Best Julia Books for 2024 [Learn Julia Programming ASAP]

Today we’re looking at the best Julia books for this year.

🧠 Did you know? According to julialang.org, there are over 1000 contributors to the Julia programming language.

What is Julia programming?

Julia is an open source, high-performance dynamic programming language.

It’s a general purpose language that can be used to write any application.

But many of its features work for numerical analysis and computational science.

What companies use Julia programming?

According to HPCwire, over 10,000 companies use Julia including:

✅ Intel

✅ NASA

✅ BlackRock

✅ AstraZeneca

✅ Federal Aviation Administration

✅ Federal Reserve Bank of New York

And many, many more.

This post contains affiliate links. We may receive compensation if you buy something. Read our disclosure for more details.

TLDR: Best Julia Books

🔥 Best Overall 🔥
Think Julia: How to Think Like a Computer Scientist

💥 Best for Newbies 💥
Tanmay Teaches Julia for Beginners: A Springboard to Machine Learning for All Ages

💸 Best Value 💸
The Julia Language Handbook

Best Julia Books

Now let’s look at some of the best Julia books for this year.

Books 1-7 are for Julia beginners.

Books 8 and 9 are for experienced Julia programmers.

You’ll discover their:

• features
• core concepts
• layout
• comparisons

And more.

Julia Books for Beginners

Now let’s take a look at some of the best Julia books for beginners.

1. Think Julia: How to Think Like a Computer Scientist

↘️ Ideal for: Julia newbies
↘️ Topics covered: fundamentals, working with databases, debugging

This hands-on guide teaches you basic, intermediate and advanced programming techniques.

➡️ In our opinion, Think Julia is one of the best Julia books overall.

Each chapter is packed with exercises to help you understand:

✅ language syntax and semantics

✅ working with files and databases

✅ variables, values, statements and functions

✅ using debugging techniques to fix errors with syntax and runtime

And much, much more.

What Julia programmers are saying about Think Julia:

Lovely intro to Julia and general approaches and perspectives on programming…

– ESL

---

2. Tanmay Teaches Julia for Beginners: A Springboard to Machine Learning for All Ages

↘️ Ideal for: Julia newbies
↘️ Topics covered: configuration, writing apps

Juila for Beginners is similar to Think Julia.

But with this book, you’ll stick with the basics.

➡️ We believe Julia for Beginners is one of the best Julia books for code newbies.

In this step-by-step guide, you’ll start by learning the basics such as:

✅ Julia environment configuration

✅ programming machine learning apps

✅ creating and using dictionaries

✅ creating and modifying arrays

✅ defining and using variables

And more.

Then you’ll learn how to build custom programs using Julia.

This includes building an app tracking items you lend out to your friends.

---

3. The Julia Language Handbook

↘️ Ideal for: Julia newbies
↘️ Topics covered: creating and testing code, Julia syntax

Like Think Julia and Julia for Beginners, you’ll learn beginner concepts in Julia.

But this book is a little easier on the wallet.

➡️ The Julia Language Handbook is perhaps one of the best Julia books for programmers on a budget.

You’ll find dozens of examples throughout the book as you:

✅ explore Julia syntax

✅ create and test code

✅ read and write data files

✅ discover data types and functions

And much more.

Once you get some of the basics down, you’ll work with some more obscure Julia concepts.

What Julia programmers are saying about The Julia Language Handbook:

Practical, clear, and easily understood instruction on Julia. A handbook must have for all using this language.

– Rick Porter

---

4. Julia Programming for Operations Research

↘️ Ideal for: Julia newbies
↘️ Topics covered: operations research

Julia Programming for Operations Research is a bit different than any other book on our list.

That’s because this book is geared specifically towards operations research.

Operations research is when problems are broken down into smaller components and solved by mathematical analysis.

➡️ Julia Programming for Operations Research is one of the best Julia books for mathematically-minded programmers.

Combining human, mathematical and computer languages, you’ll learn all about Julia programming concepts like:

✅ Julia setup and fundamentals

✅ simple linear optimization

✅ network optimization

✅ numerical methods

✅ point methods

And beyond.

What Julia programmers are saying about Julia Programming for Operations Research:

Very helpful for students in operations research and engineers that have to learn computing with Julia.

