13 of the best online courses platforms for creators
Find the best online platforms for creating exciting e-learning courses and expand your business online.
There's an idea you have for a fabulous online course. The only thing you need is an area to create it.
On an online course platform You can create your course, incorporate multimedia such as videos and pictures, and even include interactivity elements such as quizzes or certificate of completion for your course. Additionally, you can make sales pages, take payment, and monitor your students from the same place.
In this article, we'll cover what to consider when selecting course software and 13 of the most popular online platforms for course entrepreneurs, small-business owners and entrepreneurs.
All pricing is accurate as of the date of publication but is subject to change over time.
Things to consider in choosing an online training platform
Before we begin the details, let us look at some of the factors to take into consideration when selecting the right online training tool for your business.
UnlimitedBusinesses alter over time which is a great thing. Using platforms that let you create unlimited courses ensures that there's no need to worry about outgrowing the software you use for e-learning in the future as your product's needs change.
Multiple types of files: You shouldn't be restricted by the types of content you're able to include within your class. Look for platforms that make it possible to include audio, video, text, and embedded modules.
Support for the creator:Don't go it alone. Consider online educational platforms first. accessible customer support and resources including live chat, discussion forums Knowledge bases, videos to assist you in your quest.
Cost:Most creators have a small budget, which is why choosing an affordable platform is crucial. There is no need to spend for the top-quality product available when budget-friendly options can accomplish the task.
With these factors in mind With these considerations in mind, here are 13 useful tools to help you build and promote your course.
13 best online course platforms for entrepreneurs and creators
#1
The process of creating a course is a breeze. Add video, text or audio files, questions as well as coaching sessions and the ability to download files for your lessons and modules.
With , you can also embed elements from 1900+ sources, including YouTube, Vimeo, SoundCloud, Spotify, Google Slides, TikTok, Instagram, GitHub, and Google Forms.
After adding your course material, use its easy-to-use page creator to design a course website or sales webpage for your offer. If you're in need of help it provides best-in-class chat as well as 24/7 email support throughout the week.
According to professional bladesmith Ben Abbot , "I've always had a dream of creating online courses that can assist bladesmiths of all levels improve their craft. It has made that possible with their simple and powerful platform."
What are the features of HTML0?
Unlimited customers
Payment integrations that work with Stripe as well as PayPal
Coupons, payment plans and subscriptions
advantages: has a free plan that lets you build your website, set up a community, and draft your online course prior to making a decision to open your wallet. 's paid plans include unlimited courses as well as content hosting. Courses are pre-launched and sold as bundles, and it's possible to organize your materials to be a drip, cohort or self-paced course.
Scores 90.91 out of 100 points on the Creator Friendliness Index . Platforms that are supportive of creators offer tools, pricing structures, and policies to empower the creatorsand give you greater control over how you run your business. Does not charge transaction fees for any subscription plans.
cons: is a turnkey solution. So if want to create your website and course entirely from scratch, with the help of a developer, it won't be the best fit.
How much does cost?
Free (8% transaction cost)
Mover: $39/month
Shaker: $89/month
Earthquaker: $199/month
#2 Kajabi
Kajabi offers designs for self-study, drip, and membership courses. You can add any number of modules or lessons as you like with videos assessment, audio files, text, and downloadable material. If you get stuck, contact Kajabi support through live chat or via email.
What are the features of Kajabi?
Unlimited website and content hosting
Coupons, upsells, subscriptions and payments plans
Recovery of abandoned carts
Analytics and course insights
Campaigns, email broadcasts pipelines, automated sequences and sequences
Payment processing gateways include: Stripe and PayPal
Score for creator friendliness: 68.83/100
Kajabi benefits: Kajabi has a pipeline software that lets the creation of advanced sales funnels. You can also download templates for your website that you can download to spark your creativity. Kajabi does not charge any transaction fee for all of their plans that are paid.
Kajabi cons: Kajabi is one of the more expensive online courses platforms that allow creators to create There's also no free plan. Additionally, there are strict limitations to how many products you are able to create, as well as how many users can enroll on all plans.
Kajabi's products and limits for customers:
Basic: 3 products, 3 funnels, 1,000 active members
Growth: 15 products, 15 funnels, 10,000 active members
Pro: 100 products, 100 funnels, 20,000 active members
How much does Kajabi cost?
