The 8 Best Acceptance and Commitment Therapy Courses

Acceptance and Commitment Therapy has become one of the most sought-after therapeutic skills in modern mental health practice — and with good reason. Its evidence base spans anxiety disorders, depression, chronic pain, trauma, and a growing range of clinical presentations. But for practitioners wanting to learn ACT, or anyone seeking a deeper, structured understanding of the approach, the training landscape can feel overwhelming. Courses range from quick introductory videos to multi-year immersion programs, and because there is no official ACT certification process, the quality, depth, and practical utility of available options vary considerably.

A clarifying note before diving in: the Association for Contextual Behavioral Science (ACBS) — the international professional community for ACT — has deliberately chosen not to create an official certification route. As they explain, such a process would risk creating “a hierarchical and closed process antithetical to our values.” Instead, ACBS fosters an open, self-critical learning community. What this means practically is that practitioners have significant freedom in how they learn ACT — and significant responsibility for choosing training that is genuinely rigorous and clinically transferable.

This guide presents eight of the best Acceptance and Commitment Therapy courses currently available, drawn from a review of leading platforms, practitioner-recommended programs, and the most credible voices in ACT training worldwide. Each entry covers who the course is best suited for, what it delivers, its format and duration, and what makes it stand out. The guide covers options for mental health professionals seeking CE hours, practitioners wanting skills-focused training, and curious learners who want something more structured than a self-help book.

What to Look for Before Choosing an ACT Course

Not all ACT training is created equal — and the most important evaluative questions aren’t about price or prestige. They’re about whether the course will actually develop usable clinical skills rather than leaving you with a collection of interesting concepts and PDFs that never make it into your sessions.

A high-quality ACT course should deliver three specific things:

1. Process visibility. The ability to recognize what’s happening in terms of psychological flexibility — to see fusion, avoidance, or disconnection from values as they appear in a session, not just understand them abstractly.
2. Intervention selection. The capacity to choose a response that fits the function of what’s happening, rather than defaulting to a worksheet or a memorized technique regardless of context.
3. Clinical language. The ability to use ACT-consistent language in ways that land naturally with real clients — not clinical jargon, not forced metaphors, but genuine therapeutic presence expressed through an ACT-informed lens.

Beyond these core criteria, several practical factors are worth evaluating:

• Live vs. on-demand format. On-demand courses offer flexibility and repeatability. Live or cohort-based courses provide accountability, real-time feedback, and the confidence that comes from practicing in front of peers. Neither is inherently superior — the choice depends on how you learn best and what your schedule allows.
• Experiential content. Therapy demonstrations, guided exercises, and structured role-plays are essential for ACT training. Theoretical content alone produces knowledge, not competence. If a course consists primarily of lectures and reading materials, treat it as a supplement rather than a standalone training.
• Trainer credentials. Look for ACBS Peer-Reviewed Trainers (PRT) — practitioners whose training delivery has been reviewed and endorsed by the professional ACT community. This is not a certification, but it is a meaningful quality signal.
• CE accreditation. For licensed practitioners, courses that offer continuing education (CE) credits from accredited providers add professional value beyond clinical skill development.

1. ACT for Beginners — Psychwire (Russ Harris)

If there is one name most closely associated with making ACT accessible to a broad clinical audience, it is Russ Harris — psychotherapist, ACBS Peer-Reviewed Trainer, and author of The Happiness Trap, one of the bestselling ACT books ever published. His ACT for Beginners course on Psychwire is widely considered the gold standard introduction for mental health professionals.

The course runs over six weeks and delivers 16 hours of structured content, qualifying for 16 continuing education credits. Modules cover the foundational ACT processes systematically: an introduction to the model, cognitive defusion techniques, the relationship between goals and values, self-as-context metaphors, and the specific challenges of working with difficult client presentations. What distinguishes Harris’s teaching is his ability to make ACT simple without diluting its philosophical depth — a balance that is genuinely difficult to achieve and that he manages with characteristic clarity and warmth.

The course includes a community forum where participants can engage with peers and clarify questions, adding a modest social learning dimension to what is primarily an on-demand format. The main limitation is the absence of direct feedback — participants who want to build genuine clinical fluency will benefit from pairing this course with a consultation group or clinical supervision.

