13 top online learning platforms for creators
Choose the top online course platforms to build an engaging online learning product and increase your online business.
You've got an idea for a fabulous online course. The only thing you need is an area to create it.
With an online course platform it is possible to design your course, incorporate media like videos and images, and even include engaging elements, such as quizzes and courses completion certificates. It is also possible to create sales pages, accept payments, and manage your students from the same place.
In this guide we'll discuss what you should look for in choosing the best course software, and we'll also review 13 of the top online course platforms for creators, small business owners, and entrepreneurs.
The prices are accurate as of the date of publication but is dependent on changes over time.
What to search for when selecting an online learning platform
Before we dive in the details, let us look at some of the factors to consider when choosing an online learning tool to help your business.
Unlimited:Businesses alter over time and this is a positive thing. Utilizing platforms that allow you to sell unlimited courses means you don't need to fret about outgrowing your e-learning software in the future as your product's needs change.
Multiple file types: You shouldn't be restricted by the types of content you're able to include within your class. Search for platforms that permit you to incorporate audio, video, text, and embedded modules.
Support for creators:Don't go it alone. Make sure you are using online learning platforms that have access to customer service and other sources such as live chat, discussion forums Knowledge bases, video tutorials to help you in your quest.
Cost:Most creators have a limited budget, so choosing an affordable platform is crucial. It is not necessary to shell out for the top-quality option when you can find budget-friendly alternatives that get the job done.
In light of these points Here are 13 resources to assist you in creating and market your class.
13 of the best online courses platforms for entrepreneurs and creators
#1
Building a course on is a breeze. Add video, text or audio files, questions, coaching sessions, and file downloads to your lessons and modules.
Additionally, with the help of Google Forms, you are able to embed elements from 1900+ sources like YouTube, Vimeo, SoundCloud, Spotify, Google Slides, TikTok, Instagram, GitHub and Google Forms.
Once you've added your material to your course, make use of its easy-to-use page creator to design a course website or sales page to promote the course you're offering. If you need help it provides best-in-class chat as well as help via email throughout the week.
According to the professional bladesmith Ben Abbot , "I've always dreamed of creating online classes that help bladesmiths of all skill levels to improve their skill. It has made that feasible through their extremely simple and effective platform."
What are 's features?
Unlimited customers
Payment integrations with Stripe and PayPal
Coupons, payment plan, and subscriptions
pros: has a free plan where you can develop your site create an online community, and create your online course prior to spending your money. 's paid plans include unlimited content hosting and courses. Courses are pre-launched and packaged into bundles. Additionally, you can format your material into a cohort, drip or self-paced programme.
scores 90.91 out of 100 points on the Creator Friendliness Index . Creator-friendly platforms offer resources including pricing models, pricing, and policies that empower creators -- giving you more control over how you run your company. Does not charge transaction fees for any paid plans.
cons: is a turnkey solution. Therefore, if you would prefer building your site and your course entirely from scratch, with the help from a professional developer, this 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. It is possible to add the number of lessons and modules as you want using videos, assessments, audio files, text, and downloadable material. If you're stuck you can contact Kajabi assistance via live chat, or by email.
What are Kajabi's features?
Unlimited hosting for content and websites
Coupons, upsells, subscriptions and installment plans
Carts abandoned for recovery
Course insights and analytics
Email broadcasts, campaigns, pipelines, automations, and sequences
Payment gateways: Stripe and PayPal
Creator friendliness score: 68.83/100
Kajabi advantages: Kajabi has a pipeline software that lets you to make advanced sales funnels. There are also website templates which you can utilize to kickstart your creative process. Kajabi does not charge any transaction fee with the paid plans they offer.
Kajabi Cons: Kajabi is one of the most expensive online courses platforms that allow creators to create, and there's no plan that is free. Additionally, there are strict limitations in the amount of content you are able to create, as well as how many active users you can enroll on all plans.
