Teachable Alternatives (2022): Choosing the Best LMS For Your Online Courses

Learning management systems (LMS) like Teachable have provided an avenue for creators to sell and manage their online courses and coaching services conveniently. Boasting more than 100,000 instructors, Teachable is undeniably one of the most popular LMS today. With the rise of more and more online course platforms, however, it comes as no surprise that instructors and coaches are looking for Teachable alternatives. To make it easier for you to choose where to host your online courses and services, we created a shortlist of the best Teachable alternatives that fit different needs and budgets: Podia, Thinkific, Kajabi, and LearnDash.   

Teachable Alternatives Comparison Chart

Name	Teachable	Podia	Thinkific	Kajabi	LearnDash
Price	Check Price on Teachable	Check Price on Podia	Check Price on Thinkific	Check Price on Kajabi	Check Price on LearnDash
Standout Features	Feature-packed, Offers budget-friendly plans	Supports selling digital products, Affordable plans	Feature-packed, Offers a completely free plan	A powerful all-in-one platform	Best LMS for WordPress sites
Transaction Fees	5% for Basic, 0% for higher-tier plans	0%	0%	0%	0%
Number of Courses	Unlimited	Unlimited	3 to unlimited	3 to 100	Unlimited
Students	Unlimited	Unlimited	Unlimited	Up to 20,000	Unlimited
Automation	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Affiliate Program	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No
Native Certification	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	Yes
Discount Coupons	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	No
Free Trial	14 days	14 days	Forever free plan available	14 days	No, just a 30-day money-back guarantee

Podia

The most affordable Teachable alternative

Podia is one of the most recommended Teachable alternatives, thanks to its simple, clean interface that also lets you sell digital products on top of selling courses and services. To date, this is something not supported by other Teachable alternatives on our list such as Thinkific and Kajabi. With Podia, you can offer memberships, courses, coaching services, and digital products like templates, presets, and e-books. Podia also supports using a buy button that you display on your social media platforms or other partner websites. With the other platforms on our list, you’ll have to go through extra steps to be able to do so. 

Compared to Teachable, Podia’s monthly cost is lower if you consider the 5% transaction fee that Teachable charges you whenever you make a sale. Podia also offers a more seamless way of setting up a blog compared to Teachable. If you want your website to rank high on search engine results, then having a blog set up will help.

One of Podia’s strengths is its stellar customer support team. No matter which plan you’re on, Podia provides live chat support should you or your students encounter any issues during business hours. Free migration from Teachable or other LMS is also included in Podia’s plans, so that’s something you won’t have to worry about should you want to make the switch. 

Pricing

Podia has two plans you can choose from: Mover and Shaker. Mover, its core plan, offers unlimited courses, digital downloads, students, webinars, free migration support, and email marketing. Upgrading to the Shaker plan will let you offer memberships, affiliate marketing, offsite buy buttons, and more. Connecting Podia to a third-part software is only possible on the Shaker plan as well. Opting for annual billing will save you $78 a year on the Mover plan and $159 on the Shaker plan. 

You can try Podia’s features for free here. 

Thinkific

This Teachable alternative offers a forever free plan for those who are new to selling courses or want to build an audience

Of all the alternative online course platforms on our list, Thinkific offers the most similar features as Teachable. Both Thinkific and Teachable are user-friendly platforms that focus on helping creators and coaches sell courses and memberships online. On top of the standard course delivery features, Thinkific and Teachable let you award certificates upon course completion, offer coupon codes, and manage your affiliate programs within the platform.

Thinkific also supports hosting live classes and coaching calls through Zoom. One of Thinkific’s standout features is its outstanding community engagement platform where your students and members can interact with each other. With this, you won’t need a Facebook group just so your community can have a place to engage with each other. Integrations with major third-party software such as InfusionSoft, Zapier, ActiveCampaign, MailChimp, Google Analytics, and similar solutions is possible on Thinkifc as well. 

Pricing Plans

What makes Thinkific a great place to start selling online courses is its completely free plan. Even though it’s free, you can start selling up to three courses and enjoy Thinkific’s core features at no cost. If you’re still learning the ropes or want to offer a course to start building an audience, Thinkific lets you do so risk-free. Once you’re ready to grow and start selling more, you can then upgrade easily to its higher-tier plans that will give you access to more advanced tools. 

