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Cannabis Growing Course

NEW: digital badge included

Indoor & Outdoor Cannabis Growing Certificate

Learn to grow healthy cannabis indoors and outdoors, from seed or clone to a cured harvest. This self-paced online course covers plant biology, lighting, nutrients, troubleshooting, harvesting, drying and curing, and ends with the Indoor & Outdoor Cannabis Growing Certificate.
Enroll now — $199

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7-day money-back guarantee on individual purchases (Refund Policy) · Works on any phone · Progress saves automatically

What This Training Covers:
  • How to grow weed indoors and outdoors
  • Cannabis plant life cycle and growth stages
  • Lighting, watering, nutrients, and environmental control
  • Harvesting, drying, and curing methods
  • Home grow and commercial-scale cultivation principles
  • Cultivation compliance and legal awareness
Certificate Details:
  • 100% online and self-paced
  • Beginner to advanced cultivation training
  • Certificate when you pass the final exam
Who’s taking this course?
Sample of the Indoor & Outdoor Cannabis Growing Certificate from Cannabis Training University

The Indoor & Outdoor Cannabis Growing Certificate is an online cannabis cultivation program that teaches how to grow indoors and outdoors using industry-standard methods. 

Filmed by CTU in Colorado.

Who This Cannabis Growing Certificate Is For

This cannabis cultivation training is designed for:

  • First-time growers learning how to grow weed at home
  • People growing a single plant in a closet, tent, room, basement, attic, or window
  • Home growers wanting healthier plants and better yields
  • Outdoor growers learning seasonal growing techniques
  • People preparing for cultivation work at a licensed grow
  • Complete beginners: no growing experience needed

This program is not designed for hands-on or in-person training.

Home growers, gardeners, a dispensary worker and cultivation professionals with cannabis plants
text book on how to grow weed indoors

How to Grow Weed: Indoor and Outdoor Cannabis Cultivation Basics

Growing marijuana successfully requires understanding how the cannabis plant grows, what it needs at each stage, and how environment impacts quality and yield.

This training teaches:
  • How to grow a cannabis plant from seed or clone
  • Cannabis plant life cycle stages
  • Light cycles and growth timing
  • Watering and nutrient fundamentals
  • Soil vs hydroponic growing
  • How long it takes for weed to grow
  • Common beginner mistakes

How to Grow Weed Outdoors

Outdoor marijuana cultivation uses natural sunlight and seasonal cycles to produce large, healthy plants when done correctly.

You’ll learn:

  • How to grow weed outdoors
  • Choosing outdoor grow locations
  • Soil preparation and plant spacing
  • Seasonal timing and climate factors
  • Pest and mold prevention
  • Legal considerations for outdoor grows
book on how to grow weed outdoors
a women next to a cannabis plant and workers checking out cannabis plants

From First Plant to Master Grower

Cannabis cultivation skills scale from home growing to professional operations. The same fundamentals apply whether you're growing one plant or managing hundreds.

What you'll be able to do

After this course you’ll be able to:

  • Plan a grow: pick a space, genetics and a growing medium
  • Set up an indoor grow area with the right light, air, water and nutrients
  • Start plants from seed or clone and take them through veg and flower
  • Grow outdoors with the seasons
  • Spot and fix common problems before they cost you a harvest
  • Harvest at the right time, then dry, trim and cure
  • Explain the basic cannabis laws in the US and Canada
upclose of a cannabis plant

What the Cannabis Growing Certification Covers in Detail

This certification covers the planning and construction of a grow, and the grow itself from propagation through cured flower. It's covers both indoor and outdoor cultivation, at home-garden and commercial scale, and it treats troubleshooting as a core skill. Here's what you'll study.

Most failed grows are decided before anything is planted. This part of the curriculum covers every decision you make up front.

You'll learn how to choose a cannabis strain properly, the availability of seeds and clones, why stable genetics matter more than advertised THC, how to evaluate seed companies, and how to select based on desired effect, time from seed to smoke, expected yield, response to changing environmental conditions, and the space constraints you're actually working with. The advantages of growing from clones versus seeds are covered, along with deciding how many plants to run.