• Best for: Licensed mental health professionals wanting a clear, high-quality, clinically practical introduction to ACT
• Format: Structured online course with weekly module releases; community forum
• Duration / CE: 6 weeks, 16 hours, 16 CE credits
• Provider: Psychwire (psychwire.com/harris)

2. ACT Immersion — ACT Courses (Steven C. Hayes)

For practitioners who want to learn ACT from its original source, ACT Courses offers a range of programs developed under the direction of Steven C. Hayes — the psychologist who created ACT and who remains one of its most active researchers, trainers, and advocates. The ACT Immersion course is the flagship introductory offering on the platform.

A significant portion of the course material was recorded at a live three-day workshop with 30 mental health professionals, giving participants something rare: the experience of watching ACT unfold in real time with real clinicians, including the questions, confusions, and breakthroughs that characterize genuine experiential learning. The course spans 10 modules and delivers 24 continuing education hours, covering topics including the six core human yearnings that underlie psychological inflexibility, the movement from rigidity to flexibility, and the ACT account of selfhood and identity.

ACT Immersion includes audio exercises, Q&A videos, and demonstrations of real and simulated clinical sessions. Hayes’s depth of understanding of the RFT foundations that underpin ACT is unmatched, and this course reflects that — it is richer theoretically than most introductory offerings, which is both its greatest strength and a reason why some beginners prefer a more practically focused first step. Those who want immersion from the ground up rather than a gentle introduction will find this course deeply rewarding.

• Best for: Practitioners who want theoretical depth alongside clinical application, and who learn well through immersive workshop-style formats
• Format: On-demand video course with audio exercises and live-workshop recordings
• Duration / CE: 10 modules, 24 CE hours
• Provider: ACT Courses (act.courses)

3. ACT Basics — Praxis (Matt Boone)

Praxis is a continuing education platform that hosts a carefully curated collection of ACT courses from leading practitioners. Their ACT Basics course, taught by Matt Boone — a therapist, ACT trainer, and co-author of Mindfulness and Acceptance in Social Work — is one of the most practically oriented introductory options available and one of the most consistent practitioner recommendations for beginners who want to get to work quickly.

The course consists of 10 modules built around video instruction, experiential exercises, and live demonstrations — critically including recordings of actual in-person ACT workshops with mental health professionals, not just talking-head video content. Participants learn how to apply all six psychological flexibility processes, how to use core ACT tools in sessions, and how to deepen the therapeutic relationship through presence and flexibility. Bonus webinars address the questions that most commonly arise for beginners and explore how ACT can be integrated with other evidence-based approaches including CBT and DBT.

The self-paced format and clean structure make this one of the most accessible CE-eligible ACT courses available. Practitioners who want foundations they can immediately start applying — rather than a more conceptually ambitious immersion — consistently find ACT Basics delivers exactly that. Worth noting: Praxis also hosts more advanced courses from leading ACT trainers, including Robyn Walser’s Healing Trauma with ACT and Kelly Wilson’s Exploring Values in ACT, making the platform a useful long-term home for ACT professional development.

• Best for: Clinicians wanting a clean, immediately practical ACT foundation with CE hours and self-paced flexibility
• Format: On-demand, self-paced with video instruction, demos, and experiential exercises
• Duration / CE: 10 modules; CE hours included
• Provider: Praxis (praxiscet.com)

4. 2-Day Intensive ACT Training — PESI (Dr. Daniel Moran)

PESI is one of the largest continuing education organizations for mental health professionals in the United States, and their ACT training offerings have become among the most widely attended professional development options in the field. The 2-Day Intensive ACT Training, hosted by Dr. Daniel Moran — a licensed psychologist and experienced ACT trainer — delivers approximately 12 hours of CE-eligible instruction in a format designed for direct clinical translation.

The training prepares clinicians to apply ACT techniques across a range of presentations including anxiety, PTSD, mood disorders, trauma, and substance use. Case conceptualization tools and effective intervention techniques are integrated throughout, with an emphasis on practical application rather than theoretical elaboration. The digital seminar format — originally recorded as a live training event — preserves much of the energy and interactivity of an in-person experience.

PESI also offers the ACT Intensive Online Course, co-delivered by Steven Hayes and Daniel Moran, which provides 23.75 hours of CE-eligible content across six modules and includes in-session demonstrations from Hayes and other master ACT clinicians. For practitioners who want both breadth and significant CE hours, this combination represents one of the most cost-effective professional development investments available in the ACT training landscape.

