Learning Management System Software - Page 16

Essential LMS software buying information

Learning management system (LMS) software helps organizations create, manage, deliver, and track training content, with the goal of providing structured and engaging learning experiences. It can be used in any type of teaching, from academic learning to employee training.

In a corporate setting, LMS buyers most often come from industries such as nonprofit, healthcare, manufacturing, and consulting. These industries operate under strict regulations, prompting the need for training material to keep workers certified and compliant. In the education sector, buyers often come from either K-12 schools or post-secondary institutions such as colleges and universities.[1]

Most LMS platforms are priced on a monthly subscription basis that scales based on the number of people using the system and the amount of functionality it offers. A basic system for less than 100 users averages $219 USD (approximately $302 CAD) per month, while a more advanced system for 1,000 users or more costs on average $1,084 USD per month (approximately $1,497 CAD).[2]

Jenn Tardy, a consultant with more than 10 years of experience in HR and recruiting [3], says LMS software can lead to long-term savings despite the initial investment.

“Instead of sending people to a different location every quarter or so to take a course, you just buy a licence for a specific training and have your employees watch it online,” she explains.

When choosing an LMS, Canadian buyers should make sure to ask potential vendors these important questions to ensure that the vendor can meet all their needs:

• Does the system offer course authoring tools to make content from scratch, or does it allow only pre-made content?
• What features does the system offer to engage learners?
• What are the different learning activities that can be tracked?
• What level of technical support does the software provide?

What is the best LMS software?

According to our research, Trainual is among the best rated in the LMS category, with 4.78 out of 5 rating from over 481 verified user reviews from the past 2 years. Trainual earns high marks for its user-friendly interface, AI-powered search, customizable content creation tools, and ability to assign and track training progress.

These are Trainual’s main features:

• Learning management: Trainual users find it easy to organize and deliver training, track completion, and maintain consistency.

• Knowledge base management: Trainual centralizes SOPs, policies, and procedures, making process documentation accessible and organized for daily reference across teams.

• Learner portal: Reviewers highlight the platform’s user-friendly interface, individualized training dashboards, and mobile access.

• Learning paths/tracks: Organizations can create clear, role-specific learning paths, which helps users build knowledge sequentially.

• Tests/assessments: Reviewers appreciate Trainual’s easy test creation to assess retention of learner material.

What is a learning management system?

A learning management system (LMS) is software that facilitates the creation, management, delivery, and reporting of educational or training programs.

Whether you’re a Canadian business aiming to upskill your employees, a school enhancing classroom instruction, or even a subject matter expert who wants to sell their learning courses online, an LMS platform is the ideal tool to provide structured and engaging learning experiences.

In the education sector alone, Gartner predicts that 75% of all K-12 schools globally will use an LMS by 2027—highlighting how vital LMS software has become to support modern learning initiatives.[4]

This statistic doesn’t surprise Tardy, who highlights the advantages of LMS platforms: “It gives you a lot of different ways to learn and personalize your training,” she says. “For example, you can offer micro-learning sessions of 5 to 10 minutes, integrated quizzes, and low-stakes assessments to inform you about your progress. All of these things help to retain information. Compare that to a situation where people are required to attend a two-hour workshop in person where it’s much harder to absorb information.”

Capterra currently lists 1,464 different LMS products, and we published 10,194 reviews from LMS software users in the past year.[5]

How much does LMS software cost?

Most LMS platforms are priced on a “per month” subscription basis that scales based on the number of people you have using the system, the available storage and the amount of functionality it offers. A basic system for less than 100 users costs, on average, around $219 USD per month (approximately $302 CAD), while a more advanced system for 1,000 users or more averages $1,084 USD per month (approximately $1,497 CAD).

• Entry level LMS include the core functionality of course management, course tracking, and knowledge assessments.

• An advanced LMS that’s priced higher typically includes additional features such as mobile learning, blended learning, and personalized learning paths.

Twenty-seven percent of the learning management system buyers our advisors spoke to in the last two years are budgeting less than $625 per month (approximately $863 CAD).

First-time buyers should be aware that:

• Installation, integration, and customization are common upfront costs

• Maintenance and support are common recurring costs

Tardy also advises companies to consider the cost of content licensing. "You can either build your training content internally or buy training from somewhere else,” she adds. “In the latter case, you'll need to budget for the cost of those licences."

