How many **dedicated** hours did it take you to get a coding/webdev job?
So many people talk in months and years of their lives but don't indicate how many hours they were putting in per day, which I find inexact and unhelpful. I've believed this for a number of years, I think primarily due to the fluentin3months article: [How to learn a language in hours, not years](https://www.fluentin3months.com/hours-not-years/).
Now, I understand everyone's aptitude, circumstances, and job are different, but I'd still like to try to find some sort of average. Please include classroom hours as well if you are not completely self-taught.
Here's my answer to the question:
I finally got my first offer for a Junior Dev position, which I snapped up. I'm completely self-taught when it comes to coding, but had dabbled on and off since middle school. I got serious about web dev a couple years ago and because I keep pretty good track of my hourly learning/project time I can say it took me about 600 hours to get the offer, but maybe I was ready at 450 / 500?
But an undergrad CS course is approximately 120 credit hours which I've read is approximately equal to 360 total hours of class + homework. But bear in mind that an undergrad course isn't just CS credits and I myself have a Liberal Arts BA. Which might make one think it should have taken me less than 360 total hours to be job ready.
Here are some other anecdotes I've found online and their self-reported totals:
*Note that this list may evolve over time.*
# **Hours, Job Details**
[~2,500, TruSTAR Technology](https://forum.freecodecamp.org/t/the-freecodecamp-podcast-ep-35-how-i-went-from-zero-to-san-francisco-software-engineer-in-12-months/201143?u=stan-stan)
[720 to 1080, 9 months, unknown job details](https://www.reddit.com/r/learnprogramming/comments/7fpycf/comment/dqdm0hd/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3)
[600 to 800, unknown job details](https://forum.freecodecamp.org/t/34-years-old-studied-7-months-landed-frontend-react-dev-job/312267/5?u=stan-stan)
[560 to 840, unknown job details](https://www.reddit.com/r/learnprogramming/comments/7fpycf/comment/dqdnf83/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3)
[400, unknown job details](https://forum.freecodecamp.org/t/34-years-old-studied-7-months-landed-frontend-react-dev-job/312267?u=stan-stan)
[300, unknown job details](https://forum.freecodecamp.org/t/any-100-self-taught-people-here-get-hired/315693/2?u=stan-stan)
[80, unknown job details](https://www.reddit.com/r/learnprogramming/comments/7fpycf/comment/dqed9f3/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3)
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TL;DR How many focused hours did it take you to get your first job?
Answer me on [the Fediverse](https://fosstodon.org/@crucifixGlitch/110068149491097700).
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P.S. To anyone who intends to reply that counting hours like this is pointless, I respect your opinion but I will add:
I am interested in trying to find some sort of average. I know that people's ability and opportunity vary and that human beings are extremely complex and hard to quantify oftentimes, but I feel like it's worth trying.
Maybe it's a futile task.