Elearning development is a fast-paced world. Today, there are plenty of elearning development tools for producing elearning. Apollo is a free authoring tool for creating interactive learning contents.
This page describes the main elearning authoring tools that are free or affordable for small-to-medium sized companies. The tools are listed in an order that makes sense for beginners to learn them. You can learn how to use them to create elearning content and then get help from the following site, which provides useful information about creating elearning
Why do you need an authoring tool?
Unsure whether you need an authoring software to meet your elearning objectives. Here are our top five reasons to use an authoring tool:
- Allows you to personalize your content and adopt a people-centered approach to learning;
- Enables you to collaborate with your team effectively, allowing authors, SMEs and stakeholders to work together seamlessly;
- Makes it easy to roll out elearning courses in different locations and update content to comply with new regulations quickly and with ease;
- Allows you to continually improve your elearning by analyzing data and collating feedback on how your content performs;
- Enables you to adapt to new demands and produce supporting elearning content quickly.
Criteria for evaluating the best elearning authoring tools
What makes a great authoring tool? In this guide, the key criteria we have used to compare and contrast the best authoring tools on the market are:
Quality of elearning output:
- Level of customization available
- Variety of formats to choose from
- In-built design guidance
- Branching options available
Speed and efficiency:
- How quickly you can produce high-quality elearning
- Features that can speed up your production
- Collaboration options for streamlining the feedback process
- Ease of having multiple authors working on a project simultaneously
- Level of experience required for the author to use the platform effectively
Scalability:
- How easy it is to reuse, edit and scale your elearning content
- Cost-efficiency for producing elearning content at scale
- Import and export features
- Translation options
Elearning authoring tools & software to consider
Elucidat
Elucidat makes it easier for ambitious teams to produce digital learning at scale. Being a fully-cloud based elearning authoring platform, businesses can respond to change faster – and smarter!
With Elucidat you can empower experts to share knowledge and give staff access to learning on any device. From product training to compliance – Elucidat helps reduce costs and increase business performance.
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Quality of elearning output
Elucidat comes with an extensive library of pre-built templates that helps even novice authors create great-looking interactive experiences. For those wanting to innovate, the “layout designer” feature allows you to build your own page designs without needing to code.
There are some brilliant elearning examples on Elucidat’s showcase, many of which can be Gifted into your account (or free trial) to use as a template. You can check out our favorites in our Top elearning examples blog.
Flexible rules and branching options enable authors to build personalized learning paths to deliver great learning experiences. Social polling, gamification and a whole host of interaction types give you plenty of opportunities to hook in learners.
Elucidat’s analytics dashboards provide authors with detailed data on how learners are interacting with their course, enabling you to continually optimize for engagement.
Speed and efficiency
Elucidat’s feature set makes creating high-quality learning faster and more efficient.
With Elucidat’s Learning Accelerator you can produce training 4x faster. The platform will recommend elearning templates based on your project goals. You just add content (with best practice tips along the way). Simple as that.
Other effective features that will speed up your production include:
- A template library
- A suite of interactions
- Brand importer
- A WYSIWYG (what you see is what you get) interface
- The ability to apply existing styles to new projects
The more advanced features, as with any platform, can take a little longer to grasp. But, the efficiency pay-off comes when you save your pages to reuse for future projects.
As a cloud-based authoring tool, it’s easy for multiple authors to work on the same project – at the same time. Helping the whole team to meet a deadline. Stakeholders can also log comments within the authoring tool on specific parts of a page using the review feature. Making the headaches experienced with desktop-based tools a thing of the past.
Once a course is complete, sharing and releasing has never been easier. Elucidat’s Learning Launchpad allows authors to manage mobile-friendly elearning portals with ease. You can skip the admin and get content to learners more efficiently.
Scalability
Elucidat was born to help teams with scaling up elearning production. With customizable user roles and permissions, you can invite all of your stakeholders to collaborate within the platform – from your learning designers to subject matter experts.
The central asset library lets colleagues share assets across departments. Want to replace an image, logo or video? Update across multiple courses with one click.