Grow media gets substantial treatment: living soil, organic soil and compost tea, coco coir and CocoNot, rockwool, hydroton, biochar, bokashi, perlite and vermiculite for drainage, and outdoor soil remediation. Hydroponic and aeroponic systems are covered as their own approaches, deep water culture, recirculating DWC, ebb and flow, nutrient film technique and aeroponics, along with the pots, containers and equipment each requires, including smart pots, earth boxes and air pots.

Water and nutrition are treated as systems rather than products: understanding pH for cannabis, water treatment and filtration, reverse osmosis, dechlorinators and sediment filters, macronutrient and micronutrient needs across the seedling, vegetative and flowering stages, N-P-K, hydroponic and aeroponic nutrients, nutrient testing meters, feeding frequency, chelated minerals and integrated nutrient management.

The environment you build determines the ceiling on your results, and this section covers constructing it properly in a home or commercial setting.

Lighting is covered from first principles: how cannabis plants use light, and what wattage, lumens, Kelvin, CRI, PPFD and PAR watts actually mean for your garden. You'll compare the light types — HID, CFL, T5 and T8, LED, and light-emitting ceramic (CMH) metal halide, and learn how to choose based on budget, room size and growth stage, plus how to increase effective light with hoods, reflectors, reflective materials and light movers, and the accessories that matter including timers, green LED headlamps and ballasts.

Air handling is treated as engineering: calculating air-exchange equipment needs, continuous horizontal airflow fans, inlet and exhaust fans, oscillating fans, odour control and carbon filters, and correctly installing fans in a grow tent. You'll also learn to monitor and control temperature and humidity — how lights affect temperature, heating and air conditioning for a grow, relative humidity targets, correcting humidity problems, and the use of humidifiers and dehumidifiers.

The build-out section also covers space requirements, separating vegetative and flowering plants using a two-room setup versus tents, blocking external heat and light, cleanliness standards, standard equipment, water availability, electrical wiring requirements and fire safety — plus home and commercial security for both indoor and outdoor gardens.

This is the cultivation cycle itself, from starting a plant through to the end of flower.

Propagation covers the germination stage and starting from seed using wet paper towel, plug, potting soil and peroxide methods, alongside starting from clones, best cloning practice, choosing mother plants, where to take cuttings from, plug cloning, aeroponic cloning, tissue culture, micropropagation and hardening off. Breeding is included as well: cannabis genetics, F1 and F2 generations, cubing, creating hybrids, selecting males, harvesting pollen, pollinating females, harvesting seeds and the safety precautions involved.

You'll then learn to care for young plants, moving seedlings into medium, introducing light and nutrients, and transplanting into soil, coco coir and earth boxes, and later into larger pots or outdoor gardens.

The vegetative stage covers pruning techniques (defoliation, topping, the FIM technique and optimal plant structure) and training methods (low-stress training, main-lining/manifold, super cropping, the Texas kid technique, vertical trellising, staking and outdoor plant support), plus screen of green (SCROG) and sea of green (SOG). You'll study roots and the rhizosphere, root-zone additives, water needs and drainage, foliar feeding, total dissolved solids, and the temperature, humidity, airflow and lighting needs of vegetative plants, along with CO2 enrichment.

Flowering covers identifying and removing male plants, the pre-flowering stage and when to induce flowering indoors, defoliation and pruning during flower, best nutrients for flowering, the environmental targets for the flowering stage, how to tell when outdoor plants are finished, and finishing and flushing.

Harvest and cure decide what your months of work actually taste and feel like.

You'll learn to time harvest by reading trichomes and pistils rather than counting days, when to harvest outdoor plants, how to build a proper drying environment, the drying procedure itself, and how to tell when cannabis is dry enough. Wet and dry trimming are covered by hand and by machine, followed by curing, preparing plants, optimal environment, professional curing tips and the full procedure. Plus, correct storage of finished flower and restarting a garden for the next run.

The troubleshooting curriculum is extensive. Pest management covers prevention, detection, eradication and control for spider mites, aphids and root aphids, whiteflies, fungus gnats, mealybugs, scales, thrips, caterpillars, and outdoor pressures including deer, gophers and grasshoppers — using biological controls, forceful water, natural oils, insecticidal soaps and pyrethrin, plus banker plants and natural pest management for organic gardens.

