Free Offers to Help You Stay In: COVID-19 Quarantine Deals
Free Guitar or Ukulele Lessons
Fender is offering three months of free Guitar or Ukulele Lessons during COVID-10.
Fitness Classes
Fitness Blender is offering 589 free online fitness classes including 419 that require no equipment.
Niki Training Club application with workouts and health advice is now free.
Take a free 7-minute exercise break with CARROT Fit.
Aaptiv is offering a 30-day trial of audio-based fitness classes.
CorePower Yoga is offering some of their yoga and meditation classes online for free.
eBooks and Magazines
Your local public library offers free access to tens of thousands of free ebooks and magazines via their OverDrive application.
These sites are also offering free ebooks: Authorama, Project Gutenberg, LibriVox, ManyBooks, BookBub, Smashwords, Digilibraries, and BookLending.
Audiobooks
Thousands of free audiobooks available from your local public library via their Hoopla application and their RBDigital Audiobooks application.
You can also enjoy audiobooks for free at Scribd for 30-days.
Movies + Shows
Stream thousands of films for free from your public library via their Kanopy application and their OverDrive Video application.
These streaming options are also offering some content for free: Crackle, IMdbTV, PlexTV, PlutoTV, Tubi TV, Vudu, and HBO.
If you want to watch something special, ESC highly recommends Chicago’s own Music Box Theatre’s Virtual Cinema and WTTW Chicago’s Public Broadcasting Station.
Music
Enjoy endless music for free via your local public media’s Hoopla application.
Chicago’s Vocalo Music Station is available to stream live or access recorded content.
Second Language Learning
Enjoy lessons in over 70 languages including English via the Mango application.
For children age three to six, free second language learning is available from Little Pim.
Education
Online courses and learning resources for preschool through high school available for free via Khan Academy. College and graduate school test prep courses and tools also available for free.
BrainPop is offering a wide range of animated educational videos for kids.
For adults, enjoy one week of free MasterClasses.
Videoconference
There are 10 free videoconferencing solutions available.
Meditation
Headspace is offering free meditation, sleep sound, and movement exercise classes via their free Weathering the Storm program in their application.
Dark Noise Beta is available for free white noise.
Gaming
The Search point and click adventure game is now free on Steam.
Drawnful 2 is a pictionary group game for those times when you want to hang out with family and friends. The free version is available at the Mac App Store or on Steam. Nintendo Switch owners can buy a license for it for 9 cents. No, that isn’t a typo.
There are 27 personal computer games like sim Builders of Egypt available for free from GOG. They are available on multiple platforms.
Close to the Sun the adventure game and Sherlock Homes the mystery adventure game are both free via Epic Games.
Want to share a game on your device with family and friends somewhere else? We recommend the free streaming service Houseparty for remote group gaming.
Print and Play
Cards Against Humanity Family Edition is available for free if you have access to a printer.
The escape-room adventure Unlock!, the visual story telling game Dixit, and four other print and play games are available from Asmodee for free.
Print and color pages available from Crayola. Coloring is a great creative and meditative activity for young and old.
Online Cultural Experiences
Virtual experiences are a way to experience the world while staying indoors. These Chicago institutions have you covered: Adler Planetarium, American Writers Museum, Art Institute Chicago, Brookfield Zoo, Chicago Architecture Center CAC at Home, Chicago History Museum, DuSable Museum of African American History, Field Museum, Frank Lloyd Wright Home and Studio, Garfield Park Conservatory, IIT Institute of Design, Millennium Park Video Tour, Morton Arboretum, Museum of Science and Industry, National Museum of Mexican Art, Newberry Library, Oriental Institute Museum, and the Shedd Aquarium.
Performing Arts
Enjoy Chicago’s world renounced theater productions from home. Check out: Belmont Theatre District, Chicago Latino Theatre Alliance’s Casa Propia, Chicago Shakespeare Theater, Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Gene Siskel Film Center, Goodman Theatre Production of 2666, Joffrey Ballet, Lookingglass Theatre, Lyric Opera of Chicago, Steppenwolf Theatre, Teatro Vista, WBEZ, and the WFMT’s Studs Terkel Radio Archive.
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