Basic: $149/month
Growth: $199/month
Pro: $399/month
#3 Thinkific
In the course builder, Thinkific creators are able to add downloadable content, quizzes, polls, and even voice-over PowerPoints. The higher-end plans allow you to add prerequisite lessons and require students to finish modules in the correct sequence.
Thinkific also offers a free plan where you can develop three courses and set up your website. This plan is free of transaction fees, and all plans allow unlimited students. If you have any questions, Thinkific offers phone and email assistance.
What features are available at Thinkific?
Offer bundles, courses, and memberships
Unlimited video and content hosting with all plans
Students are able to leave their course critiques
Exam Integrations into higher-level plans
Course compliance tools
Score for creator friendliness: 87.01/100
Thinkific advantages:With Thinkific, you are able to sell unlimited courses and provide unlimited content to all paid plans. It is possible to connect the tools available on the Thinkific app store for more capabilities if you want to add additional features.
Thinkific negatives:Thinkific is a popular online course option, but there's not an easy way to offer other digital items including ebooks, downloads and coaching sessions. Also, some desirable features like the basic community, memberships, product bundles as well as payment plans and subscriptions can only be found for those who subscribe to the premium Pro plan and above.
How much will Thinkific price?
No cost (No charge for transactions)
Basic: $49/month
Pro: $99/month
Pro+Growth add-on: $149/month
Premier: $499/month
4. Teachable
Teachable's free plan includes one course , and unlimited students. Paid plans come with unlimited self-paced classes, cohort courses, coaching products, and video bandwidth. Course design templates are available for you to get going with your course, as well as adding quizzes, videos, audio text, and even custom CSS within the course module.
Help with teaching is provided via email on every plan. Chat support via live chat is offered with the professional plan and higher.
What are the Teachable's capabilities?
Unlimited training and coaching are included on paid plans
Course completion certificates, quizzes as well as lecture notes
Subscriptions, free trials or memberships as well as payment plans
Build a custom storefront and sale pages to promote your courses
Affiliate center, with automated payouts
Basic email marketing features
The score for Creator-Friendliness is 77.92/100
Teachable advantages:Teachable offers course compliance tools like lesson order enforcement to ensure students move through the material in a correct method. There are also integrated with affiliate tools as well as a student refer feature.
Teachable's cons: Teachable doesn't come with a built-in social feature. If you're looking to create a community for your learners, you'll need to integrate third-party software at the cost of an extra fee. Teachable has hefty charges for transactions on its Basic and free plans.
How much does Teachable cost?
The free plan is ($1 + 10% transaction fee on paid products)
Basic: $39/month (5 5 percent transaction cost)
Pro: $199/month
Business: $299/month
#5 LearnWorlds
Creators may include video transcripts as well as overlay buttons and links. Students can highlight or take notes in the course viewer. instructors may add assessments, tests that are random as well as certificates of completion for courses. LearnWorlds support is available through telephone, email or ticketing and live chat.
What do you think of LearnWorlds's features?
Offer memberships, courses, subscriptions, and product bundles
Build your own website
Integrated video editing tools and transcripts
Marketing via affiliate
Mobile App (for an additional cost)
Unlimited SCORMs and HTML5
Creator friendliness score: 76.62/100
LearnWorlds benefits: LearnWorlds users can manage affiliates, establish members, and organize promotions to promote their course. You can also make a white label iOS or Android app with an additional fee.
LearnWorlds pros: LearnWorlds is heavily designed for course creators so this might not be the right choice for you when you are offering online downloads, webinars or training, or community.
With the LearnWorlds Starter plan, you can only offer paid courses (no no-cost courses) as well as LearnWorlds will charge you $5 for each course sold. The plan allows you to build a minimal site, but it's limited to three pages. The cost of $99 per month Pro Trainer plan to get more capabilities.
How much does LearnWorlds cost?
Starter: $29/month (+$5 fee per course sale)
Pro Trainer: $99/month
Learning Center 299$/month
Corporate: Custom pricing
#6 LearnDash
With LearnDash You can design courses that include prerequisites, drip content, subscriptions, and memberships. You can also send automated notifications to students, enable course discussion forums, and award certificates to successful students.
The courses can be subscribe-based, memberships, or single-time purchases. If you're looking to get contact, you are able to get in touch with LearnDash customer service from Monday to Friday.
