Online courses require at least as much study time as their campus-based counterparts.  You should expect to study at least 2-3 hours a week for each credit hour you are enrolled for in a given term.  In other words, for each three credit hour course, you can expect to study 6-9 hours per week.  These amounts are to be used as a rough guideline, as the actual time needed to study for a given course will vary from student to student.

Below is a chart that illustrates the general amount of time per week you should expect to study for a given class (per credit hour) based on the course length.  For example, if you enroll in an 8-week course as opposed to a semester-long 16-week class, you should expect to spend double the time studying for a given course each week.  In general, the shorter the class length (number of weeks), the greater the number of hours you can expect studying each week.