In this post, I will show you the top 6 best online teaching platforms.
I’ve tested them all to save your time and money.
Disclaimer: This article has affiliate links at no cost to you
1. Thinkific
Thinkific is my favorite online teaching website on the market right now.
This tool is great for beginners, and for example, I’m hosting two courses on the site right now.
I really like Thinkific because it’s an all-in-one platform focused on helping you build a successful course.
My Experience
Thinkific is more than just a place to upload your teaching material—you could do that on YouTube or Google Drive.
What makes it different is that it handles all the other work that comes with teaching online.
Some examples are:
- Processing payments
- Handling refunds and chargebacks
- Hosting webinars and coaching sessions
- Creating a school page and course landing pages
- Tracking student progress
- Building a community
That’s just what I can think of right now.
Even this short list shows things you might not think about when you’re starting out. But once your students start joining, these things become important quickly.
This is where Thinkific really works well. It’s designed to help you run a successful online course business.
You can even start by creating your course plan and first drafts with AI.
Next, you can set up a school page and landing pages that match your brand. Some other teaching platforms don’t let you customize much and instead force their own design on your courses.
For example, this is what my page looks like:
As you can see, there’s no mention of “Thinkific” anywhere.
You can add video lectures, downloadable files, quizzes, certificates, assignments, and more.
If you need something extra, you can always check the Thinkific plugin store to fill the gap.
Pros
- Focuses on teaching: Thinkific handles most of the work that comes with teaching online.
- Easy to use: I didn’t watch any tutorials before starting my courses. It’s intuitive and simple to get going.
- Control: You can manage everything, from page design to discounts and coupons. This helps you build your own brand instead of working for someone else.
- Quick support: The support team is great. Sometimes their answers are a bit generic, but they always help and point me in the right direction.
Cons
- Sometimes too basic: It has all the features you need, but some are very simple and limited. You might expect more options than what’s offered.
- Expensive add-ons: If something is missing, you can find it in the Thinkific plugin store. That’s helpful, but these plugins can be pricey.
Pricing
- Free: $0/month forever
- Basic: $36/month
- Start: $73/month
- Grow: $146/month
Why Choose Thinkific?
Thinkific works well if you want to teach on a larger scale. It’s made for serious business.
If you already have an audience or an online community, Thinkific is a great way to turn that into income.
You can customize your pages and course materials to match your brand, which helps build your reputation.
On Thinkific, students take your course, not a “Thinkific course.”
Because you handle your own marketing, you can control pricing, sales, and coupons, which many other platforms don’t allow.
Why You Might Not Choose Thinkific
If you don’t have an audience or don’t plan to build one over time, Thinkific may not be the best fit.
Without an audience, platforms like Udemy can help by bringing students to you, though they take a cut.
Also, if teaching is just a side project to make some extra money, Thinkific might be more than you need.
2. LearnWorlds
LearnWorlds is an all-in-one platform for teaching online, geared more toward advanced use.
It’s not just for hosting courses. It also offers stronger marketing tools, better community features, and more options to customize your course.
My Experience
I created a course on LearnWorlds, and here’s what I found.
When it comes to teaching, LearnWorlds is similar to Thinkific.
But it also gives you:
- More advanced marketing tools
- More ways to customize your course
- Better community features
And that’s just a few of the extra benefits.
I call it the complete package—an all-in-one teaching platform for serious businesses.
But that doesn’t mean it’s the best choice for everyone.
With so many features, it can take a while to learn how to use it. Plus, many of the features are things you might never actually need.
On top of that, the pro plan costs quite a bit more than Thinkific.
Here’s how I see it:
If you have a team and a serious course business and want to manage everything in one place, LearnWorlds is a great choice.
But if you’re just starting out as a beginner or running things solo, I’d stick with Thinkific.
That’s why I’ve stayed with Thinkific. I’m fairly new to online teaching and running everything on my own.
Pros
- All-in-one: LearnWorlds handles everything, from creating courses to building a website to marketing.
- Customization: Unlike platforms that feel basic, LearnWorlds lets you tweak almost everything to your liking.
- Easy to use: Even with all its features, it’s still fairly easy to get your course up and running. It just takes a bit longer than Thinkific.
Cons
- Too many features: If you’re solo and just want something simple, most features may go unused.
- UI issues: The interface can be clunky. For example, I couldn’t find the video upload option easily, and I didn’t realize my draft course was already published.
- Learning curve: With so many features, it can take time to figure out how everything works at first.
Pricing
- Starter: $24/month forever
- Pro Trainer: $79/month
- Learning Center: $249/month
- High Volume & Corporate: Contact sales
Why Choose LearnWorlds?
If you have a large community and a team to help with your teaching business, LearnWorlds is a great choice.
