LearnDash vs Teachable: Which is the better LMS platform?

Torn between using LearnDash vs Teachable for your next eLearning platform?

Both are exceptional platforms with years of experience in the LMS (Learning Management System) industry. So, which one is the best platform for you? Let’s find out.

Before we begin, let’s quickly introduce LearnDash and Teachable before we dive into a detailed feature-wise comparison.

LearnDash vs Teachable At a Glance

LearnDash, the brainchild of Justin and Kloé Ferrima, is an LMS plugin for WordPress. It adds LMS features to the CMS (Content Management System) platform. It debuted in 2013 and has been part of the StellarWP from 2021 onwards.

Teachable started as Fedora in 2013 and became Teachable two years later. Its founder, Ankur Nagpal, wanted a course platform with better customization and payment options than the one he was using then

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Plans and Pricing

LearnDash

LearnDash’s pricing is pretty rigid. There is no free tier or lifetime license, either. You will have to sign up for one of the three yearly subscriptions, which start at $199 per year.  

LearnDash doesn’t have many add-ons since most of the features are included in the plugin itself. However, you’ll have to pay an additional $49 per year for each premium add-on you use. 

LearnDash Plans	Pricing	Benefits
Basic	$199/year  No Lifetime Package	1-site license  Core LMS Features  Free integrations and add-ons  1 year of updates and support
Plus	$399/year  No Lifetime Package	10-site license Core LMS Features  Free integrations and add-ons  1 year of updates and support
Pro	$799/year  No Lifetime Package	Unlimited site licenses Core LMS Features Free integrations and add-ons 1 year of updates and support
Cloud	$25 – $83/month	Fully hosted website with LearnDash LMS

Teachable

Though Teachable has a free plan, it is limited in features: You can only publish one course, and you need to pay the transaction fee for each course sold. Unlimited courses are only available on the Business plan, which costs $664 per month or $5988 annually.

Teachable	Pricing	Benefits
Free	FREE	$1 + 10% transaction fee 1 published product of each type (course, coaching, downloads) No-code course builder and web pages Student referrals teachable:pay with integrated payment processing
Basic	$59/month $468/year	5% transaction fee 5 published products of each type (course, coaching, downloads) Community 1 membership tier Integrated email marketing Coupons and order bumps Custom domains Live group coaching Accelerator challenge access
Pro	$159/month $1,428/year	0% transaction fees 50 published products of each type (course, coaching, downloads) Unlimited membership tiers Affiliate marketing Live chat support Upsells to increase order value Public API access Removable branding 5 admin seats
Pro+	$249/month $2,388/year	0% transaction fees 200 courses 200 coaching products 200 digital downloads 200 product bundles Custom user roles
Business	$664/month $5,988/year	Unlimited courses, coaching products, and digital downloads Unlimited admin & author seats Advanced theme customizations Custom user roles Bulk student enrollment

LearnDash wins this round as it offers more plans with compete features.

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Feature

Initial Setup 

LearnDash’s setup wizard focuses on setting up the plugin based on your needs and requirements. It includes courses, payment, and other settings.

On the other hand, Teachable’s wizard helps you with course creation, setting up a payment gateway, and even customizing the platform.

	LearnDash	Teachable
Setup Wizard	✅	✅

Thus, setup wizard of Teachable is more resourceful.

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Course Builder 

Both LearnDash and Teachale offer drag and drop builders covering all the fundamental features. However, you can create limited number of courses on Teachable unless you sign up for the Business plan which costs $664 per month or $5998 per year.

	LearnDash	Teachable
Drag and Drop Builder	✅	✅
Front-end Builder	✅ (Premium Add-on)	✅
Unlimited Courses and Lessons	✅	✅  (Only on Business Plan)
Course Dashboard	✅	✅
Course Attachments	✅	✅
Download Materials	✅	✅
Course Preview	✅	✅

Thus, course creation features are similar across the two platforms. However, LearnDash is more economical for creating unlimited course.

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Quiz Builder 

Teachable lets you create multiple-choice questions but that is about it. It doesn’t even have multiple question types.