What features are available with LearnDash?
WordPress LMS plugin
You can enroll unlimited students, and you can offer unlimited classes
Compatible with all WordPress themes
Subscriptions, one-time purchases courses, memberships as well as big licenses
Students are offered incentives, tests as well as evaluations, certificates, and incentives
Notify students
LearnDash advantages:LearnDash offers student engagement tools like quizzes, leaderboards games, assignments, and gamification. LearnDash doesn't take any transaction fees, and you can use the plugin with the majority of WordPress themes, which makes it very adaptable.
How much does LearnDash cost?
Basic: $199/year
Plus package: $229/year
Pro package: $369/year
Hosting costs for your WordPress website as well as Domain registration
#7 Uscreen
Uscreen is video membership software featuring course creation tools and community tools. This software is best for people who have an an extensive library of content in video they would like to store in one place.
Every one of Uscreen users get a high-quality video player, website and unlimited bandwidth for streaming. In order to create your own courses, you can tag your videos by topic and then arrange them into catalogs. The possibilities include one-time purchase as well as tiered subscriptions, free trials, and rentals on all plans.
Uscreen users have access to customer support via email.
What is Uscreen's feature?
Build a membership site for your video content
Design your own website and mobile app
Livestreamed events
Uscreen pros: Uscreen is on the costly side, and there's no free plan. It's only a good fit for courses that use video, therefore should you provide other offerings like downloads, live coaching, and interconnected communities, you'll want to choose a different software.
How much will Uscreen cost?
Basic: $79/month + $0.50 per subscriber
Growing: $159/month plus $0.50 per subscriber
Uscreen Plus Uscreen Plus: Custom pricing (This plan comes with the white-label mobile application and the TV streaming app)
#8 Mighty Networks
Alongside courses, Mighty Networks has advanced community services like live streaming, personalized feeds, member profiles, direct messaging virtual events and calendar functions. Mighty Networks customers can access support through a ticketing system as well as the "Host Support" button.
What Are the Mighty Network's capabilities?
Create unlimited courses on the Business plan, and on up
Communities can be populated by unlimited members and moderators
Chat messaging for private and group chats
The community of creator support
Program for referring members
Score for creator friendliness: 59.74/100
Mighty Networks pros:With Mighty Networks, you can develop courses that include an element of community. Mighty Networks supports video courses, drip courses, and livestreaming, and you can include unlimited moderators or instructors.
Mighty Networks cons: Mighty Networks is, first and foremost, a social platform. There's no built-in way to offer services, such as coaching or digital downloads. Storage limitations exist in the Community and Business plans and transactions fees for all plans.
Additionally, you are able to export a list of your members and their email addresses for the Business plan, making it difficult to migrate away from Mighty Networks to a new platform.
What is the cost of HTML0? Mighty Networks cost?
Community plan Monthly cost: $39 (3 3%) transaction cost)
Business plan 119/month (2 percent transaction fee)
Mighty Pro: Customized pricing
#9 Academy of Mine
A complete solution for online learning, Academy of Mine is a platform that lets you develop, market, and market your online course through the white label platform of your choice. It's a good choice if you are within the B2B industry and want to sell bulk licences to a single customer.
On their site, Academy of Mine is typically used for:
Continuing education
Safety-related training
Employee development
Certifications and professional training for the profession.
Training in compliance
Onboarding of employees
Help for Academy of Mine users is accessible via email as well as a ticketing system.
What is features of HTML0? Academy of Mine features?
Offer self-paced classes with tests as well as surveys and tests.
Create sales and marketing pages
Customized branding and site builder
Export and import features for bulk goods
Flexible ecommerce reporting and analytics
Third-party integrations
Academy of Mine pros:Academy of Mine works great for creating teams or corporate business education programs. It is possible to create self-paced or live courses and create your own website.
Academy of Mine cons: Academy of Mine is an expensive choice designed for big businesses but not individuals who want to create. It also has limitations on storage space and monthly active users.
How much will Academy of Mine cost?
Essentials: $599/month
Professional: $899/month
Enterprise: Custom pricing
#10 Teachery
Teachery is an easy but efficient software made for course creators by course creators. It's not stuffed full of whistles or bells, however, it's an easy choice for those who only wish to start an online business for your course.