Disease coverage includes powdery mildew, botrytis, algae, fusarium and pythium root rot, verticillium wilt and stem rot (damping off). Nutrient disorders are covered with a focus on distinguishing genuine deficiencies from pH lockout, along with the prevention and correction of iron, magnesium and nitrogen deficiency, nutrient and heat burn, and controlling pH.

The class also covers repairing broken stems and branches, weather damage in outdoor gardens, insufficient light, and diagnosing salinity problems, larf, failure to flower, hermaphrodites, irrigation issues and foxtailing.

Start the Growing course free

Not sure yet? Read the first lesson of the Indoor & Outdoor Cannabis Growing Certificate free. All you need is a free account: your first name and email, no card.

Start the free lesson →

The free lesson is part of the full course. The certificate comes with the full Growing course.

Cover of CTU's free Autoflower Grower's Guide PDF

Free guide for autoflower growers

Free Autoflower Grow Guide (PDF)

Setup, light schedules, feeding, watering, low-stress training and harvest timing for autoflowers, in one free 14-page PDF.

Get the free guide
Cannabis cultivation career guide

Cannabis Cultivation Career Guide

Learn how people turn cannabis growing skills into real opportunities, from home grows to professional cultivation roles.

What You’ll Learn

  • Cultivation career paths explained
  • Indoor vs outdoor career differences
  • What employers look for in growers
  • Skills that matter most
Download the Free Cultivation Guide

Is learning how to grow weed legal?

Yes. This program provides educational training and does not involve growing, selling, or distributing cannabis. Students enroll to learn cannabis cultivation principles and compliance awareness and are responsible for following the laws in their local state or country.

Cannabis Cultivation Certification FAQs

The Indoor & Outdoor Cannabis Growing Certificate is a self-paced online cannabis cultivation certification offered by Cannabis Training University. The program teaches structured indoor and outdoor cultivation concepts, including plant biology, lighting systems, nutrients, harvesting practices, and cannabis compliance fundamentals.

Yes. The curriculum covers planning, building and running both indoor grows (tents, rooms and commercial spaces) and outdoor gardens, including the differences in soil, climate, security, harvest timing and pest pressure.

No. It starts with the fundamental decisions, genetics, medium, space and equipment, and builds through the full cycle, so complete beginners can follow it while experienced growers can fill gaps and formalise what they know.

Yes. Soil and living-soil growing are covered alongside coco coir and hydroponic and aeroponic systems including deep water culture, recirculating DWC, ebb and flow, nutrient film technique and aeroponics.

Yes. You'll learn what wattage, lumens, Kelvin, CRI, PPFD and PAR mean in practice, and how to compare HID, CFL, T5, LED and CMH lighting based on your budget, space and growth stage.

Yes, and it's one of the most valuable parts of the course. The troubleshooting curriculum covers pests, diseases, nutrient disorders, pH lockout, heat and nutrient burn, and issues like foxtailing and hermaphroditism — including how to tell them apart, which is where most growers go wrong.

Yes. Harvest timing by trichome reading, drying environment and procedure, wet versus dry trimming by hand and machine, the full curing process, and correct long-term storage.

You're covered by our 7-day money-back guarantee. Ask within 7 days of purchase for a full refund, as long as your certificate hasn't been issued and you've completed less than 25% of the course. See our Refund Policy.

Yes. Cannabis genetics, F1 and F2 generations, cubing, creating hybrids, selecting males, harvesting pollen, pollinating females and harvesting seeds are all included, with the relevant safety precautions.

Yes — fully online, entirely self-paced, no scheduled sessions.

The curriculum covers the full cannabis life cycle including plant selection based on time from seed to smoke and response to environmental conditions, which applies to both photoperiod and autoflowering plants. Growing autos? Start with our free Autoflower Grow Guide (PDF).

A downloadable Cannabis Growing Certification of Completion covering indoor and outdoor cultivation.

Ready to Learn How to Grow Cannabis the Right Way?

Enroll for $199

7-day money-back guarantee on individual purchases (Refund Policy)

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Cannabis remains illegal under U.S. federal law. Education provided is intended only for jurisdictions where cannabis activity is legal. Users are responsible for understanding local laws.
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Medical Disclaimer: The information on this website is for informational purposes only and is not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment.
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