	LearnDash	Teachable
Unlimited Quizzes	✅	✅ (Only on Business plan)
Multiple Question Types	✅ (8, Includes Survey)	❌
Quizzes Import and Export	✅	❌
Randomize Questions	✅	❌
Quiz Duration	✅	❌
Limit Quiz Attempts	✅	❌
Quiz Hints	✅	❌
Answer Explanation	✅	❌
Quiz Leaderboard	✅	❌
Email Notification	✅	❌

Thus, LearnDash has a better quiz builder than Teachable and that too by a mile.

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Built-in Order & Payment Support 

Teachable offers more payment gateways with the native teachable:pay. However, it doesn’t have a revenue-sharing feature, which is essential for the course marketplace.

	LearnDash	Teachable
Built-in Order System	✅ (Stripe Connect)	✅ (PayPal, Google Pay, Apple Pay)
Course Subscription	✅	✅
Revenue Sharing	✅	❌

Teachable’s built-in payment gateway is great for individual instructor. However, LearnDash is still a better option for a course marketplace.

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Sales and Ecommerce 

As a WordPress plugin, LearnDash offers more options for third-party e-commerce integrations than Teachable.

	LearnDash	Teachable
WooCommerce	✅	✅ (Via Zapier)
WooCommerce Subscriptions	✅	✅ (Via Zapier)
Shopify	✅ (Via Zapier)	✅ Via Zapier)
Stripe	✅ (Built-in)	✅
PayPal	✅	✅ (Built-in)
Razorpay Integration	✅	✅ (Via Zapier)
Easy Digital Downloads	✅	❌
Paid Membership Pro	✅	✅ (Via Zapier)
Restrict Content Pro	✅	❌

LearnDash has more options when it comes to third-party e-commerce integration.

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Certificate Builder

While LearnDash has a Gutenberg-based drop and drag certificate builder, Teachable has an in-house builder with customizable elements. Alternately, you can create a custom certification using HTML.

	LearnDash	Teachable
Drop and Drag Builder	✅	❌
Certificate Blocks	✅ (4 Custom Blocks)	✅ (11 Sections)
Pre-built Certificate Templates	❌	✅ (3)
Unlimited Certificates	✅	✅
Certificate Dashboard	✅	✅
Auto Attach Certificate to Email	❌	✅
QR Verification for Certificate	❌	❌

Teachable has more flexible certificate builder as you can use the existing templates or create one yourself using HTML.

That said, Teachable’s certificate builder is not complete. For instance, Masteriyo features a drop-and-drag builder with extensive customization options and advanced features like QR verification.

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Gradebook and Analytics 

LearnDash has dedicated grade book features that let you design your own grade system and use it to evaluate students. On the other hand, Teachable only supports basic graded quizzes.

Teachable lets you access video heat maps of learners. That said, it is only available on the Pro plan and above. Analytics on LearnDash are available through the ProPanel add-on, which costs an additional $40 per year.

	LearnDash	Teachable
Gradebook	✅	❌
Course Analytics	✅ (Available as ProPanel)	✅ (Available on Pro, Pro+ and Business Plans)

LearnDash has an edge over Teachable as it has a better grade book feature.

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Live Sessions 

Teachable has built-in support for Zoom and can host other live streams with embedded media. Likewise, LearnDash supports live sessions through Zapier integration. It also has an Event Calendar to track live sessions, which Teachable lacks.

	LearnDash	Teachable
Calendar	✅ (Event Calendar)	❌
Live Interaction	✅ (Zoom, Google Meet, GoToWebinar)	✅ (Zoom, Google Meet)

Though both platforms support live sessions, only LearnDash has a calendar to track them.

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Course Protection and Security 

Both LearnDash and Teachable offer plenty of features to secure course content and user credentials.

	LearnDash	Teachable
Course Content/Video Protection	✅	✅
Password Strength Checker	✅	✅
Google reCAPTCHA	✅	✅
Email Verification	✅	✅

Thus, it is a tie.

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Student Engagement 

Teachable doesn’t offer a course review feature for students to rate the course after completion. This gives it a disadvantage over LearnDash and other major LMS platforms.

