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Best resources to learnReverse Engineering

Study sheet

Reverse engineering recovers how binaries work without source. You will learn x86/ARM assembly, disassemblers and debuggers such as Ghidra and GDB, binary exploitation basics and CTF-style practice.

6 resources · · How we curate

🎓Courses(3)

course

Nightmare: Intro to Binary Exploitation and Reverse Engineering

Over ninety real CTF challenges arranged in sequence with complete writeups, moving from reading assembly and stack overflows through ROP, format strings, integer bugs, heap exploitation, and symbolic execution. Uses only free tooling and ships the original binaries.

advanced🇬🇧
course

pwn.college - Program Security: Reverse Engineering

Reading about RE builds nothing; this is the best free source of graded, auto-checked binaries with a curriculum behind them, and the challenges escalate from license-key crackmes to reversing a bespoke virtual machine. Arizona State University's hands-on module: browser-based Linux workspaces holding crackmes, byte-limited binary patching tasks, and a custom VM-obfuscation series students must reverse instruction by instruction. Lecture slides and videos accompany dozens of graded challenges.

intermediate🇬🇧
course

Architecture 1001: x86-64 Assembly

Every serious RE path starts with assembly, and this is the deepest free structured course on x86-64 aimed specifically at reverse engineers rather than at compiler writers. Video class teaching x86-64 assembly from a reverse engineer's perspective: registers, memory layout, calling conventions, and the twenty-odd instructions that dominate real binaries, with disassembler labs. Prerequisite for OST2's reverse engineering and exploitation paths.

beginner🇬🇧

📚Books(2)

bookPaid

The Ghidra Book, 2nd Edition: The Definitive Guide

632-page reference to the NSA's open-source disassembler and decompiler, covering navigation, data type and structure recovery, scripting through PyGhidra, BSim behavioural matching, the debugger, and collaborative multi-user projects. Second edition published March 2026.

intermediate🇬🇧
book

Reverse Engineering for Beginners

Free reference pairing small C and C++ snippets with the x86, x64, ARM, and MIPS assembly that compilers actually emit for them, then working through Windows and Linux examples. Includes exercises; PDFs published in several languages.

beginner🇬🇧

🌐Websites(1)

website

Azeria Labs: Writing ARM Assembly

Seven-part introduction to 32-bit ARM assembly written for security work: data types, the instruction set, memory addressing modes, conditional execution, branching, and stack and function behaviour, with follow-on tutorials covering ARM shellcode and exploit development. This is the best free ARM-for-reversers material, and it is written by the person who then wrote the definitive ARM RE book, so it scales into paid depth if the learner wants it.

intermediate🇬🇧
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Frequently Asked Questions

What are the best free resources to learn Reverse Engineering?

Dantes has curated 6 resources for Reverse Engineering, including 2 books, 3 courses, 1 websites. All resources are hand-picked for quality — no algorithmic filler. Browse the full list above to find the format that works best for you.

Is Reverse Engineering hard to learn?

Reverse Engineering is approachable at the beginner level — there are resources here specifically for those starting from scratch. As you progress, intermediate and advanced material is also available to take your skills further.

What types of Reverse Engineering learning resources are available on Dantes?

For Reverse Engineering, Dantes has curated 2 books, 3 courses, 1 websites. Each resource type serves a different learning style: videos and YouTube for visual learners, books for depth, courses for structured progression, and websites for quick reference.

How does Dantes select Reverse Engineering resources?

Dantes is an algorithm-free learning directory. Resources are hand-curated based on quality, accuracy, and usefulness — not engagement metrics or paid placements. The goal is to surface the best learning material for Reverse Engineering, whether it's a free YouTube series, a classic textbook, or an open courseware from a top university.

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