LearnDash

LearnDash is an online software designed to simplify the online course experience for instructors and students.

They offer competitive prices and features and a versatile and light course-making tool.

The software is a well-known WordPress LMS plugin designed for creating online courses.

LearnDash suits the needs of just about anyone, from small businesses to large universities to private instructors.

Finding the perfect teaching tool can be a headache, as many tools offer similar features for different needs.

This review will go in-depth about LearnDash and would benefit the most from it.

It will also dig through pricing, features, advantages, and disadvantages to provide an extensive guide explaining all LearnDash offers.  

What Is LearnDash?

LearnDash is a course maker plugin with a wide variety of features to ensure a smooth online classroom experience.

It is a perfect pick for those wanting to create a course website but lack the coding knowledge to do so.

It comes with many customizable themes to pick and choose out-of.

All templates are customizable through their drag and drop feature.

In addition, LearnDash displays its starter themes so you can understand what your design will be familiar too.  

With LearnDash, you can create lesson modules, quizzes, and assignments and even provide badges and certificates digitally.

In addition, you can use one of their stock course themes to quickly start your online teaching experience or edit and customize any of their themes until it fits your needs.

If you want to monitor your students, using ProPanel will provide an in-depth analysis of everyone in your course.

Using ProPanel is perfect for having a professional helping hand in managing your students and being informed about the details of everyone assigned to you.

With ProPanel, you can view all newly enrolled students and what assignments are pending.

LearnDash also allows you to separate your users into groups to help with the management.

Monitoring individual students and their progress in all their courses is also possible.

It also provides a convenient way to approve or reject assignments.

It’s worth noting that ProPanel is an official add-on to LearnDash, comes with its price tag, and is not in any of LearnDash plans.

ProPanel provides extensive analysis tools to help optimize your course by identifying potential problem areas and what areas need improvement.

Another feature offered by ProPanel is the ability to export course data to an Excel file.

How LearnDash Works

LearnDash is a WordPress plugin, meaning you need a website running on WordPress before you can begin to use it.

The plugin is famed for its deep customization and flexibility.

LearnDash allows you to tailor your courses to create a great deal of content to suit many needs.

E-learning plugins are called LMS plugins, and there are many.

LMS is short for Learning management systems.

WordPress LMS plugins are lightweight and run efficiently as a plugin to your existing WordPress website.

After you integrate LearnDash into your WordPress website, you should be good to start using the course builder.

To begin building your course, you can use one of the many themes offered by LearnDash to start.

Once a theme is selected, you can customize it to match and fit your needs.

After editing your theme, you can begin creating course data.

Within every course, you can create any number of lessons.

All this is easily accessible by using the LearnDash dashboard.

With the dashboard, you can control and edit your course website from appearance to plugins.

For each lesson, you have the option to include videos that your students must watch to progress with your course.

You may also include assignments for finishing any lessons.

While editing your course, you can view the user experience from their visual course builder, providing you with a live representation of what your edits do.

Notable Features of LearnDash

LearnDash offers vast tools and features to provide the best learning experience for teachers and students.

1. Communication Centers

There are a few areas that are provided for you and your learners to communicate.

Automated Notifications

You can set automatic emails to trigger due to certain actions your learners take in your course.

For example, you can automate sending an email to those who are falling behind progress-wise in your course or remind others of an upcoming deadline.

Discussion Forums

LearnDash can enable discussion forums for your learners to converse and discuss course specifics.

2. Awards

There are a few ways that learners can be rewarded for their progress.

Course Points

Provide learners with points for completing lessons; so they can progress to more advanced lessons.

Badges and Certificates

Hand out official certificates for completing a course or stellar quiz performance.

Assignments

Set a block on advancing through content until the learner completes all required assignments.

Leaderboards

Have your learners compete for the best scores to achieve a higher rank on the leaderboards.

3. Various Work Modes

There are a few different modes that you can work in while using LearnDash.

Creator Mode

LearnDash allows for a flexible creator mode, allowing various options to create the exact lesson you want.

LearnDash Focus Mode

Provides a gateway to all your content through one portal.

You can customize and edit the portal to suit your brand image.

Drag & Drop Course Builder Mode

Create your lessons easily by using the drag & drop course builder feature from LearnDash.

Pick and choose from templates to create the perfect lesson for your students.

4. Advanced Sales Options

There are a few different ways that you can sell your courses.

One Time Purchases

You can set your course to be locked behind a one-time purchase option to entice sales.

Subscription Service

Impose a monthly subscription fee for users to maintain access to your course.

This feature is great for recurring payments to keep a flow of revenue from your learners.

Shopping Carts

Integrating payment options require using one of the free shopping carts offered by WordPress plugins.

One of the available options includes WooCommerce, which is an excellent free option for managing sales.

LearnDash also supports sales funnel integration to help you optimize your sales efforts.