The variations manager centralizes courses with several versions into one simple ‘master course’. Child courses then sit underneath it. The parent-child relationship means all versions are editable at the master level – saving a tonne of time editing several variations of the same course!
Translations are easy too! Using a simple import/export feature, upload a new language and watch the course adjust its size. Then make separate edits to each individual translated course using variations manager.
Supported elearning formats
Elucidat’s authoring platform is totally cloud-based, which produces high-quality, SCORM compliant HTML5 elearning content. Supporting most elearning formats, as well as advanced xAPI data reporting and mobile responsive content, Elucidat is considered as one of the top SCORM elearning authoring tools for both Mac and Windows.
Elucidat supports the following elearning formats:
- HTML5, Video, SCORM (1.2, 2004), xAPI (TinCan)
- Windows, Mac OS
Elucidat Strengths
- Ready-made templates that will make your production 4x faster
- Wide range of interactions and features, including rules, branches and badges
- Out-of-the-box pages, plus the flexibility to make your own
- Easy to use WYSIWYG interface
- Advanced brand management to meet guidelines
- Flexible permissions and user roles
- Variations management to simplify working at scale
- Sophisticated translation process
- Outstanding support team, included as part of your package
Elucidat Weaknesses
- A time investment is needed to utilize the full capabilities of the tool
- Can seem expensive if you’re not producing much content, as the platform is designed for teams creating and managing elearning at scale. More on the ROI of Elucidat here.
Best for:
- Authors of all abilities
- Big enterprise employers looking to get a quicker business impact
- Teams that need to produce high-quality elearning, fast
- Teamwork on a global scale
- Comprehensive tutorials and user support
- People-centered learning
Case studies and awards:
Elucidat was awarded a number of prestigious industry awards over recent years including a Brandon Hall Gold Award for Best Advance in Course Authoring in 2020.
Elucidat’s customers include world-leading brands across many industries such as finance, for example, Metro Bank and nCino, and retail, with global names such as Tesco, Benefit and Kingfisher.
iSpring
iSpring’s big draw is that it takes PowerPoint content and converts it to eLearning courses. So, it’s super simple for those new to SCORM to understand and execute the process. As well as slides, you can incorporate video capture, interactions, and assessments to build engaging content.
The data generated is then fed into the reporting suite of your LMS. One thing to note for Mac users is there’s no dedicated version for your machine unless you install Windows on your Mac.
Camtasia
First and foremost a video capture tool, Camtasia content can be exported as SCORM packages. It’s an excellent option if you want to jazz up PowerPoint presentations as you can effortlessly record narration and even your face simultaneously.
It may be a lighter option than the others listed, but it benefits you by being highly accessible and affordable. Just be sure to test the reporting output on offer so you know it meets the requirements of your organization.
dominKnow | ONE 4.5/5 (14 reviews)
With more than 20 years in the business, dominKnow continues to push the boundaries for what modern eLearning authoring tools can do. Their learner-centric approach to authoring and content development is key. They offer an integrated authoring system that empowers Instructional Designers, developers, and teams to create better learning experiences efficiently thus, giving authors the flexibility to create almost anything they want for any formal course, performance support, or microlearning need. Interested to see what makes it one of the best eLearning authoring tools?
Highlights
dominKnow | ONE helps teams create better content, together.
- Authoring
- Collaboration
- Content management
Articulate 360 4.4/5 (13 reviews)
Trusted by 98,000+ organizations worldwide, Articulate software, services, community, and content make it easy to create compelling courses for every device. Articulate 360 has everything eLearning professionals need for course development. The annual subscription includes the award-winning authoring apps Storyline 360 and Rise 360 with 6+ million course assets. Also, you get an easy-to-use project review app and live and on-demand online training with industry experts such as Tom Kuhlmann. It’s continuously updated with new features and assets.
Highlights
- Multidevice eLearning, automatically
- Ever-expanding asset library
- Live and on-demand training with industry experts
Conclusion
This blog post highlights the best authoring tools for creating eLearning courses. Some online tools are completely free, so you don’t need to buy anything.