• Best for: US-based licensed practitioners seeking substantial CE hours and broad clinical ACT training from a trusted provider
• Format: On-demand digital seminar (originally recorded live); CE credits on completion of post-test
• Duration / CE: ~12 hours CE eligible (Intensive version: 23.75 CE hours)
• Provider: PESI (pesi.com)

5. Healing Trauma with ACT — Praxis (Dr. Robyn D. Walser)

For clinicians working with trauma populations, this specialized course from Praxis — taught by Dr. Robyn D. Walser, one of the most respected ACT trainers in the world and co-author of The Heart of ACT and Learning ACT — is widely considered the definitive training in ACT-based trauma work. Walser has spent decades applying ACT in trauma contexts including veteran PTSD, complex trauma, and moral injury, and this course distills that expertise into 12 modules of structured clinical training.

Participants learn how to build psychological flexibility with trauma survivors through clear instruction, clinical role-plays, audio debriefs, and hands-on exercises. The curriculum addresses the specific challenges that arise in ACT-based trauma work — how to work with shame, how to approach trauma narratives with flexibility rather than avoidance, how to navigate the relationship between exposure and acceptance, and how to integrate ACT with other trauma therapies such as Prolonged Exposure and EMDR.

The course includes 12 CE hours and provides lifetime access to all materials — an important practical feature for practitioners who want to return to specific content as clinical situations require. For any clinician working regularly with trauma and PTSD, this course represents a significant professional development investment with clear real-world clinical returns.

• Best for: Mental health practitioners working with trauma, PTSD, moral injury, and complex trauma populations
• Format: On-demand, 12 modules with clinical role-plays, audio debriefs, and hands-on exercises
• Duration / CE: 12 modules, 12 CE hours, lifetime access
• Provider: Praxis (praxiscet.com)

6. ACT for Depression and Anxiety — Psychwire (Russ Harris)

Building on the foundation established in his beginner course, Russ Harris’s ACT for Depression and Anxiety is a six-week, 16-hour intermediate course designed for practitioners who want to deepen their ACT skills specifically for the most common presentations in clinical practice. The course requires more than beginner-level ACT knowledge — participants should have completed an introductory ACT training, worked through a beginner-level ACT textbook, or attended a foundational two-day workshop before enrolling.

The curriculum is impressively specific to the clinical realities of anxiety and mood disorders. Topics include the psychology of worry and how ACT approaches it differently from traditional CBT, the critical distinction between mindfulness and relaxation, the difference between fear and anxiety from an ACT perspective, how to explore the roots of anxiety experientially, and how to work on values with clients who claim to have none — one of the most practically challenging scenarios in ACT-based practice.

Harris’s capacity for clinical specificity — moving from broad ACT principles to the precise language and interventions that work in particular clinical moments — is what makes this intermediate course consistently recommended by practitioners who have completed it. For clinicians regularly working with anxiety disorders and depression, this course represents one of the most targeted and immediately applicable advanced ACT training options available.

• Best for: Practitioners with ACT foundations seeking specialized skills for anxiety and mood disorder presentations
• Format: Structured online course with weekly modules; community forum
• Duration / CE: 6 weeks, 16 hours, 16 CE credits
• Provider: Psychwire (psychwire.com/harris)

7. Focused ACT for Brief Interventions — Praxis (Strosahl and Robinson)

One of the most practically significant challenges in applying ACT in real-world settings is the pressure of time. Many mental health professionals work in contexts — primary care, brief therapy models, inpatient settings, crisis services — where the luxury of extended ACT-based work is not available. This course, delivered by Dr. Kirk Strosahl and Dr. Patti Robinson — both co-founders or co-developers of Focused Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (FACT) and authors of some of the most influential texts in applied ACT — addresses that challenge directly.

Across six modules, the course teaches FACT: a distillation of ACT principles into brief, focused interventions deliverable in sessions as short as 10 to 30 minutes. The curriculum covers how to conduct effective initial FACT sessions, how to structure follow-up contacts, how to use metaphors efficiently in brief therapeutic encounters, and how to work with complex or challenging clients within significant time constraints. Teletherapy role-plays and practical exercises throughout ensure the content is immediately transferable.

This course addresses a genuine gap in ACT training: most programs are designed with traditional 50-minute weekly therapy formats in mind. For practitioners whose clinical reality is fundamentally different — in primary care, brief therapy, or integrated behavioral health settings — FACT training may be the most clinically relevant ACT skill development available.