It has everything in one place.
You can host your students, chat with them, create discussion threads to answer questions, and even run coaching sessions.
Your team can also work there easily since marketing, sales, and payment tools are all built in.
Why You Might Not Choose LearnWorlds
LearnWorlds is a big platform, and it can feel overwhelming for a solo teacher or course creator.
It might be more than you need, and many of the features you pay for could go unused.
If you’re just starting out, it’s usually easier to use a platform like Thinkific or Udemy (also covered in this guide) to get started quickly.
3. Udemy
Udemy is an online teaching marketplace. It’s very different from Thinkific or LearnWorlds.
On Udemy, they bring you the students.
On Thinkific or LearnWorlds, finding students is completely up to you.
This makes Udemy a great option for beginners who don’t have an audience yet.
My Experience
Udemy is easy to use! No marketing, sales funnels, or other hassles.
Does that make it the best place to teach online? The answer is both yes and no:
- Yes: If you don’t want to scale your business. You can create a course and make a little extra money each month.
- No: If you want to grow a serious online teaching business. For that, Thinkific or LearnWorlds is better.
Overall, Udemy is beginner-friendly and non-technical. You can just sign up and start creating courses for free.
You’ll have the basic options for teaching, like videos, quizzes, and more.
You’ll also get a landing page just for your course.
You can also message your students if they need help.
But keep in mind that Udemy takes a big cut and often runs course discounts without warning.
This can seriously limit your earnings.
Also, you’re not building your own brand. Each course is seen as a “Udemy course,” not yours.
Pros
- Very easy to use: Udemy is probably the simplest teaching platform. Just sign up and create your course. You can cover all the basics to make a solid course.
- Big brand: Even if no one knows you, they know Udemy. This means you can get students quickly without doing much marketing. On platforms like Thinkific, building an audience can take years.
- No marketing needed: Udemy promotes your courses. They run ads, sales, emails, and other strategies so you don’t have to.
Cons
- Many restrictions: You can’t customize your course page, run discounts, build a community, or access your student data. Udemy uses all this to grow its platform, not yours.
- Approval required: You can’t just sign up and start earning. Your course must meet their quality standards, which isn’t an issue on platforms like Thinkific.
Pricing
- Free for instructors
- Udemy takes a 50/50 cut of sold courses
- Courses are often discounted 80–90%, which lowers your earnings further
Why Choose Udemy?
If you’re a beginner who just wants to teach and earn a little, Udemy is great. You don’t need marketing skills, and it’s very easy to use. You can create a basic course in minutes without watching tutorials.
Why You Might Not Choose Udemy
If you want to grow a serious online teaching business, Udemy isn’t the best choice.
- Earnings and brand are limited. You’re building Udemy’s brand, not your own.
- They control most sales and take a large cut, so you might only earn a few dollars per student.
- You don’t own student data, so you can’t market to them directly.
- It’s not built for community. Messaging exists, but it’s not a full community experience.
At first glance, Udemy might seem like the easiest option. But for serious creators, independent platforms like Thinkific usually provide much better income and long-term growth.
4. Khan Academy
Khan Academy is a completely free, non-profit teaching platform.
It lets you create courses using existing materials. You can guide your students and track their progress easily.
My Experience
Khan Academy is quite different from the other platforms when it comes to creating courses.
Instead of making your own teaching materials from scratch, you use content that’s already been created and organized by experts.
This means you can create courses much faster. Instead of spending weeks making one, you can put it together in a single day.
But remember, Khan Academy is free and non-profit.
So it’s not the right choice if you want to build a scalable online teaching business. Khan Academy is best for schools or teaching subjects like science and math.
You can join as a teacher, use the existing materials, and help your students whenever they get stuck.
Pros
- Easy to use: Just create a course by combining existing materials.
- Accessible: Invite students from anywhere with a simple link. You can track their progress and support them along the way.
- Non-profit and free: The platform focuses purely on learning and teaching. No marketing tricks or sales tactics. I personally love Khan Academy—I learned math there!
Cons
- Not for business: Khan Academy is meant for free education and doesn’t support building a teaching business.
- Limited flexibility: You can’t create your own materials. You have to rely on what’s already provided.
Pricing
- Free!
Why Choose Khan Academy?
If you believe education should be free, Khan Academy is a great option. You can create courses quickly using their large library of pre-made materials.
It’s mainly for K-12 learning and test prep.
If you want to teach basic math, physics, chemistry, or similar topics for free, Khan Academy might be the best choice.
Why You Might Not Choose Khan Academy
If you want to build a proper online teaching business, a free non-profit platform with pre-made content isn’t the way to go.
Also, if your subject is outside the K-12 range, Khan Academy won’t fit your needs.