Kajabi's product and its customer limitations:
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
Through the course builder Thinkific creators can add online content, quizzes and polls, and even voice-over PowerPoints. Plans with higher tiers let you add prerequisite lessons and require students to finish modules in the correct in the correct order.
Thinkific also has a no-cost plan that lets you create three courses and create your own website. This plan is free of charges for transactions All plans permit unlimited students. If you have any questions, Thinkific offers phone and email support.
What features are available at Thinkific?
Offer bundles, courses, as well as subscriptions
Unlimited hosting of content and video on all plans
Students are able to leave their course critiques
Exam integrations on higher plans
Tools for ensuring compliance with the course
Score for creator friendliness: 87.01/100
Thinkific benefits:With Thinkific, you are able to sell unlimited courses and provide unlimited content to all plans that are paid. Connecting tools can be done through the Thinkific app store for more features if you require additional capabilities.
Thinkific Cons:Thinkific is a popular online learning option, however it's difficult to sell other digital products such as ebooks, downloads and coaching sessions. Furthermore, many desired features such as memberships, basic communities and product bundles payments plans, and subscriptions are only available on the pricey Pro plan or higher.
How much does Thinkific Cost?
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 include unlimited self-paced courses, cohort courses, coaching products, and video bandwidth. There are course design templates that can help you start as well as the ability to add questions, videos, audio, text, and specific CSS in your modules for courses.
Help with teaching is provided via email with every plan. Live chat support is available with the professional plan and above.
What are the Teachable's capabilities?
Unlimited classes and coaching with paid plans
Quizzes, certificates of completion as well as lecture notes
Trials and subscriptions for free as well as memberships and payment plans
Create a storefront that is custom-designed and selling pages on your courses
Affiliate center that offers automatic payments
Email marketing basics
Score for creator friendliness: 77.92/100
Teachable pros:Teachable offers course compliance features like the enforcement of lesson orders to make sure students are able to move through your content in a proper manner. It also integrates with affiliate tools as well as a student refer feature.
Teachable's disadvantages: Teachable doesn't come with a built-in social feature. If you're interested in to create a community of students, you'll have to integrate third-party software at the cost of an extra fee. Teachable is also a provider of high transaction costs on their Basic and free plans.
How much does Teachable cost?
Plan for free: ($1 plus 10% charge for transactions on purchased products)
Basis: $39/month (5% transaction fee)
Pro: $199/month
Business: $299/month
#5 LearnWorlds
Creators may add video transcripts with overlay buttons as well as links. Students are able to highlight and make notes inside the course viewer. Additionally, instructors can include assessments, randomized tests as well as certificates of completion for courses. LearnWorlds support is available through email, phone and ticketing systems and live chat.
What are LearnWorlds's features?
Make sales of memberships, classes, subscriptions, and product bundles
Make your own website
Tools for video editing integrated into the system and transcripts
Affiliate marketing
Mobile application (for an additional charge)
Unlimited SCORMs and HTML5
Creator friendly score: 76.62/100
LearnWorlds pros: LearnWorlds users can manage affiliates, manage members, and organize promotions to promote their courses. Additionally, you can create a white-label iOS or Android app with an additional fee.
LearnWorlds cons: LearnWorlds is heavily focused on course creators, so this might not be the right choice for you if you offer online downloads, webinars or training, or community.
On the LearnWorlds Starter plan, you are able to only provide paid courses (no no-cost courses) as well as LearnWorlds charges a $5 fee per course sale. You can create a simple website, however you're limited to 3 pages. The cost of $99 per month Pro Trainer plan to get additional 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
Through LearnDash You can design courses with prerequisites, drip content, subscriptions and memberships. Additionally, you can send automatic notifications to students, enable discussions on the course and give certificates to students who have done well.
The courses can be subscribe-based, annual memberships or just one-time purchase. If you're looking to get contact, you are able to connect with LearnDash customer service from Monday to Friday.
What is LearnDash's feature?
