3Blue1Brown: Neural Networks: study plan and how long it takes
The 3Blue1Brown playlist is 10 videos and 3.6 hours long. Here's how long it takes at different paces, a week-by-week schedule built from the real videos, and a planner that turns it into your own daily plan.
10 videos · 3.6 hours · 3Blue1Brown
3Blue1Brown's neural networks series explains deep learning visually: what a neural network is, gradient descent, backpropagation intuitively and with calculus, then large language models, transformers, attention step by step, how LLMs might store facts, cross-entropy, and how AI image and video generation works.
Ten videos, under four hours, and the best visual intuition for modern AI on YouTube.
Who it's for: Anyone curious about how neural networks and LLMs work, from students to developers starting in AI.
How long does it take?
The full playlist is 3.6 hours across 10 videos. Here's roughly how many days that is at different daily watch times and speeds, counting video time only:
| Daily time | At 1x | At 1.5x | At 2x |
|---|---|---|---|
| 30 min a day | 8 days | 5 days | 4 days |
| 1 h a day | 4 days | 3 days | 2 days |
| 2 h a day | 2 days | 2 days | 1 days |
Make your own schedule
The playlist link is already filled in. Press Plan, set how much time you have each day and your speed, and you'll get a day-by-day schedule with a finish date and a calendar file. It reads the live playlist, so new videos are included.
Week-by-week schedule
A sample plan at 30 minutes a day and normal speed, using whole videos so none is split across days. That's 2 weeks in total. For a different pace, start date or speed, use the planner above.
Week 1Videos 1–8 · 2h 26m
Day 1 · 19m
- 1But what is a neural network? | Deep learning chapter 119m
Day 2 · 21m
- 2Gradient descent, how neural networks learn | Deep Learning Chapter 221m
Day 3 · 23m
- 3Backpropagation, intuitively | Deep Learning Chapter 313m
- 4Backpropagation calculus | Deep Learning Chapter 410m
Day 4 · 8m
- 5Large Language Models explained briefly8m
Day 5 · 27m
- 6Transformers, the tech behind LLMs | Deep Learning Chapter 527m
Day 6 · 26m
- 7Attention in transformers, step-by-step | Deep Learning Chapter 626m
Day 7 · 23m
- 8How might LLMs store facts | Deep Learning Chapter 723m
Week 2Videos 9–10 · 1h 11m
Day 8 · 34m
- 9But what is cross-entropy? | Compression is Intelligence Part 234m
Day 9 · 37m
- 10But how do AI images and videos actually work? | Guest video by Welch Labs37m
Tips for finishing
- Watch the first four videos in one week; they build a complete picture of how networks learn.
- Follow up with Karpathy's Zero to Hero to build these ideas in code.