It is also common for LMS vendors to offer free trials of their products. Organizations can leverage those trial versions to see if they match their business or trainee needs. There are also some free versions available, with basic features.

LMS features rated by users

All LMS software systems include course management, course tracking, and test/assessment features, and most have a variety of common features such as a content library, gamification, and real-time synchronous learning.

Core LMS features

• Course management: Create customized learning courses, organize them within a planned curriculum, and assign them to learners. 89% of reviewers rate this feature as critical or highly important.

• Course tracking: Track which course materials have been completed by each user, as well as what progress has been made. 84% of reviewers rate this feature as critical or highly important.

• Tests/assessments: Create and administer assessments to measure learner retention of course material. 75% of reviewers rate this feature as critical or highly important.

Tardy emphasizes that these three features are incredibly important for managing the career path of your employees. “The fact that you can track someone’s training history helps you gain better insight into whether associates are ready for the next step in their career,” she says.

“For example, when someone is applying for a management position, you can easily check whether she or he has already completed a management training program. It also works the other way around: You have an overview of employees who are ready for the next step in their career.”

Common LMS features

Our analysis of proprietary reviews data reveals other common LMS features users rate as valuable:

• Learner portal: Gives students/employees access to materials and allows them to communicate digitally with instructors. 90% of reviewers say this is a highly important feature.

• Progress tracking: Track and report on the progress of a particular user, team, or course. 81% of reviewers say this is a highly important feature.

• Asynchronous learning: Allows users to access and engage with educational content or training course materials at their own pace and schedule. 72% of reviewers say this is a highly important feature.

• Learning paths/tracks: Arrange course materials to be completed in a specific order for personalized learning purposes.

• Mobile learning: Enables access to complete learning materials on mobile platforms.

• Assessment management: Manage various created assessments to evaluate users on their progress.

• Blended learning: Create and track learning paths that combine in-person and virtual learning experiences.

Top LMS benefits identified by users

More agile and comprehensive training programs: Users say their LMS platform has boosted their employee training efficiency and helped keep workers and other stakeholders up to date on important knowledge.

“[Our product] has been an excellent tool both for training our customers and for training our employees, especially in a fast-paced environment where knowledge changes so quickly and frequent updates and retraining are necessary.”

–Dave K., director of technical learning, electronic manufacturing

Better communication and knowledge sharing: LMS features such as forums, direct messaging, and user-generated content tools allow for more seamless discussions on course materials.

“Students can readily interact with one another via forums, chat rooms, and online conferences, resulting in an immersive learning environment.”

–Shivam D., senior machine learning engineer, computer software

Customized content creation: Reviewers say their LMS software helps their company target specific areas by easily creating and integrating content geared to these needs. Additionally, LMS platforms enable regular updates, ensuring that learning programs remain aligned with the organization's objectives.

“Any area of improvement that our facilities are facing, we are able to target those specific areas and create content that would benefit our safety awareness and improve the safety of the cultures within the organizations.”

–Ashley H., regional human resources director, hospital & health care

Tardy says another key benefit is the accessibility of training materials on an LMS. “Your associates can access a central repository of their trainings at any time and do them at their own pace,” she adds.

“The self-guided aspects of online training help people get up to speed very quickly when they need to, as compared to in-person sessions that require coordinating around the trainer’s schedule.”

Common challenges of LMS software identified by users

Forty-four percent of Canadian HR leaders cite training and upskilling employees as the main operational challenge they expect to face in the next 12 months.[6] Technological issues make it harder for organizational leaders to overcome this challenge.

For example, recent learning management systems reviewers cite issues with software bugs, the grading and quizzes features, and with page design.

Users of learning management systems have encountered various glitches. These range from minor inconveniences, such as the calendar not automatically loading on today’s date, to more significant challenges, such as tracking issues, slow loading times, or unexpected system errors.

Educational users have also indicated challenges with the grading and quizzes features. Automatic notifications for completed assignments are not always available, nor is the ability to import questions in bulk or in batches.

LMS users also point out page design challenges, like limited template customization and difficulties with the editor when pasting content. These issues can hinder the desired layout and design.