WordPress LMS plugin
You can enroll unlimited students, and you can offer unlimited courses
It works with the majority of WordPress themes
One-time purchases, subscriptions, memberships, course bundles, and bulk licences
Quizzes and incentives for students as well as evaluations, certificates, and incentives
Notify students
LearnDash benefits:LearnDash offers student engagement features like quizzes, leaderboards as well as gamification and assignments. LearnDash doesn't take any fee for transactions and users are able to use it with most WordPress themes, which makes it highly adaptable.
How much does LearnDash cost?
Basic: $199/year
Plus package: $229/year
Pro package: $369/year
Costs for hosting your WordPress site and 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 keep in one spot.
All Uscreen customers get high-quality video player, a website and unlimited bandwidth for streaming. To create classes, you can label your videos by topic and then arrange them into catalogs. It is possible to offer single-time purchases, tiered subscriptions, free trials, and rentals for any plan.
Uscreen users can access customer support via email.
What are Uscreen's features?
Build a membership site for your video content
Make your own site and mobile app
Livestreaming events
Uscreen pros: Uscreen is on the expensive side as there's no plan that's free. It's only suitable for courses that use video, therefore if you offer other products like downloads, live coaching, and interconnected communities, you'll want to go with a different program.
How much will Uscreen cost?
Basic: $79/month plus $0.50 per subscriber
Growing: $159/month plus $0.50 per subscriber
Uscreen Plus Pricing is custom (This plan includes the white-label mobile application and the TV streaming app)
#8 Mighty Networks
In addition to courses, Mighty Networks has advanced community services like live streaming customized feeds, profile pages for members, direct messaging virtual events, as well as calendar capabilities. Mighty Networks customers can access support through a ticketing system or using the "Host Support" button.
What Are the Mighty Network's capabilities?
Make unlimited courses with the Business plan and up
Communities are able to have unlimited members and moderators
Chat messaging for private and group chats
The community of creator support
Member referral program
Score for creator friendliness: 59.74/100
Mighty Networks pros:With Mighty Networks, you are able to create courses with a community element. Mighty Networks supports video courses drip-courses, drip courses and livestreaming. You can also create unlimited instructors and moderators.
Mighty Networks cons: Mighty Networks is, in the first the most important thing, it's a social platform. There's no built-in way to sell services like training or downloads via digital media. There's a storage limit on both the Community and Business plans and transaction fees on all tiers.
Additionally, you are able to export a list of your members and their email addresses on the Business plan, making it difficult to transfer members from Mighty Networks to a new platform.
How much does Mighty Networks cost?
Community plan: $39/month (3 3%) transaction cost)
Business plan 119/month (2 per cent transaction cost)
Mighty Pro: Custom pricing
#9 Academy of Mine
An all-in-one solution for online training, Academy of Mine is an application that allows you to create, sell, and market your online training course on your own white-label platform. It's a good choice if you are in the B2B space and require the ability to sell large licenses to one customer.
On their site, Academy of Mine is often used for:
Education for the future
Safety-related training
Employee development
Certifications and professional training for the profession.
Compliance training
Employee onboarding
Support to Academy of Mine users is accessible via email as well as an online ticketing system.
What are features of HTML0? Academy of Mine features?
Sell self-paced courses with quizzes survey, assessments, and quizzes
Design sales and marketing pages
Website builder and custom branding
Export and import features for bulk goods
Ecommerce analytics and reports that are flexible and adaptable
Integrations from third parties
Academy of Mine pros:Academy of Mine works excellent for the development of teams or corporate business training programs. You can create self-paced or live courses and build your site.
Academy of Mine cons: Academy of Mine is an expensive option specifically designed for businesses of all sizes, not individual creators. There are also limits on storage space and each month, 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 packed with a lot of whistles or bells but it's a good choice for those who only wish to start an online course company.
Teachery comes with a course maker that comes with two different templates. In your modules and lessons include video, audio, and slide presentations. It is possible to create endless payment, sales, as well as email page pages that promote your class. Contact the Teachery support team via email.
What are Teachery's features?