• Best for: Practitioners working in brief, primary care, or integrated behavioral health settings with limited session time
• Format: On-demand, six modules with video instruction, teletherapy role-plays, and practical exercises
• Duration / CE: 6 modules; CE hours included
• Provider: Praxis (praxiscet.com)

8. ACT Boot Camp — With Steven C. Hayes, Robyn D. Walser, and Gijs Jansen

For practitioners who want the deepest available ACT training experience, ACT Boot Camp is in a category of its own. This is a four-day intensive training delivered in a live format — held periodically in Europe and occasionally in North America — by Steven C. Hayes alongside Robyn D. Walser and Gijs Jansen, bringing together three of the most respected figures in the ACT world in a single immersive learning environment.

Boot Camp is not designed as an introduction. It is a total immersion: four consecutive days of teaching, experiential exercises, live demonstrations, and practice that are intended to fundamentally shift how practitioners understand and apply ACT. The format mirrors the intensive learning environments where clinical skills develop most rapidly — sustained focus, immediate application, real-time feedback, and a community of fellow practitioners engaged in the same developmental process.

The European version runs under the domain actbootcamp.eu and has developed a strong reputation among European ACT practitioners as the training of choice for those ready to move from competence to genuine clinical fluency. The intensity is real — participants consistently describe it as both demanding and transformative. For practitioners who have foundational ACT knowledge and want a significant accelerant to their clinical development, Boot Camp represents an investment with returns that extend across an entire career.

• Best for: Practitioners with ACT foundations seeking intensive, immersive clinical development with ACT’s most credentialed trainers
• Format: Four-day live intensive training (European and occasional international dates)
• Duration / CE: 4 days; CE hours vary by event
• Provider: ACT Boot Camp (actbootcamp.eu)

How to Choose the Right ACT Course for Your Stage of Development

With eight strong options covering introductory to advanced levels, the key is matching the course to where you actually are — not where you’d like to be, or where it might feel more impressive to start.

1. If you are new to ACT, start with either Russ Harris’s ACT for Beginners (Psychwire) or Matt Boone’s ACT Basics (Praxis). Both provide genuinely solid foundations with excellent clinical teaching and CE accreditation. Pair either with a peer consultation group or clinical supervision to begin building actual fluency.
2. If you want foundational depth from ACT’s source, ACT Immersion through ACT Courses offers the most theoretically grounded introduction available, with the added richness of live workshop recordings. Expect more conceptual density than the Harris or Boone courses.
3. If you need substantial CE hours efficiently, the PESI 2-Day Intensive or ACT Intensive Online Course (Hayes and Moran) offers strong content with high CE hour counts and broad clinical applicability.
4. If you work primarily with trauma populations, Robyn Walser’s Healing Trauma with ACT (Praxis) is the most clinically specific and most widely recommended option in that specialization.
5. If you work in brief or integrated care settings, Strosahl and Robinson’s FACT course (Praxis) directly addresses the real clinical constraints you face — it may be more immediately applicable than any general ACT training.
6. If you have solid foundations and want accelerated development, ACT Boot Camp provides the most intensive live learning experience available in the field, with a faculty that cannot be matched.

One consistent piece of advice from experienced ACT practitioners: whatever course you choose, the real development happens after the training, not during it. A consultation group, clinical supervision with an ACT-informed supervisor, or simply a committed practice of reviewing cases through an ACT lens will consistently deepen skills faster than additional course-taking alone.

FAQs About Acceptance and Commitment Therapy Courses

Is there an official ACT certification?

No — and this is intentional. The Association for Contextual Behavioral Science (ACBS), the international professional community for ACT, has explicitly chosen not to create an official certification process. Their reasoning is that formal certification risks creating a hierarchical, closed system that would be inconsistent with ACT’s values of openness and collaborative development. What ACBS does maintain is a Peer-Reviewed Trainer (PRT) program — a voluntary process through which experienced trainers’ teaching delivery is reviewed and endorsed by the community. When evaluating an ACT course or trainer, PRT status is a meaningful quality signal, though not the only one. For practitioners, the appropriate credential to deliver psychotherapy remains your professional licensure in your jurisdiction — ACT training supplements that credential, it does not replace it.

Do I need to be a licensed therapist to take ACT courses?

It depends on the course. Most clinically oriented ACT training programs — including the Psychwire, Praxis, PESI, and ACT Courses options described in this guide — are designed for licensed or credentialed mental health professionals and award CE credits accordingly. Some introductory offerings on platforms like Udemy are open to anyone with a general interest in psychology and therapy. It’s important to recognize the distinction between learning about ACT as an educational exercise — valuable for anyone interested in psychology — and learning to deliver ACT as a clinical intervention, which requires appropriate professional training and licensure. If your goal is clinical application with clients, professional training credentials and supervisory support are essential components of safe and ethical practice.