To avoid running into these issues, you can ask the following questions when talking to vendors:

• What type of technical support and regular software updates does the LMS provide?
• What type of notifications and feedback options does the LMS offer for grading assignments?
• What level of template customization does the LMS provide?

What is LMS software used for?

Analysis of our extensive LMS reviews highlight the most common use cases:

• Centralized content management: An LMS stores all learning materials, such as courses, documents, videos, and assessments, in one centralized location. This makes it easier for coordinators to organize, update, and manage learning content efficiently.

• Automated compliance tracking: Manual tracking of worker certifications is a thing of the past. With an LMS, employees are automatically notified when an important training or certification is due, and you can track when it’s been completed.

• Creating more engaging learning content: Gamification elements and microlearning features can enhance the learning experience and increase learner engagement and motivation. These platforms also support various multimedia formats, such as videos, animations, audio, and graphics, to present information in diverse ways—enabling users with different learning styles to grasp concepts more effectively.

• Data-driven insights: Visualized data on completion rates, time spent on courses, assessment scores, and more can give your team insight into which training materials are effective and where improvements may be needed.

Learning management system usage also differs based on the breadth of functionality offered. All of these can be purchased as either a standalone tool or as an integrated feature set within a comprehensive LMS suite:

• Course authoring software: Create engaging digital learning content that can be administered through an LMS.

• Gamification software: Add point systems, leaderboards, and other gamified elements to course content that promote usage and engagement.

• Learning experience platform software: Consolidate disparate learning content into a single user experience, complete with personalized learning paths.

• Microlearning software: Create and distribute microlearning content that can be consumed in short periods of time.

• Mobile learning software: Create and distribute learning content that scales to different mobile device sizes.

Who uses LMS software?

Businesses use LMS software to create, store, maintain, deliver, and report on learning content and learner activities, with the goal of upskilling their workforce. Gartner indicates that these technologies assist organizations in various areas such as compliance training, certifications, onboarding, talent development, upskilling, collaboration, coaching and mentoring, sales training, partner education, and customer training.[7]

Companies can create an immersive training environment when combining LMS with innovative technologies like virtual reality (VR) or augmented reality (AR). This can have a positive impact in a hybrid work environment. Dan Schawbel, HR futurist, believes it can even help motivate employees to come into the office more often: "It's all about doing more with fewer resources. Obviously with AI and all this transformative technology, it's about how we become more efficient. And with VR and AR, it's leveraging that technology in the office space as part of the value proposition to get people back in.”

Schools and universities use LMS software to support the various roles involved in teaching and learning—facilitating online collaboration and communication among learners, instructors, and administrators. According to Gartner, post-secondary learning management systems serve as the primary hub for teaching and learning technologies. They provide a range of tools and services, both within and outside the platform, to support the different roles involved in education. LMS platforms promote online collaboration and communication among learners, instructors, and administrators.[8]

Most learning management systems are purchased by organizations with between one and 499 users, $25 million USD or less (approximately $34.5 million CAD or less) in annual revenue, and between one and 449 employees, based on conversations with LMS software buyers in the past two years. In a business, the number of users and employees are often the same, but in an educational institution these numbers often differ (such as the number of teachers versus the number of students in a school, for example).

On the corporate side, LMS buyers often come from industries such as nonprofit, healthcare, manufacturing, and consulting. These industries operate under strict regulations, prompting the need for training material that can keep employees certified and compliant. In the education sector, buyers often come from either K-12 schools or post-secondary institutions such as colleges and universities.

Common LMS integrations

An analysis of our extensive reviews database reveals the three categories that most often integrate with learning management systems are accounting, higher education, and meeting software.

Integrating accounting software with an LMS helps streamline financial processes by seamlessly adding accounting functionality. This can include automated invoicing, payment tracking, and subscription management, improving the efficiency and the accuracy of financial transactions for organizations.

Higher education software integration with an LMS helps educational institutions streamline processes such as student recruitment, admissions, faculty and course management, and financial aid. By providing a centralized platform and data transfer, integration enhances efficiency, communication and collaboration, ultimately improving the overall effectiveness of the institution.