Membership & Bundle Options

You can create memberships that allow access to more than one course at set prices, which will help you create and motivate learners to sign up for more than one course and receive the benefits of better prices.

For example, if you offer two courses related to art, you can sell them both at a deal to urge learners to purchase more.

Bulk Orders

If your services cater more to enterprises, then allowing bulk access is a great way to entice companies to sign up for your courses.

LearnDash also provides access for a team leader to view the progress and performance of all staff undertaking your courses.

This feature requires a group registration premium add-on to function.

Premium add-ons require third-party payments, as they are not a feature offered by LearnDash.

Bulk order pricing is set by a third party and is only recommended if your service targets enterprises.

5. Other Notable Features of LearnDash

LearnDash has so many features, so here are our honorable mentions.

• Content protection
• Events Calendar
• Certificate builder
• Pro Membership Options
• bbPress Integration
• BuddyPress Integration

Are There Any Minimum Requirements Necessary to Use LearnDash?

For those running their websites, there are a few requirements to add LearnDash as a plugin.

Using a WordPress website is a must since LearnDash is a WordPress plugin.

LearnDash recommends the WordPress requirements for your host to support.

If you’re letting LearnDash run your website, no minimum requirements are needed.

How Much Does LearnDash Cost?

The plugin pricing is only available in year-long options.

While the year price tag might appear like too much of a sudden commitment, LearnDash offers a 15-day money-back guarantee policy, so you can refund if the service is not up to your standards.

WordPress Plugin Pricing

These are the prices for integrating LearnDash into your existing WordPress website.

• 1 Site: $199 Per Year
• 10 Sites: $399 Per Year
• Unlimited Sites: $799 Per Year

Benefits

Regardless of your choice, LearnDash provides you with the same benefits.

Your website will be able to handle anywhere from 5 to 500,000 students.

LearnDash allows users to access a plethora of free community plugins for use, there also feature premium plugins, but those come with a price tag.

The unlimited sites option is great for enterprises, as there is no cap on how many courses you can create.

Full Site Service Pricing

• $29 a Month

Benefits

This option is great for those lacking a WordPress website.

LearnDash will provide a website fully optimized for e-learning and competitive features and advantages.

LearnDash provides free access to ProPanel if you’re using their website.

ProPanel costs $50 per month and provides extensive analytical tools to help you monitor and evaluate the effectiveness of your courses.

LearnDash offers more template options, giving you 15 stellar templates to pick and customize.

All maintenance and web hosting are handled directly by LearnDash, meaning all your focus is spent on coursework.

They also allow you to add any additional WordPress plugins and themes for your site.

The pricing & purchase page by LearnDash provides information on all features offered by their plans.

This option also features all the benefits offered by the plugin option.

LearnDash Promotions & Savings

LearnDash does not provide a free trial.

It only provides a demo website to help you get a feel for their course maker.

There are no current coupons or lifetime deals for LearnDash.

Who Are LearnDash’s Main Alternatives?

Podia includes more features such as creating landing pages and many other features unrelated to course making.

Due to its wider scope of focus, LearnDash offers better options for developing courses.

LearnPress is another alternative, although it struggles with maintaining high-quality control over its service and lacks good customer service compared to LearnDash.

If you’re seeking a more budget-friendly option, Thrive Apprentice is a great option.

However, the major downside with Thrive Apprentice is that it lacks the wide customizability offered by LearnDash.

How Does LearnDash Differentiate Itself From Competitors?

LearnDash offers extensive theme options, all of which are customizable to a great degree, and solely focus on course creation and nothing else.

They provide good customer service and provide competitive pricing.

Who Is LearnDash Best For?

LearnDash is a great choice for larger organizations managing many students.

Major universities and fortune 500 companies allegedly use LearnDash.

Smaller training businesses benefit the most from smaller plans offered by LearnDash, as they are offered an excellent course builder for all their training purposes.

Is LearnDash Easy To Use?

LearnDash is very easy to use, which is one of the main secrets of its success.

They offer an exceptional welcome wizard that familiarizes new users with their dashboard for a great orientation experience.

Their drag and drop feature is simple and is quickly picked up by users.

What Features Do Users Love?

Users love the expensive quizzing options offered by LearnDash, enabling them to create quizzes exactly how they envisioned.

Another feature users adore is that LearnDash offers many add-on options, providing course makers with more niche features.

What Features Do Users Hate?

LearnDash offers very limited payment options, which causes frustration for many users.

Reporting is only offered as an add-on with a price tag for plugin websites.

Frequently Asked Questions

Here are a couple commonly asked questions regarding LearnDash.

Wrap Up

LearnDash provides a simple-to-use website course maker with many themes to choose from.

All themes are customizable with their click and drag functionality, requiring zero coding skills.

LearnDash offers great plans for small to large businesses alike.

If this review of LearnDash has helped you, please consider leaving a review in the review section below!