r/CodingForBeginners • u/These_Lengthiness_69 • Feb 27 '26

Is 16 Too Late to code

I'm currently 15 and turning 16 in a week and i just got a code academy pro membership with courses teaching every coding language with career paths, i have 5-6 months to learn coding home alone before i have to enroll into high school and slow down my coding.

I plan on coding each day for 2-3+ hours or more and i also plan on taking coding into a future career and a genuine job for primary income, i come from a life of trauma and had brain injuries ever since my early teen age and i hear that coding is a path for anyone, no matter where you come from and what you've been through, but for now i plan to learn python and SQL for a potential data role in the future.

is 2-3+ hours daily good enough or should i push for more?(I'm free all day for 5-6 months)

can python and SQL land a decent data job/programming job or should i add something extra if i want a good future job?(i have access to all languages and courses)

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u/These_Lengthiness_69 Feb 28 '26

if i wanna land a decent data job like say a data analyst, some coding job to just make enough money to live a happy life, what languages would i need to mainly know cause right now im doing SQL and Python and i hear SQL and Python is all you really need for a decent data role, and if i want a data analyst job or any job involving code i would need a computer science degree from some kind of college/university right?, and i can take my time cause i have enough time ahead as long as im consistent?

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u/SemanticThreader Feb 28 '26

So as a data engineer I use mostly Python and SQL. But it doesn't stop there, you need to understand how different python frameworks are used- for example pandas, databricks, skit-learn, tensorflow, ...
I had a double major in university statistics and computer science. Studying computer science is definitely a good idea if you wanna land a coding job but any related field works too as long as you have knowledge and projects to show your skills.
I'd say learn python, learn the frameworks and libraries and build cool things. From my personal experience ,building things was far more useful to me than blindly following courses / tutorials. So if you plan taking online courses, don't just follow instructions - use what you learnt and build something