LearnWorlds vs Teachable: Which platform is right for you?

When it comes to building an engaging and informative online course, both Teachable and LearnWorlds offer robust tools designed to simplify the course creation process. However, there are distinct differences in their offerings that could sway your decision.

Teachable and LearnWorlds both offer a user-friendly interface requiring no design or technical experience, making course creation accessible for all educators. Teachable enhances the course creation process with downloadable content, a built-in presentation creator, and the ability to embed a wide range of multimedia content.

Recurring live lessons with Zoom integration make it easy to engage with students in real-time.

LearnWorlds, on the other hand, stands out with its robust set of features including live lessons, quizzes, assignments, and a variety of course content templates. Its capability for bulk import and support for multiple content types per lesson simplifies the process for educators looking to create comprehensive and diverse learning experiences.

Customers have shared that the LearnWorlds interface is confusing and can be difficult to use and update. As one customer on Trustpilot put it: "The number one problem with LearnWorlds: the in course Discussion and Community UI."

As an alternative to Teachable and Learnworlds, Thinkific stands out with its intuitive drag-and-drop builder AI features, and extensive app integrations, simplifying the course creation process. With Thinkific’s advanced AI technology, preparing courses and other educational materials is made easy. For example, creators can build course outlines and quizzes in a few clicks. Thinkific’s AI Course Outline Generator instantly creates a detailed course outline tailored to your audience's needs, and Thinkific's AI Quiz Generator creates quizzes that keep learners engaged, test comprehension, and identify knowledge gaps.

A compelling learning experience is vital for student engagement and retention. Both Teachable and LearnWorlds aim to provide an enriching environment, but their approaches and features differ.

Both platforms prioritize a seamless and engaging learning experience. Teachable offers easy course navigation and optimization across all devices, ensuring students have a smooth learning journey. Community features and social sharing options foster a sense of connection and interaction among students.

One student of a Teachable creator was not impressed by the student experience, saying, "I can’t speak for the teacher experience, but I’ve purchased courses that use the Teachable platform and the overall experience is horrendous."

LearnWorlds goes a step further by including course insights and analytics, providing educators with valuable data to enhance course content and student engagement strategies. Its comprehensive suite of engagement tools, including third-party app integrations, enriches the learning experience.

Thinkific excels with its intermission and progress pages, while offering a highly customizable experience. Thinkific’s intermission and progress pages in between lesson modules has been proven to significantly increase student engagement and completion in a course. These pages are intended to allow students to keep track of their progress through the course, an important factor in preventing drop-off and keeping course completion rates high.

Thinkific makes the student journey and learning experience a priority. To add more value to student learning, Thinkific is about more than courses alone. For example, Thinkific lets you create and sell digital learning experiences like Digital Downloads, Live 1-1 Coaching Sessions, and Webinars. With Digital Downloads, students can find value in quickly-downloadable guides, templates, exclusive resources, and more. With Coaching & Webinars students can schedule coaching sessions and other forms of dedicated one-on-one time, attend workshops, and register for webinars.  

Effective sales and marketing tools are essential for attracting and retaining students. Teachable and LearnWorlds offer a suite of features to help you market your courses and manage sales efficiently.

Teachable and LearnWorlds equip educators with a wide array of sales and marketing tools. Teachable's streamlined checkout process, coupled with customizable payment plans and offers, simplifies the purchasing experience for students. However, creators should note Teachable's transaction fees for paid products on certain plans.

LearnWorlds excels in offering extensive marketing features, including SEO optimization and robust affiliate marketing tools. Its integration with e-commerce tools and the ability to send bulk emails to students make it a powerful platform for growing your audience and boosting course sales.

Selling in bulk on LearnWorlds can get quite expensive, as one reviewer on Trustpilot commented, "when you squint at the fine print (you’ll need a magnifying glass), you discover that “unlimited” actually means a maximum of 2,000 active learners a month" The same reviewer found it, "especially disappointing considering the plan’s annual cost of nearly $4,000."

