and answer beginner questions.
A free ongoing forum thread where experienced Roblox scripters point complete beginners to the best free starting resources.
A free open source game development forum section dedicated to helping newcomers learn Lua through LÖVE2D.
A free open source repository of small Lua projects you can read, clone, and extend as practice.
A free written walkthrough that turns Lua fundamentals into an actual playable LÖVE2D game step by step.
A free curated list of Lua libraries, game engines, and tools, useful for picking a real library to build a practice project around.
A free archive of community-submitted Lua code samples covering dozens of small, practical tasks worth rebuilding yourself.