– Alexis Toullat

---

5. Julia 1.0 Programming Complete Reference Guide

↘️ Ideal for: Julia newbies
↘️ Topics covered: data visualization, developing web apps

This book is a combination of the books Julia Programming 1.0 and Julia Programming Projects (next book on our list).

➡️ Julia 1.0 Programming Complete Reference Guide is possibly one of the best Julia books for developers who are looking for multiple Julia resources in one book.

You’ll learn how to build fast, efficient applications while tackling problems.

After initial setup, you’ll learn about built-in types.

Then you’ll explore:

✅ arrays and matrices

✅ type conversions

✅ macros

✅ functions and methods

✅ running external programs

---

6. Julia Programming Projects

↘️ Ideal for: Julia newbies
↘️ Topics covered: crunching numbers, analyzing data, building apps

If you aren’t interested in the full Julia 1.0 Programming Complete Reference Guide, you can just stick with this book to work on projects.

You should have a basic knowledge of programming before reading Julia Programming Projects.

➡️ We believe Julia Programming Projects is one of the best Julia books for building applications.

Like other books on our list, you’ll learn how to get started with Julia programming.

But with this book, you’ll find tons of projects to work on such as building a recommender system using supervised machine learning.

Along the way, you’ll learn about:

✅ time series data analysis

✅ exploratory data analysis

✅ leveraging Julia packages

✅ analyzing and manipulating datasets

✅ unsupervised machine learning algorithms

And much more.

---

7. Julia – Bit by Bit: Programming for Beginners

↘️ Ideal for: Julia newbies
↘️ Topics covered: operators, looping, functions

Like Julia for Beginners, Julia – Bit by Bit doesn’t go beyond the basics of Julia programming.

But this book really takes its time and explains concepts in small chunks.

You could say… byte by byte.

➡️ Julia – Bit by Bit may be one of the best Julia books for learning fundamental programming principles.

You’ll start with an overview of the programming process.

Then you’ll write your own Julia program.

After that, you’ll dive into Julia concepts like:

✅ looping

✅ functions

✅ array processing

✅ sorting and searching

✅ integers, operators and expressions

And more.

---

Julia Books for Experienced Developers

The following Julia books are ideal for developers experienced with Julia programming.

8. Hands-On Design Patterns and Best Practices with Julia

↘️ Ideal for: experienced Julia programmers
↘️ Topics covered: features, design patterns, reusable programs

This book is geared towards beginner to intermediate Julia developers.

➡️ We believe Hands-On Design Patterns and Best Practices with Julia is one of the best Julia books for developers interested in developing large-scale applications.

For starters, you’ll:

✅ discover design patterns to improve architecture and design

✅ use different design patterns

✅ develop reusable programs

✅ use advanced techniques

And much more.

In all, you’ll master features of Julia that enable you to build large-scale software apps.

---

9. Julia High Performance

↘️ Ideal for: experienced Julia programmers
↘️ Topics covered: high-performance code, numerical code, machine code

Like Hands-On Design Patterns and Best Practices with Julia, Julia High Performance is for experienced Julia developers.

But with this book, you’ll learn a different set of skills.

➡️ Julia High Performance may be one of the best Julia books for learning high-performance technical programming.

For instance, you’ll learn about:

✅ transforming Julia code into machine code

✅ accelerating code using the GPU

✅ defining and calling functions

✅ measuring time and memory

✅ creating fast machine code

And so much more.

---

Best Julia Books: Conclusion

Today we looked at the best Julia books including:

🔥 Best Overall 🔥
Think Julia: How to Think Like a Computer Scientist

💥 Best for Newbies 💥
Tanmay Teaches Julia for Beginners: A Springboard to Machine Learning for All Ages

💸 Best Value 💸
The Julia Language Handbook

So whether you’re just getting started or are an experienced programmer, we think these are the best Julia books of this year.

---

Readers of Best Julia Books are also reading:

• 10 Best Machine Learning Books for Beginners
• 11 Best Python Machine Learning Books
• 6 Best Machine Learning Courses and Specializations
• 14 Best Computer Science Books
• 11 Best Computer Networking Books

---