Teachery features a course builder with two templates. Within your lessons and modules include audio, video, or slide presentations. The ability to make unlimited payments, sales and emails capture pages for promoting your course. The Teachery help desk via email.
What features are available in Teachery?
Unlimited classes, lessons and students
Sell memberships and bundle products
Integrations are possible with Mailchimp, ConvertKit, and Zapier
Affiliate program
Free, one-time, recurring payment
Teachery pros:Teachery is a white-label platform which you can modify to fit your personal branding and style. There are two simple pricing plans, which include the entire platform's features.
Teachery cons:Teachery is not optimized for the sale of digital downloads, or other services. There's no community features, and they don't provide audio or video hosting so you'll need to embed videos from third-party sources like YouTube as well as Vimeo.
What is the cost of Teachery costs?
Monthly plan: $49/month
Annual plan: $470/year
#11 Ruzuku
Ruzuku is a learning management system that lets you build an engaging online course including student forums, questions and answers areas. Utilizing Ruzuku it is possible to teach live, always-on self-directed online courses using a student-friendly monitor.
What are the Ruzuku's capabilities?
Participants can have social profiles, bios, and photos in the course community
Copy a previous course to repeat it several times
Email announcements to course participants
One-time or subscription payments
Course completion data
Forum FAQ and student discussion
Ruzuku advantages: Ruzuku gets good ratings for customer service as well as their extensive instructional courses, tutorials and Help docs and a Facebook group. It is possible to use Ruzuku to create unlimited courses, and all plans come with audio and video hosting.
Ruzuku cons: Ruzuku is not the best choice if you are offering digital downloads, communities, as well as coaching and consultation services. Although sending out email notifications can be done, there are none of the advanced features for email marketing. It also does not have a fully-featured web-based builder.
How much does Ruzuku cost?
Bootstrapper: $99/month
Up and Comer: $149/month
University: $199/month
#12 Udemy
Features:
Course builder that is user-friendly and easy to use.
Learners can leave course reviews
Built-in marketing tools
Instructors may be included in the site-wide offers to increase participation
Score for creator friendliness: 52.78/100
Udemy advantages: Udemy promotes your courses on its platform, making your marketing less hands-on. Udemy is also a well-established platform with brand recognition and an extensive users, which make it much easier to get students to find the course.
Udemy cons:On Udemy, you are less in control of the quality of your content, branding and earnings. Your audience isn't yours to control, and you can't migrate your students' lists off the platform in the future. Additionally, you aren't able to run cohort courses, live courses or even membership-based classes.
How much does Udemy cost?
It's free to join Udemy to create content but it's a requirement to be part of Udemy's revenue-sharing plan.
Revenue sharing plan:
The instructor gets 97% of the time when a student utilizes the code of referral provided by the instructor.
The instructor keeps 37% if no referral code is used
#13 Skillshare
Students pay a monthly charge to have unlimited access to every course available on the platform. teachers earn money on how many minutes students watch their video. Teachers also earn money by the students they refer to Skillshare. Creators are able to access help via an email.
What are the features of Skillshare?
Make money from royalties or the Skillshare affiliate program.
Creators are discovered by students already using the platform.
Upload one class each seven days
Make video lessons
Creator friendliness score: 44.78/100
Skillshare advantages:Because Skillshare is an online learning platform, there's less marketing required on your end. Skillshare already has an audience, which may result in more people taking a look at your classes. The service is also free to developers to start.
Skillshare Cons: When students watch your classes via Skillshare it doesn't mean you own your audience. It isn't possible to create an email list for students you teach, and neither can you contact them again in the future.
Each lesson must adhere to Skillshare's guidelines, which means that you aren't in control of the creative process in your course. There's no community option as well as you cannot offer downloads of digital content, live cohort courses, memberships, or different formats other than videos of lectures.
How much will Skillshare Cost?
Free to creators
For choosing the right online training platform for your entrepreneurial venture
Making online-based courses is an excellent way to grow your business and spread your knowledge. In selecting the right online learning platform, ask yourself the following questions:
Is the platform all-in-one so I can handle my company from one central location?
Can the platform restrict the amount of products I could make?
Are there easy ways to reach assistance if I require help?
Do I have to include video, audio, text, and other types of material?
Is the price reasonable for this phase of my business?
Your talents and knowledge can be valuable. By creating the online class, you'll be well in the process of sharing your enthusiasm with other students. Enjoy giving!