Unlimited lessons, courses, and students
Bundle and sell memberships
Integrations are possible with Mailchimp, ConvertKit, and Zapier
Affiliate program
Free, one-time, recurring payment
Teachers pros:Teachery is a white-label platform you can personalize to fit your personal branding and design. It offers two easy payment plans that include every feature of the platform.
Teachery pros:Teachery is not optimized for selling digital downloads or other services. There's no community feature or community feature, and they do not offer video or audio hosting, which means you'll need to insert videos from third-party sources like YouTube as well as Vimeo.
What is the cost of Teachery cost?
Monthly plan Monthly plan: $49/month
Annual plan $470/year
#11 Ruzuku
Ruzuku is a system for managing learning that allows you to build an online course that is engaging and interactive, that includes student forums as well as questions and answers areas. With Ruzuku you are able to offer either live, evergreen self-directed online courses using a student-friendly dashboard.
What are the Ruzuku's capabilities?
Participants can have social profiles including bios and pictures in the course community
Replicate a prior course and take it again
Announcements via email to students of courses
Subscriptions or one-time payments
Course completion data
Forum FAQ and student discussion
Ruzuku Pros: Ruzuku gets good ratings for customer service They also have extensive training courses, tutorials, help docs, and a Facebook group. Ruzuku allows Ruzuku to create unlimited courses All plans are equipped with audio and video hosting.
Ruzuku Cons: Ruzuku is not the best choice if you are offering digital downloads, communities, or coaching and consulting services. Although sending out email notifications can be accomplished, there's any advanced marketing tools for emails. The platform also lacks 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:
A user-friendly, easy-to-use course creator and uploader
Learners can leave course reviews
Inbuilt marketing tools for marketers
Instructors are able to be part of website-wide promotions to encourage the number of students
Creator-friendliness Score: 52.78/100
Udemy pros: Udemy promotes your courses on its platform, making your marketing less hands-on. Udemy is also an established platform with brand recognition and a large existing users, which make it much easier for students to discover the course.
Udemy cons:On Udemy, you can't control your content, branding, and earnings. Your audience isn't yours to control as well as you aren't able to transfer your list of students off the platform at a later date. You can't also offer live courses or even membership-based classes.
How much does Udemy cost?
It's free to join Udemy as a creator, but you'll be part of Udemy's revenue-sharing plan.
Revenue sharing plan:
The instructor keeps 97% of the time when a student uses the code of referral provided by the instructor.
The instructor keeps 37% even if there is no referral code used
#13 Skillshare
Students pay a monthly cost to have unrestricted access to all classes that are available, and teachers earn money according to how long students view their videos. Teachers earn their money through referring students to Skillshare. Creators can access support via email.
What are the Skillshare features?
Earn money through royalties or the Skillshare affiliate program.
Creators may be found through students who are already on the platform
Upload a class once every seven days
Create video lessons
Creator friendliness score: 44.78/100
Skillshare pros:Because Skillshare is an online library for learning it requires less effort to market on your end. Skillshare already has a built-in audience, which may mean more eyes on your class. It's also free for designers to begin.
Skillshare Cons: When students watch your classes on Skillshare, you don't own the audience you are aiming at. You can't build an email list of your students, nor can you contact them again at a later time.
All lessons must meet the guidelines of Skillshare, meaning there is less control over your work. The community features aren't available, and you can't sell digital downloads as well as live-cohort courses, memberships, or other formats beyond video lectures.
How much will Skillshare Cost?
Free to creators
Selecting the most suitable online course platform for your creative business
Online courses are an excellent way to grow your company and share your knowledge. When choosing the best online education platform, you should consider the following concerns:
Does the platform come with all-in-one features so that I can handle my company in one place?
Does the platform limit the number of products I could create?
Is it easy to contact support if I need help?
Do I have to include videos, audio, texts or other forms of content?
Are the costs reasonable for this stage in my business?
Your skills and experiences can be valuable. If you create an online course, you'll be in the process of sharing your enthusiasm with other students. Happy giving!