Did you know that the Learning Management System (LMS) market size is currently USD 27.09 billion in 2025 and is projected to grow to USD 82.00 billion by 2032!?

To surf this increasing tide, select the best Learning Management System (LMS) plugin for your online learning platform. A Learning Management System (LMS) simplifies the process of creating, managing, tracking, and selling material. It also includes extra features that improve the user experience and learning.

If you’re here, you’ve already narrowed your options and are torn between LearnDash and Tutor LMS. Don’t worry, this post will discuss their features, cost, integrations, usability, and scalability side by side, making this decision easy for you.

Tutor LMS

A small team of WordPress theme developers called Themeum founded Tutor LMS in 2019 with the goal of revolutionizing the infobusiness sector. In spite of being a relatively young product, it soon established itself as a key instrument in the e-learning industry.

Tutor LMS is well-liked for its easy-to-use features, such as its drag-and-drop course creation and excellent dashboard for both students and developers. To enhance the learning process, it incorporates tests, quizzes, and a no-code certificate builder. It also comes with a mobile learning app, powerful analytics and reporting, and the ability to move from other plugins without losing any data. Additionally, Tutor LMS connects with advanced page builders like Divi and Elementor and offers video embeds from any source.

For beginners who require a straightforward yet effective platform to develop and market courses, Tutor LMS is excellent. Using the Tutor LMS free version, you can test your platform before going for the premium subscription.

LearnDash

Prior to becoming a leading online course design tool, LearnDash was established in 2013 as an e-learning blog by Justin and Khloe Ferriman. After starting off as a WordPress LMS plugin, it has since grown to include a whole website as part of its software suite.

LearnDash has a lot of features and functions that can help you make the best online courses possible. It has advanced and customizable course makers as well as easy payment integrations. What sets it apart from the rest? We’d say their gamification integration to their lessons. LearnDash offers excellent engagement options in addition to badge and certificate builders to help students stay focused and on course. When it comes to features, LearnDash is second to none. From task automation to built-in detailed analytics tools, it stands at the top of LMS plugins, along with a few others.

LearnDash primarily focuses on course creators, it gives them complete freedom to design their business model the way they see fit. It offers a plethora of user engagement tools as well as many other integrations to improve the quality of your platform

Tutor LMS vs LearnDash: The Comparision

Without further ado, let’s explore their features, usability, pricing, and overall performance to help you make a decisive choice.

Course Builder

It is safe to say that the course builder is an LMS’s biggest and most important feature, and neither of these two platforms is lacking in this department. Both Tutor LMS and Learndash provide an intuitive solution. Let’s dive deep. 

Tutor LMS

Tutor LMS’s course builder is divided into 3 major sections: 

1. Basics
2. Curriculum
3. Additional

Basic: In the basic section, you can add the title of the course, set the URL, Choose course privacy, specify general settings, set the schedule and add media files like images and videos.

Curriculum: Here you add topics to your courses and organize their content. Create lessons, design quizzes, and assignments, etc.

Additional: It allows you to add course overview, target audience information, learning objectives, course duration, including materials, requirements, etc.

On top of this, the integration of AI is one of Tutor LMS’s most notable features. AI can be used to develop course materials, titles, and descriptions, as well as to create featured images for your courses.

For further details on their AI feature, you can visit this official Tutor LMS website. 

LearnDash

LearnDash course builder also consists of 3 main sections

1. Course page
2. Builder
3. Settings

Course Page: In this section, you can write the course title and description, add featured images, and set courses into categories and tags.

Builder Section: This is the foundation of LearnDash’s course development process. It allows you to add section headings to organize your course, create lessons for specific sections, add topics within lessons, and as well as add quizzes. 

The course material may be easily arranged and navigated thanks to its hierarchical structure. Although it lacks the AI features of Tutor LMS, it has a lot more user-friendly and configurable UI.

Settings: You can set up prerequisites, certificates, course advancement, the points system, course access settings, and content drip settings in this section.

Ease of Use

Both LearnDash and Tutor LMS provide a smooth user experience by utilizing WordPress’s well-known content management system.

Tutor LMS

Includes a setup tutorial and an easy-to-use interface for creating an LMS site or course marketplace.

LearnDash

offers a user-friendly design as well; a new onboarding process for creating course pages and websites has been added. This wizard generates necessary registration pages and automatically installs plugins according to user choices.

Both platforms come with comprehensive documentation to help users who might require assistance with setup or operation.