Thinkific leads with over 90 integrations, offering unparalleled flexibility in marketing your courses. This means that in addition to Thinkific’s native selling and marketing tools, you get the best tools in the business for marketing and email automation, increasing sales, and enhancing the learning experience through gamification. These apps are created by developers for Thinkific and can be downloaded, installed, and implemented without any coding experience needed. 

Thinkific’s sales and marketing stack is also powered by AI. You don’t have to worry about list-building or creating sophisticated email flows with Thinkific, as Thinkific also offers an AI-supported email marketing feature. Creators can grow and manage email lists, launch personalized campaigns and roll out automated sequences that support their sales and marketing strategy.

Thinkific offers other sales and marketing digital learning products like Digital Downloads, Live 1-1 Coaching Sessions, and Webinars. Digital Downloads make it easy to maximize your earning potential, engage new audiences, and deliver more content to your existing audience. By offering digital products like eBooks, guides, templates, and more, businesses can open up a new stream of revenue and increase leads. 

Likewise, Coaching & Webinars make it easy to build a meaningful connection with your audience, and find and attract new customers — while boosting revenue by adding a price tag to these events.

The ability to customize the design of your course and platform plays a crucial role in branding and student engagement. Teachable and LearnWorlds both offer design customization features, but their approaches cater to different levels of customization needs.

Teachable provides course creators with the flexibility to customize courses and communities, ensuring that the learning environment aligns with their brand. Customizable course landing pages enhance the marketing appeal of courses.

One Trustpilot reviewer didn't like how much Teachable charged for the ability to customize their site's code, saying: "The fact that teachable is now charging a $665 monthly fee for creators to access their own custom code is ridiculous."

LearnWorlds offers similar customization options and adds the unique feature of a branded mobile app, allowing educators to extend their brand's reach onto students' mobile devices.

It’s important to choose a course platform that you can trust, where getting the answers to your questions is easy and your data is secure. 

Teachable offers multiple support options, including a private instructor community and access to experts, ensuring educators have the resources they need. Higher-tier plans enjoy additional support features like live chat and group coaching calls.

Reviewers on trustpilot had some concerns with Teachable's support, saying "Overall reasonably stable and full-featured. However, customer support is absolutely atrocious ... I've submitted dozens of online support tickets, and Teachable always replies with a quick excuse about why they can't help with the issue."

LearnWorlds prides itself on providing 24/7 support, dedicated onboarding, and a wealth of guides and video tutorials, making it an excellent choice for educators seeking comprehensive support.

Both platforms offer robust security features, including 99.9% uptime, secure cloud hosting, and daily backups.

From a pricing standpoint, Teachable and Learnworlds only offer three pricing tiers that work well for solopreneurs.

Users on Trustpilot also expressed concern over value for money for LearnWorlds.

One user mentioned limited functionality on their lower plans, and as one user put it, "every button you click leads to an upgrade offer."

If you have a large number of students, LearnWorlds could get quite expensive, as one reviewer shared:

"customers investing nearly $4,000 annually in the Learning Center plan are subjected to such restrictive active learner limit."

The same reviewer liked that they could have unlimited users on Thinkific, saying: "In contrast, I contacted Thinkific to ask about their “unlimited” plan. They confirmed they actually mean unlimited. No catch. No fine print."

They also do not offer a free plan, so you're not able to test and experiment with the platform, and your course, before you start paying. This is a huge barrier to course creators who need ample experimentation time before they are ready to monetize.

One Teachable reviewer had a tough time getting their 30-day refund, saying:

"Try cancelling or getting a refund as per their 30-day money back guarantee. They will deliberately block / avoid you being able to do so." It appears as if they were refunded 18 days after their review.

Other users are finding it hard to justify Teachable's price increases amonst all the issues they've been having, saying: "Some glitches seem to be ongoing. I'm considering a different platform, especially since they are increasing their pricing by about 50%."