Integrating meeting software with an LMS enhances communication and collaboration between teachers and students. This integration provides a platform that facilitates the organization and management of meetings, enabling the coordination and participation in collaborative meetings.

Recent trends in LMS software

Capterra’s 2025 HR Software Trends report highlights that ongoing training is important to close skills gaps and support digital change. AI-powered learning management systems can tailor training and speed up employee growth, but Canadian organizations are falling behind. Despite 67% of Canadian HR leaders having AI-powered HR tools, only 41% use them, lagging global peers who show stronger adoption. The study also finds that only 33% of Canadian HR leaders who use learning management software rate it as critical to their company's HR operations.

Generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) contributes to the growth of user-generated content: By leveraging an LMS with user-generated content (UGC) functionality, learners can create and share their own learning content—facilitating all-important knowledge sharing. Generative AI is fueling this effort even further by reducing the amount of effort needed to make UGC. Nearly half (47%) of Canadian employees want their company to implement AI-enhanced educational courses.[9]

Overwhelmed middle managers want more training in conflict resolution and communication: Nearly 3 in 4 middle managers in Canada say they “sometimes” or “always” feel burned out at work. Our research reveals that they are being set up to fail almost immediately due to a lack of training: only 45% received managerial training when they were hired or promoted to their role, and most don’t receive ongoing managerial training afterward.[10] An effective LMS platform can help organizations quickly scale their digital training program, but learning doesn’t stop there. Organizations can offer informal training opportunities such as mentorship programs that pair new managers with existing leaders.

On-the-job learning beats traditional training methods: By integrating your LMS with something such as a customer relationship management (CRM) system, relevant training content can appear to employees as they do actual job tasks—negating the need for them to open a separate system to learn. This method, called “on-the-job learning,” has been found by Gartner to have a “tenfold impact on talent outcomes, threefold impact on employee performance and more than twice the impact on employee engagement relative to traditional training methodologies.”[11]

Sources

1. Capterra advisor call notes: Findings are based on data from telephonic conversations that Capterra’s advisor team had with small-to-midsize businesses seeking learning management tools. For this report, we analyzed phone interactions from the past 2 years as of the production date. Read the complete methodology.

2. Capterra software pricing data: Only products with publicly available pricing information and qualified software products within the category, as of the production date, are included in the pricing analysis. Currency conversions are based on the rate of the day of publication and may differ from current currency rates. Read the complete methodology.

3. Jenn Tardy, LinkedIn

4. Market Guide for K-12 Education Learning Management Systems, Gartner

5. Capterra reviews data: Capterra reviews are collected from verified users for individual software products. For this report, we analyzed reviews from the past year as of the production date. Read the complete methodology. Number of products refers to our complete catalogue.

6. Capterra's 2025 HR Software Trends Survey was conducted in April 2025 among 3,256 respondents in Australia (n=278), Brazil (n=300), Canada (n=289), France (n=300), Germany (n=300), India (n=294), Italy (n=300), Mexico (n=300), Spain (n=300), the U.K. (n=296), and the U.S. (n=300). The goal of the study was to understand the HR software that companies are buying, their benefits and challenges, and the impact of AI on HR. Respondents were screened for employment at companies with more than one employee, working in management-level roles or above. Respondents were also confirmed to be at least partially responsible for HR software purchase decisions within their organization.

7. Market Guide for Digital Learning Content Providers, Gartner

8. L&D Technology Innovations Bullseye 2024 Report, Gartner

9. and [a]. Capterra’s Career-driven Learning Survey was conducted in August 2023 among 5,089 respondents in the Canada (n=1,002), France (n=1,027), Italy (n=1,024), Japan (n=1,022), and the U.K. (n=1,014). The goal of the study was to analyze how small to midsize enterprises (SMEs) are using learning management tools and explore the challenges and benefits of these tools. Respondents were screened to be employees in companies using online courses as part of their training.

10. Capterra’s 2024 Manager Sentiment Survey was conducted online in January 2024 among 435 respondents in the U.S. (n=85), U.K. (n=103), Australia (n=86), and Canada (n=155). The goal of the study was to learn more about the experiences and challenges managers face in their current role. Respondents were screened for employment at the management level with at least one direct report.

11. Market Guide for Higher Education Learning Management Systems, Gartner