Welcome to this LearnWorlds vs Thinkific comparison. In this article, I am going to take a look at which of these platforms performs better when comes to creating your first online course.
When selling a course online, it’s crucial that you choose the right platform.
If you don’t, you could be losing out on a lot of sales and features that you need to provide the best experience to your students.
Let’s take a look to see which one of these platforms is better for you.
LearnWorlds and Thinkific are both two popular online course builders. They both aim to be an all-in-one platform for course creators by offering more than just a course builder platform.
For example, they also come with a range of features for the following parts of your business:
- Website building
- Sales & Marketing
- School Administration
This makes both platforms a good option for course creators who want to turn their courses into a real business. Let’s take a look to see which of these options is better for you.
What Is LearnWorlds
LearnWorlds was founded in 2014. Since then it has received funding and grown pretty rapidly and has become one of the most popular platforms for course creators.
Today, it is one of the most advanced course builder platforms on the market for businesses of all sizes.
That being said, it provides excellent features that both beginners and experienced course creators can use.
This is also reflected in LearnWorlds’ marketing as they market themselves as a premium course builder.
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What Is Thinkific
Thinkific was founded in 2012, and also started as a small platform for course creators. Similarly to LearnWorlds, it has grown rapidly since then, and now has an estimated yearly revenue of $15 million.
Thinkific is known for its ease of use, as it simplifies the entire process of creating and selling online courses.
One of the reasons it’s so easy to use is its drag & drop builder, as it even makes it easy to build a membership site, and also the website on the front-end.
Create And Sell Online Course: LearnWorlds Vs Thinkific
Course Creation
LearnWorlds
LearnWorlds has advanced course creation tools to help you build the perfect course.
The course builder is also fairly easy to use. It’s not quite as easy as with Thinkific, but it’s not exactly hard either.
Something that I like about LearnWorlds is the ability to add and create interactive videos. Any type of interaction makes the student experience much better, so this is extremely useful.
It also has such a range of options for the types of courses you want to create. If you’re looking to create a quick and simple course with a couple of videos, you can do so.
Or, you can also choose to create a detailed course with several modules, interactive tests, and more. In this aspect, LearnWorlds doesn’t disappoint.
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Thinkific
The course creation process with Thinkific is incredibly easy. It has a drag & drop builder that is easy to use, and it’s just as easy to upload any type of files into the course.
Thinkific comes with a range of pre-made course themes for various types of courses depending on the length, audience, and more. These themes can be easily edited with the drag & drop builder.
You can add quizzes or other elements such as text lessons directly using the drag & drop builder. Overall, this process is incredibly easy and the customization is pretty sweet too.
The only thing that I would note is that a lot of the themes look quite similar in style. If a course was created with Thinkific, you can usually guess that pretty easily. Launch and sell your course in 5 days!
That being said, In terms of course creation, LearnWorlds has an advantage over Thinkific as it comes with more options.
Ease of Use
LearnWorlds
LearnWorlds’ interface is packed with information, which is useful for beginners getting around the software.
It has an advanced analytics feature that is capable of churning out reports for data analysis.
You get tons of information and features which naturally might affect the ease of use a little. But, once you get used to the interface and features, you’ll find it much easier.
You just have to overcome the initial learning curve, and from there you should be fine. The overall LearnWorlds’ ease of use is good.
Thinkific
Thinkfic’s ease of use is where it outperforms pretty much any other course building platform in the market.
When you first sign up for Thinkfic, you’ll be presented with a clear overview of the dashboard. From here, you can choose to create your websites or courses.
The builder for both the courses and the websites is extremely easy to use, as it’s drag & drop.
The entire process from filling out the needed settings like the pricing to publishing is all laid out in a step-by-step process, so you don’t miss a step.
In terms of ease of use, LearnWorlds and Thinkific are equally good.
Marketing and Sales
LearnWorlds
With LearnWorlds, you can create a front-end school website to sell your course. Plus, it also comes with an affiliate management feature which lets you recruit and manage your affiliates.
To help you sell more of your course you can offer coupons and promotions.
LearnWorlds has marketing and sales tools, but you’ll probably need to integrate it with other software. Luckily LearnWorlds has a long list of integrations, but we’ll talk more about that later on.
Other note-worthy things are that you can use custom domains and that the websites are SEO-friendly which is always good.
Thinkific
Thinkfic comes with the following marketing and sales tools:
- Basic Email Marketing
- Websites/Landing Pages
- Affiliate Management
- Coupons
The email marketing tools are only available on the growth plan. But, as they are rather basic it would make more sense to use one of the email marketing integrations.
In terms of websites and landing pages, Thinkific does quite well too, as it comes with a range of website themes specifically made for education businesses.
These can again be edited with the drag & drop builder. Other than that, Thinkfic also comes with affiliate management and coupons which is pretty standard and the same as LearnWorlds.
5 Key Differences Between LearnWorlds and Thinkific
Now that we have run through the course creation and features of both platforms, let’s take a look at the key differences between these two platforms.
LearnWorlds Has More Course Creation Tools
LearnWorlds has better course creation tools as compared to Thinkific. The difference isn’t big, but LearnWorlds is better in this aspect.