	LearnDash	Teachable
Q&A Section	❌	❌
Community	✅ (As Groups)	✅
Review System	✅	❌
Course-wide Announcement	❌	❌
Notification System	✅	✅

Student engagement options are better in LearnDash.

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Course Control and Access 

Features like course preview, content drip, and course bundle are available on LearnDash and Teachable. That said, LearnDash has course prerequisites and challenging exams that are not available on Teachable.

	LearnDash	Teachable
Course Preview	✅	✅
Course Prerequisites	✅	❌
Content Drip	✅	✅
Course Retakes	✅	✅
Challenging Exams	✅	❌
Course Bundle	✅	✅
Course Expiration	✅	✅

For course control and access features, LearnDash has more features than Teachable.

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User Roles and Membership 

Teachable lets you create custom rolled; however, it is only available on the Pro+ and Business plans. Likewise, unlimited users are only available on the business plan. This gives it a disadvantage over Teachable.

	LearnDash	Teachable
Unlimited Instructors and Students	✅	✅ (on on Business Plan)
User Import and Export	✅	✅
Bulk Course Enrollment	✅	✅
User Profile	✅	✅
Social Login	❌	❌
QR Login	❌	❌
Multiple Instructor	✅	❌
Membership Site	✅	✅

Thus, LearnDash has more flexible options when it comes to user roles and membership.

If you want more convenience, Masteriyo has a QR login along with all the other features mentioned.

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Design and Customization

Though LearnDash doesn’t have a native theme, it still offers customization options because of the WordPress platform. Teachable’s in-house page builder is not quite as flexible as Gutenberg or other WordPress page builders.

	LearnDash	Teachable
Native Theme	❌	✅
White Label	❌	✅
Webhooks	✅ (Zapier)	✅ (Zapier)
Advanced Email Automation	✅	✅
Shortcodes	✅	❌

Thus, LearnDash has a better design and customization options than Teachable.

If you want white labeling but are keen on using WordPress, check out Masteriyo, which offers it along with all other LMS features.

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Support and Documentation 

Teachable offers different levels of support based on the pricing plans. This is not the case with LearnDash, which also offers an academy and live webinars.

	LearnDash	Teachable
Live Chat	❌	✅ (Pro, Pro+, and Business plans)
Documentation	✅	✅
Video Tutorials	✅ (YouTube, Academy)	✅  (YouTube)
Live Walkthrough	✅	❌
Facebook Community	✅	✅

Thus, LearnDash has better support unless you are comfortable paying for tier-tier Teachable plans.

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LearnDash vs Teachable: Which should you choose? 

Here’s a summary of everything discussed so far. To give you a broader sense of the competition, we’ve also included Masteriyo in the comparison chart. 

Feature	LearnDash	Teachable	Masteriyo
Pricing	4 ⭐	3.5  ⭐	5  ⭐
Initial Setup	4.5  ⭐	5 ⭐	5  ⭐
Course Builder	5 ⭐	4⭐	5⭐
Quiz Builder	4.5 ⭐	2 ⭐	4.5 ⭐
Certificate Builder	4⭐	4.5⭐	5⭐
Live Sessions	5⭐	4.5⭐	5⭐
Course Protection and Security	5⭐	5⭐	5⭐
Student Engagement	4⭐	3.5⭐	5⭐
Built-in Order and Payment	4 ⭐	4.5⭐	5⭐
Sales and Ecommerce	5⭐	4⭐	5⭐
Gradebook and Analytics	4.5⭐	2.5⭐	5⭐
Course Control and Access	4.5⭐	4⭐	4.5⭐
User Roles and Membership	5⭐	4.5⭐	5⭐
Design and Customization	4.5 ⭐	2.5⭐	5⭐
Support and Documentation	5⭐	4.5⭐	5⭐

To conclude, LearnDash and Teachable each have strengths and weaknesses. However, LearnDash is better LMS for the long run because of its flexible features.

Before you make the ultimate decision, we suggest looking into other alternatives, as there are a lot of new promising LMS in the market. One such platform is Masteriyo, which has all LMS features and even more flexible pricing.