Ask HN: Best way to develop front end dev skills?

This would be a small supplement to actually building some basic projects out, but one thing that I've found helpful in the past and continue to find helpful is to play around with modifying the CSS and html within chrome's devtools. It's a great way to see how certain properties in CSS affect their respective elements in real time without wiring up project files and development environment. This little guide is a good start: https://developers.google.com/web/tools/chrome-devtools/css/

If you see a nicely designed website, try to replicate it. You can learn by checking the CSS/JS and learning from it. This assuming you have bare html/js/css skills. If not, then try some online tutorials/classes/books.

The same way you develop any skill. Set a goal, put in a lot of repetitions and constantly refine your approach.

In this context. Have an idea of what you want to make. Start building something and get stuck. Find a package that solves your problem and bloat your codebase.

I always recommend www.freecodecamp.org

Go for it! Finish the certificates you judge relevant (it is easy to quit before, don't do it)