Here are some of the course creation features that LearnWorlds offers, which Thinkific doest not have:
- Interactive Learning Videos
- Interactive Ebook
- Website Builders with Templates
- Interactive Videos With Captions and Transcripts
- Customizable Course Player
- Gamification
- GDPR
- Copyright protection for your course
- SCORM files
Overall, LearnWorlds provides powerful customization in the back-end for courses. Even on the front-end where you create a website that sells the courses, LearnWorlds has more options.
LearnWorlds Has More Integrations
LearnWorlds has more integrations as compared to Thinkific. We’ll cover the full list of integrations in a moment.
But, this is quite an important difference as it will give you more options to get the features you want. There are some names on that list which you might want to use, in which case it would make sense to go for LearnWorlds.
The main integration differences are in video hosting, support, and email marketing software.
This means you might have to use Zapier to be able to integrate with the software you want which might cost you additional fees.
LearnWorlds Is SEO-Friendlier
Another key difference between these two platforms is that LearnWorlds is SEO-friendlier as compared to Thinkific.
Most course creators usually don’t use SEO as a traffic source, but for those that do, it is a competitive edge and thus it would make sense to go for LearnWorlds.
With LearnWorlds, you gain more control over your meta titles, tags, and other components that affect SEO. So, if you are looking to optimize your courses for search engines, LearnWorlds is the right option for you.
Thinkific Has a Free Plan
If you head over to Thinkific’s pricing plan and scroll down, you’ll see that there is a free plan available. The free plan does not require a credit card.
This allows you to test-drive Thinkific. But bear in mind that the free plan comes with very limited features.
And you may want an upgrade to the paid plans to unlock the rest of the features.
SCORM & HTML5 Support
LearnWorlds is a SCORM compliant Learning Management System (LMS).
This means it allows you to seamlessly upload, control, and as well as deliver SCORM compliant courses without any confusion. Even better, it supports other multimedia file types such as HTML5.
On the other hand, Thinkific has recently discontinued supporting SCORM.
LearnWorlds vs Thinkific Integrations
Both builders do still have features that they could either improve on or don’t have at all. Take a look below to see what integrations both platforms offer.
LearnWorlds Integrations
LearnWorlds has everything you need to create the perfect course and front-end website. But two key features it misses are help desks and email marketing capabilities.
Fortunately, LearnWorlds is capable to integrate with various email marketing and helpdesk software, meaning you can still use these features.
Some of the main integrations LearnWorlds provide include:
- Zapier
- MailChimp
- Aweber
- ConvertKit
- Hubspot
- Zendesk
- Freshdesk
- Paypal
- Stripe
Additionally, you also get access to API keys. This means you should be able to add most custom integrations.
Overall, the list of LearnWorlds integrations is pretty solid, especially when you consider that you get their API key too.
Thinkific Integrations
Thinkific is quite similar to LearnWorlds as you get some good tools to create your course and front-end website.
You also have basic email marketing capabilities on the professional plan, but they are still extremely basic, and it would make sense to go for one of their integrations instead.
Something to note though is that if you want to connect helpdesk software, there are currently no direct integrations. This means you’ll need something like Zapier to connect them.
Here are some of Thinkific’s main integrations:
- Constant Contact
- ActiveCampaign
- ConvertKit
- Mailchimp
- Aweber
- Stripe
- Paypal
- Zapier
Overall Thinkific has a reasonable list of integrations. However, LearnWorlds’ total list is larger.
Pricing Comparison: LearnWorlds vs Thinkific
Now let’s take a look at how much is LearnWorlds and Thinkific will cost you.
Below, I have created a comparison table to help you understand which software’s pricing is better suited for you.
| Pricing | LearnWorlds | Thinkific |
|---|---|---|
| Starter | $29/month | $49/month |
| Professional | $99/month | $99/month |
| Higher | $299/month | $499/month |
| Free Plan | No | Yes |
| Free Trial | 30 Day Trial-Full Access | Yes-Limited Features |
| Enterprise | Custom pricing | Custom pricing |
Interestingly, despite that LearnWorlds offering a more advanced course builder, it cost less than Thinkific.
This could be a big reason to go for LearnWorlds because you get more features for a smaller price.
Thinkific on the other hand does have a free plan, but it’s extremely limited. And once you upgrade, it would make sense to consider LearnWorlds over Thinkific.
Verdict
This was an incredibly tight race between LearnWorlds and Thinkific. In fact, I’m not even sure if you can pick out a winner of this LearnWorlds vs Thinkific battle, because they are both great course builders.
While Thinkific is better suited for beginners and is incredibly easy to use, LearnWorlds has some pretty powerful advanced features for course creators.
Both let you build a real business around your courses but will also require additional integrations, especially for email marketing.
On the other hand, if you are looking to build an advanced front-end website, as well as more interactive features for better student engagement, I recommend going for LearnWorlds.
Both options are good and you can’t go wrong with them!
Calvin Lim is a professional blogger and founder of TheCalvinLim.
He enjoys helping others learn about various internet marketing tools and dedicated to helping people achieve success online.