5. YouTube (Always!)
I hate articles that fill space with obvious information. Seeing YouTube on a list like this might feel exactly like that.
But trust me, this one’s different.
YouTube is the best way to build awareness for your online teaching business. Honestly, I can’t imagine starting a course business without spending most of your time there.
My Experience
I’m selling two blogging courses, and most of my traffic comes from YouTube.
Here’s how the YouTube strategy works:
- Pick a topic.
- Become really good at it.
- Teach that topic on YouTube to get followers.
- Offer a free training session.
- Ask viewers to join in exchange for their email.
- Promote your course to the people who joined the training.
This is basically the only way to sell courses online.
If you don’t have a YouTube channel (or a blog, which I’ll cover next), you can’t really build a course business.
You need to become one of the top voices in your field on YouTube and be seen as your audience’s best resource—and “friend”—on your topic.
Also, you need a lot of people to watch your content before making a single sale. Here’s the math (most people don’t show this):
- 1% of content viewers sign up for your newsletter (assuming you have a good freebie).
- 1% of those newsletter subscribers become paying students.
That means you need about 10,000 content views to make one sale.
If you send people straight to your course page, almost nobody will buy. You need a multi-step funnel. For example, I send people to my free training first, then promote the course.
This is why you need to teach on YouTube. It’s where all your potential students are.
With its recommendation system, search visibility, and huge audience, YouTube is the best place to start.
Pros
- Free: Just sign up and start creating videos. YouTube brings the views for you.
- Build trust: Sharing valuable content helps you become a credible authority. To sell your courses, you need to be your audience’s go-to voice. This takes time and hundreds of videos.
- Search visibility: YouTube videos often show up in Google search. Good content can bring in passive traffic over time.
Cons
- Takes time: There are thousands of creators in every niche. You need years of quality videos, teaching skill, and reputation to match them.
- No control: YouTube is a business. They can remove your videos or change how search works at any time. Building a business on a platform you don’t own carries risk.
Pricing
Free
Why Choose YouTube?
To grow your online teaching business, you need a YouTube channel. Free long-form videos are the best way to build a loyal audience.
This is how you build a personal brand people trust. Years later, those loyal followers can become paying students.
Once you have an audience, you can start hosting a course on Thinkific or LearnWorlds, paired with a solid marketing plan.
Why You Might Not Choose YouTube
If you already have a large student base, building a YouTube channel might not be worth the effort.
For example, if you use a platform like Udemy, they bring in the students for you, so you can just focus on creating courses.
But this approach doesn’t scale. Udemy takes a big cut and limits your course pricing, which means your earning potential is low—usually just a few hundred dollars per month at best.
6. Medium (or any other blog)
Another great free way to market your online teaching business is by starting a blog.
One of the simplest options is Medium. It’s free, and you can set it up in just a few minutes.
A better option is to start a WordPress blog, but it takes more time to set up and to get it to rank on Google.
Medium, on the other hand, is built to perform well in search engines. It can bring you passive traffic and even income.
For example, here’s one of my posts that ranks on Google for a valuable keyword:
My Experience
I sell a blogging course, and one of my main traffic sources is my Medium blog.
Many of my first-paying students told me they had been following me on Medium for a few years.
The Medium strategy works like YouTube:
- People read my Medium posts.
- Some sign up for my free training.
- (Some subscribe to my YouTube.)
- A small portion signs up for my paid course.
That said, a blog isn’t as powerful as YouTube. People connect less with text than with a real person. But if you don’t like being on camera, it’s a good option.
Pros
- Free: Just sign up and start sharing your posts.
- Built-in audience: Medium has millions of readers. Its recommendation system can show your content to the right people.
- Search-friendly: Medium posts can rank on Google, bringing passive traffic and potential students.
- No cameras: Perfect if you prefer writing over recording videos. It’s like “YouTube for blogs.”
Cons
- No control: Like YouTube, you don’t own Medium. They could remove your posts, and Google could stop ranking them at any time.
- Less personal: Written content isn’t as memorable as video. It takes years for people to recognize and trust you through text alone.
Pricing
Free (with paid Membership options)
Why Choose Medium?
If you don’t have an audience yet, you need to build a personal brand first. Medium (or WordPress) helps you grow your audience and fill the top of your sales funnel.
If you don’t like being on camera and don’t have students yet, Medium is a good place to start.
To build a scalable online teaching business, you need a large following first—on platforms like Medium or YouTube.
Why You Should Not Choose Medium?
Medium isn’t for you if you already have a student base.
For example, if teaching is just a side project and you don’t have big financial goals, spending time on Medium isn’t worth it. In that case, it’s better to host a course on Udemy and let them bring students to you.
Thanks for reading!