Assignments and Quizzes

Tasks and assessments must be effective to assess student learning and progress. LearnDash and Tutor LMS provide several assignment and quiz options. However, each platform offers unique features that benefit different teaching and grading methods.

Tutor LMS

Tutor LMS enables teachers to create, grade, and track student progress for activities and quizzes. Tutor LMS lets teachers personalize grading, conduct quizzes with diverse questions, and allow students to complete assignments as part of their course.

Key Features:

• Teachers can use the built-in quiz builder to create multiple-choice, true/false, and short-answer quizzes for various topics.
• Courses can be designed to have requirements to ensure students complete particular tasks before moving on.
• Tutors can assess students with assignments. Because assignments are maintained in each course, they’re straightforward to track and grade.
• Tutor LMS’ gradebook lets teachers track students’ progress and test scores. This simplifies homework and test feedback.

LearnDash

Because of its advanced assignment and quiz capabilities, LearnDash is ideal for teachers who need flexible and thorough testing tools. The platform’s quiz builder allows teachers to create class-appropriate examinations. It contains eight question varieties, customizable quiz settings, and automatic scoring.

Key Features:

• The feature of approving, writing on, and scoring assignments makes grading easier for teachers with many students.
• LearnDash’s quiz builder gives teachers more test options with eight question categories, including essay, multiple choice, and matching.
• AI-powered quiz Generator from LearnDash saves teachers time and effort by creating quiz questions from lesson plans or course material.
• LearnDash’s automated marking system enables teachers to personalize quiz results-based messages and actions, making big groups easier to monitor.

Gamification

Gamification uses reward points, certificates, badges, incentives, and other methods to motivate students to accomplish course goals. Increasing engagement and quality of learning experience.

Tutor LMS

The Tutor LMS gamification feature by default has very limited options available. They are not as customizable or robust as LearnDash. 

LearnDash

LearnDash has integrated gamification features like leaderboards, medals, and awards that improve student engagement.

Features	Tutor LMS	LearnDash
Points System	Basic, customizable point assignment	More flexible point assignment
Achievements/Badges	Basic badge system	Robust certificate system
Leaderboards	Yes	Yes
Progress Tracking	Basic progress indicators	Detailed course progress tracking
Customization	limited badge customization	Highly customizable certificates

Content Drip System

Many course creators value content dripping because it controls the pace of students’ access to materials.

Tutor LMS

Tutor LMS offers a content drip system with 4 features:

• Date-order: Release content on set dates
• Content availability after set days of enrollment: Releases content based on the date of enrollment.
• Sequential course content: Students must finish prior lessons to start new ones
• Complete prerequisites to unlock course content: Releases content after students complete a specific course or lesson

Course designers can create highly personalized learning paths for their students because of this array of options.

LearnDash

LearnDash offers 2 primary course progression systems:

• Linear: There is a set order in which students move through the study
• Free Form: Allows the students to navigate the course freely

When it comes to specific lessons or topics, LearnDash provides 3 scheduled release options.

• Content availability after set days of enrollment: Releases content based on the date of enrollment.
• Availability on a specific date: Releases the content on the set date. 
• Immediately: All the content is available from the time of enrollment

LearnDash provides good content drip functionality that should be adequate for the majority of course authors, even though it is not as comprehensive as Tutor LMS’s offerings. 

However, our plugin “Drip-Feed Content Extended for LearnDash” is a good option if you want to further customize content drip.

Reporting 

Data-driven analysis is needed to understand student progress, and course performance. LearnDash and Tutor LMS both include analytics and reporting tools to assist teachers evaluate their classes, but they manage data differently.

Tutor LMS

Tutor LMS’s reporting tools show students’ performance, course progress, and engagement. The reporting system is simple, so teachers can easily access and analyze data without much computer knowledge. Another essential Tutor LMS component is the gradebook, which helps track academic progress. It centralizes student scores.

LearnDash

LearnDash features a more extensive reporting system for users who need to know how well students are doing in class. This improves user experience by giving teachers and students a configurable dashboard to monitor their results, track course completion, and track their progress. All this is done via a simple, user-friendly interface.

Integration

Integrating and using 3rd party plugins to an LMS gives you new ways to use and personalize it for business and school needs. Both of these LMSs provide a wide array of plugins to enhance their features further.

Tutor LMS

Some of the key integrations Tutor LMS provides are:

• Zoom and Google Meet allow real-time participation in live classes.
• Integration with popular web builders like Elementor and WordPress, letting teachers drag and drop course pages.
• WooCommerce and Tutor LMS work together to enable instructors to deliver courses utilizing all of WooCommerce’s e-commerce functionalities.
• Helps teachers with student communications and marketing by integrating Groundhogg with FluentCRM.