Thinkific has three paid plans: Basic, Pro ($99/month), and Premier ($499/month). Opting for an annual subscription will save you 20% off the total cost. The Basic plan, which costs $49/month, lets you schedule content, offer discount coupons, and connect with leading third-party tools. The Pro and Premier, which cost $99/month and $499/month, respectively, have more advanced customization tools and let you create more user accounts.

You can try Thinkific’s Pro features for 14 days for free here. 

Kajabi

A powerful and popular Teachable alternative

Perhaps one of the most recognizable names among online course platforms, Kajabi is one of the top Teachable alternatives and competitors. It provides a wide array of tools that can replace ClickFunnels, page builders, email marketing tools, and more. Kajabi lets you host and sell your online courses, build a website, design and send emails, and create automated workflows through the Kajabi Pipelines. You can also build your community within Kajabi itself so you won’t need a Facebook group just for this purpose, further helping you streamline your processes.  

While it strives to be an all-in-one solution, Kajabi has missed some features that Teachable offers. Unlike Teachable, Kajabi doesn’t support native certification and coupon codes. These can still be done on Kajabi, but will require third-party tool integrations. Another difference between Kajabi and Teachable is the former doesn’t offer unlimited products and students in its monthly plans. 

Pricing Plans

Among our list of Teachable alternatives, Kajabi has the highest monthly plans. The pricing chart above reflects Kajabi’s monthly fees if you choose to be billed monthly. Meanwhile, opting for an annual subscription will save you 20% of the total annual fee. Kajabi’s higher-tier plans have similar features as the base plan, although they let you sell more products and pipelines, have more contacts and members, run more websites, and have more user accounts. In addition, if you want to remove the Kajabi branding on your courses, you’ll have to upgrade to the Growth and Pro plan.

To try Kajabi for free for 14 days, click here.  

LearnDash

The best Teachable alternative if you already have a WordPress website

Existing WordPress website owners will find LearnDash is a great Teachable alternative. LearnDash is a premium WordPress plugin that lets you host, sell, and manage your courses within your WordPress site. If you want to centralize your tools and processes, LearnDash makes it easy to do so. Just like Teachable, LearnDash lets you sell unlimited courses, have unlimited students, administer advanced quizzes, reward certificates, automate your lessons, and more. It also integrates seamlessly with WordPress themes. If you have an existing blog on WordPress, it also helps users find your courses through your content on WordPress.

Although LearnDash does help streamline the process for WordPress website owners and has lower fees, it’s not the route we recommend beginners to take. With WordPress, you’ll need a hosting provider, domain name, and a couple of plugins to be able to run your website smoothly. LearnDash requires a higher bandwidth or it will end up slowing your site down. If you don’t know anything about speed optimization or don’t know how to choose the best hosting plan that can support your bandwidth requirements, we recommend going for the other Teachable alternatives on our list instead. They are more user-friendly and they take care of the backend for you so you can focus on creating content or marketing your courses.

Pricing Plans

LearnDash has the lowest fees of all the Teachable alternatives that we included. You can choose from three annual LearnDash plans: Basic, Plus, and Pro. These plans have similar features, except the higher-tier plans give you access to its ProPanel and more site licenses. LearnDash lets you try its platform for 30 days and if you’re not happy, you can ask for a refund. You can compare the annual plans and see current deals here.

Verdict

The best Teachable alternative overall is Podia while the best alternative LMS for WordPress websites is LearnDash

Podia

Best Teachable alternative overall

LearnDash

The best Teachable alternative for WordPress websites

Teachable remains one of the biggest and most popular learning management systems, but Podia, Thinkific, and Kajabi are also reliable platforms and excellent Teachable alternatives. Just like Teachable, these LMS have intuitive interface, drag and drop builders, and tried and tested training, marketing, and content management tools. We picked Podia as the best Teachable alternative overall as it offers more tools and lets you sell more digital products on top of online courses and coaching services.  Unlike Teachable, Podia won’t charge you a 5% transaction fee if you’re only subscribed to its base plan. 

If you want an LMS that can be easily installed to your WordPress website, LearnDash is the best Teachable alternative for you. It’s not as user-friendly or advanced as the other stand-alone platforms on our list, but LearnDash still performs its job well. Big names like Yoast, InfusionSoft by Keap, and OptinMonster won’t trust LearnDash if it can’t deliver what they need for their training programs. 

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