How long does it take to become competent at ACT?

Foundational conceptual understanding can be developed in a focused introductory course of 16 to 24 hours. Clinical competence — the ability to apply ACT flexibly and effectively in real sessions with real clients — takes considerably longer and develops primarily through supervised practice rather than training hours alone. Experienced ACT trainers consistently observe that fluency develops most reliably through deliberate practice across cases, regular consultation with peers or supervisors, and the willingness to apply ACT processes in one’s own life. A reasonable expectation is that a committed practitioner who completes a solid foundational training and engages in regular ACT-informed supervision will begin to feel genuinely competent within 12 to 24 months of active clinical practice.

What is the difference between FACT and ACT training?

Focused Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (FACT) is a brief intervention adaptation of ACT developed by Kirk Strosahl and Patricia Robinson specifically for settings where extended therapy is not available — primary care, integrated behavioral health, brief therapy models, and crisis contexts. FACT distills the core ACT processes into focused, efficient interventions deliverable in sessions as short as 10 to 30 minutes. Standard ACT training typically assumes a traditional therapy format with regular weekly sessions over an extended period. FACT training teaches the same underlying principles but focuses specifically on case formulation and intervention selection under significant time pressure. For practitioners in primary care or brief therapy settings, FACT training is often more immediately applicable than general ACT training.

Can ACT be learned effectively through online courses alone?

Online courses can provide excellent foundational knowledge, clinical frameworks, and exposure to demonstrations — and several of the courses in this guide deliver that to a high standard. However, the consensus among experienced ACT trainers is clear: online learning alone is insufficient for developing genuine clinical competence. ACT is a relational, experiential therapy, and clinical fluency develops most reliably through practice with real clients, feedback from experienced supervisors or peer consultants, and the experiential work of applying ACT processes in one’s own life. Online courses are best understood as an important starting point or supplement to clinical training — not a complete developmental path in themselves. Pairing any online ACT course with regular peer consultation, clinical supervision, or attendance at live workshops significantly accelerates the development of practical skills.

Which ACT course is best for working with anxiety specifically?

Russ Harris’s ACT for Depression and Anxiety (Psychwire) is the most specifically targeted and widely recommended course for practitioners working primarily with anxiety disorders. It covers the ACT-specific conceptualization of anxiety — including the functional role of avoidance, the difference between fear and anxiety, and how worry functions as experiential avoidance — and provides targeted intervention guidance for GAD, social anxiety, panic, and related presentations. Note that this is an intermediate course requiring prior ACT foundations. For beginners who work with anxiety, completing ACT for Beginners first and then progressing to the anxiety-specific course provides the most coherent developmental path. The PESI 2-Day Intensive also covers anxiety extensively within a broader clinical ACT training.

Are ACT courses useful for people who are not therapists?

Yes — with important caveats about what can realistically be gained. Non-clinicians who are curious about ACT can benefit meaningfully from introductory courses, self-help books, and educational content that explain the model’s principles and exercises. Understanding ACT concepts — psychological flexibility, cognitive defusion, values-based action, acceptance — can inform personal development and support one’s own wellbeing in genuinely valuable ways. Several platforms offer courses open to general audiences, and Russ Harris’s book The Happiness Trap is widely recommended as a high-quality self-directed ACT resource. What non-clinicians cannot appropriately gain from ACT training is the competence to deliver ACT as a therapeutic intervention with clients — that requires professional training, licensure, and supervised clinical experience that no online course alone can provide.

What should I do after completing an ACT beginner course?

The most consistently recommended next step after completing a foundational ACT course is joining or forming a peer consultation group. Consulting regularly with colleagues about ACT cases — bringing real clinical material, receiving feedback, and observing how others conceptualize and respond — develops clinical fluency faster than additional course-taking alone. ACT-informed supervision, if available through your professional context, serves a similar function. Practically, beginning to apply ACT processes with appropriate clients — starting with the techniques and concepts you feel most solid on — and bringing that clinical experience to consultation is the developmental path that experienced trainers most consistently recommend. Additional courses at the intermediate level (such as the Russ Harris anxiety-specific training or Robyn Walser’s trauma course) become more valuable once you have real clinical experience to bring to the learning.