LearnDash

Through its wide ecosystem of add-ons and integrations, LearnDash offers tremendous customization. Some of these are: 

• GamiPress and BadgeOS integrations add badges, points, and rewards to motivate students.
• BuddyBoss and BuddyPress allow you to create student profiles, private messaging, and forums that help build social learning communities.
• Integrates with email marketing platforms and CRMs like Groundhogg and FluentCRM to improve communication and engagement.
• WooCommerce with Easy Digital Downloads provides extensive e-commerce features
• The Events Calendar lets educators manage live classes and webinars in the LMS.
• It also offers 30 native and over 5,000+ Zapier integrations.

Payment Gateways / Monetization

A Learning Management System (LMS) must have integrated payment channels, particularly if it provides subscriptions, paid courses, or other monetized services.

Tutor LMS

Tutor LMS version 3’s built-in e-commerce system eliminated the need for third-party plugins for simple monetization. It supports several payment platforms:

• Stripe
• Amazon Pay
• Mollie
• Redsys
• Paypal (available in the free version too)
• Razorpay
• Monoris

Some of its monetization features include one-time payments, subscription-based, course bundles, coupons, and even tax calculations. 

LearnDash

On the other hand, LearnDash offers three built-in payment gateways by default:

• Paypal
• Razorpay
• Strip Connect

It does support 3rd party integrations with WooCommerce, Paid Memberships Pro, SamCart, ThriveCart, etc.

For payment modes, LearnDash provides multiple options:

• Open:  Allows anyone to access the courses
• Free (registration is required): Allows access to registered users
• Buy Now: One-time purchase
• Recurring: Subscription-based
• Closed: Only allows users who are manually added to access the course.

Security

For Learning Management Systems (LMS), security is one of the most crucial components. It doesn’t only protect your student’s data, its also responsible for protecting your course. They can be easily stolen and cause massive damage to your revenue. 

Both LearnDash and Tutor LMS have strong security features that make sure the platform is as safe as it can be. Some of the things they do to keep you safe are Google reCAPTCHA, password strength checkers, email verification, and content/video safety.

Support

Support is yet another important feature of a learning management system (LMS). When choosing between these two, it’s critical to take this component into account for a seamless operation.

Tutor LMS

People frequently complain about their customer service if you read their reviews. The assistance they get isn’t usually a one-time fix. Although people disagree, they do assert that they offer expert email and chat services.

LearnDash

customer service. On websites and forums, they receive overwhelmingly positive feedback for their assistance. Additionally, the community is actively supporting one another. Finding help is far simpler compared to Tutor LMS.

Pricing

Pricing and licensing are also important when choosing an LMS because they affect the initial investment and the system’s growth. LearnDash and Tutor LMS have numerous pricing options for different budgets and uses.

Tutor LMS

From individual teachers to larger institutions, it provides a flexible pricing structure that is affordable for educators of all sizes. They also provide a 30-day money-back guarantee.

Plans:

• Single Site License: In the $149/year, all basic LMS features, upgrades, and support are included.
• License for 5 Sites: $199 per year; perfect for those that need to manage several sites with LMS functionality.
• Unlimited Sites License: For $299/year, agencies or large organizations that use Tutor LMS on numerous websites can scale with this plan.

LearnDash

Professional course developers and universities are drawn to LearnDash because of its slightly higher pricing structure and extensive feature set in each bundle. Moreover, LearnDash offers a 15-day refund period.

Plans:

• 1 site plan: For $199/year, All LMS features, updates, support, and access to the LearnDash marketplace are included for 1 site.
• 10-site plan: For $399/year, agencies or businesses can manage 10 websites and their LMS needs.
• Unlimited sites plan: for $799/year. You can use LearnDash on any number of sites you need.

The Extract

Tutor LMS is better for newbies or anyone who is looking to save money and is newly introduced to this market. Its free plan and user-friendly basic interface make it a reliable initial choice for beginners.

On the other hand, LearnDash is a superior choice for educators who wish to advance their courses because it provides additional capabilities and integrations. Making the customization almost boundless. Its more suited for a bigger audience. 

If you are still conflicted between the two, why not leave it to the professionals? Reach us with your requirements and future goals, and let us determine the best option for you based on your needs. At LDninjas we have vetted experts who excel in providing one-stop LMS solutions. Be it plugin development, SEO optimization or developing a platform from scratch. 
Take a better look at the list of services we provide here.