With the learning management software nowadays, you don’t even need to meet clients in person to train them. You can transfer the entire learning process online, and make use of different marketing tools and membership plugins. The essential tool you need, however, is a WordPress coaching plugin.

Which WordPress themes support online coaching? Let us present the best WordPress online course plugins you can use on your website. This is the easiest way to turn a WordPress page into an online platform for learning, even without coding experience.

The best WordPress coaching plugin for your website

How would you like a Treehouse or Udemy-like website? Luckily for you, every WordPress website can have these functionalities. The only thing you need is an LMS plugin compatible with your WordPress theme.

Developers identified this need a long time ago and created an array of great plugins and appropriate page templates. It is therefore even more important to make an informed decision and to understand your requirements.

Why should you use LMS WordPress plugins?

• You don’t have to pay: Most of the time, WordPress plugins for learning are free of charge. This is the case with Thinkific, Udemy, and Learnworlds.
• You can upload personalized content. A responsive WordPress coach plugin lets you update content based on your audience and line of business.
• You can generate income regularly. Instead of selling courses, you can organize monthly and yearly subscriptions and earn money all along.

Many great WordPress plugins are developed for membership and eLearning. The ideal coach plugin for your website should include the following features:

• Creating courses
• Monitoring the progress of courses
• Enabling enrolment for course participants
• Gamification
• Completing and processing payments
• Content Dripping
• Organizing tests and quizzes
• Leading a community forum

A good LMS WordPress plugin can even be used for upselling purposes. You can turn course attendees into clients and get them engaged in private coaching, and generate even more profits.

These are the best learning plugins for WordPress plugins:

Amelia

Amelia is a powerful WordPress booking plugin that works flawlessly with WordPress sites of all kinds. It has a minimal, yet powerful appointment booking interface designed to ease your workflow, automate repetitive tasks, avoid double booking, and make appointment booking a breeze for your customers.

You can even have email notifications and SMS notifications so that nobody forgets about their appointment bookings.

In order to book an appointment, the complete user interaction takes a few clicks with this WordPress plugin. Moreover, with it you can accept payments via PayPal and Stripe, perfect for those who want to pay in advance to book appointments.

As a business owner, you can monitor KPIs in the WordPress dashboard and analyze other important data to keep a pulse on your business. Amelia is a straightforward, no-nonsense booking calendar plugin and an amazing option for those who want an around-the-clock solution for their WordPress site.

Amelia also has an Events Calendar module integrated within its features.

You can now automate your event bookings as well. To be more precise, it means that you will be able to schedule a single day, a multi-day, and also recurring events with Amelia.

Did we mention that you can manage multiple locations and that you have Google Calendar integration?

All of these and much more are under only one license, no add-ons are needed.

To test things for yourself, I’d suggest checking out the demos and seeing how things look on the front end as well as in the back end.

Consultant booking page demo

A pseudo Business Consultant / Coach / Lawyer website, where a customer can browse through provided consultancy and lawyer services and book an appointment.

Hands down, this is one you should absolutely use from this list.

LearnDash

This plugin is professional and reliable, which makes it a top choice for higher learning institutions. We recommend you to check LearnDash – a great WordPress plugin developed in line with industry standards.

The WordPress plugin comes with multiple features, including the possibility to create as many courses as you need. In addition, you can organize interactive quizzes and create downloadable certificates.

For each of the lessons, you can enable a timer function for each lesson to make sure attendees are not skipping the sections. Both the organizer and the learner can track the progress, or enhance the course with additional features.

The plugin can be used to organize both premium and private courses, and it offers multiple earning sources. Sell your lessons as one-time purchases or memberships. Or, organize special discounts for visitors interested in multiple courses.

The plugin license costs $159 per website.

MemberPress Courses

Many learning WordPress themes use MemberPress, and for a good reason. The plugin comes with an unparalleled set of built-in features that manage every aspect of course provision. The plugin is also preferred by educational institutions, thanks to the nifty Classroom Mode.

Building a course curriculum with their WordPress page builders will be very easy. Developers included a drag-and-drop interface, and let users embed pretty much any piece of content they need. Instructors will also be able to follow the progress of their students and help them complete the courses successfully.

And yet, the most distinctive advantage of this plugin is the access control rule. It is the admin who decides who can access which content, and who is entitled to a certificate. It is even possible to introduce several membership levels for each course. Depending on your needs, you can sell course bundles according to specific rules.

As for the pricing, there are three tiers to choose from. It starts with the basic plan priced at $179 per year for a single website.

Tutor LMS

Tutor LMS hasn’t been around that long, but you can still find it on many learning WordPress themes. You will appreciate its modern interface, as well as the moderate pricing scheme. You can download it free of charge at WordPress.org.

What makes this plugin so successful is partially its integration with video platforms, such as Vimeo and YouTube. You can easily upload any video you want on your website.

When it comes to course creation, the plugin facilitates the process. It has probably the easiest drag-and-drop builder you can find on a WordPress theme. It will also enable a beautiful interface and easy navigation for all course-takers.

For a tool that doesn’t require payment, this plugin certainly excels at generating profits. You can organize courses from multiple instructors in a single marketplace, such as the one of Coursera or Udemy.

After the course is completed, you can test attendees on the same WordPress website.

These are the key features to expect:

• Creation and management of courses
• Management of students and learning personel
• Creation and awarding of course certificates
• Quizzes and testing
• State-of-art analytics
• Monetization and user community

All the fundamental features are available in the free version. Other than that, Tutor LMS offers three paid plans starting at $119.20 per year.

Good LMS

Good LMS is also a great learning plugin for your WordPress site. It is best known for the easy creation of courses, which only require basic user knowledge. If you created a WordPress blog post at some point, you will be able to create courses too.

Next to the courses, you can assemble your quizzes, certificates, and grade books on your WordPress dashboard. Depending on the WordPress theme, you can even involve new audiences with coupon codes.

Good LMS improves learners’ experience as well. They have their account and can follow their progress and their scores at any point in time.

As for pricing, you get to use a learning tool with premium features at a fraction of the usual price. The yearly subscription for web hosting is only $32 per year.

These are the highlights of the WordPress theme plugin:

• A friendly and simple interface
• Customizable courses and quizzes
• Possibility to retake a course multiple times
• Generation of discounts and coupon codes
• Backend features and personalized accounts for your students
• Badges and certificates

Video Lessons Manager

If you are only looking to organize video courses on your WordPress website, check CM Video Lessons Manager. The all-in-one solution lets you create amazing courses, share those across social platforms, and earn from them.

We recommend this tool to creative users looking to improve their video courses. The same courses can then be hosted on Wistia or Vimeo, and shared on any WordPress page where you need them.

If you want to receive payments for the lessons, you will need the Video Lessons Payment add-on. There are also multiple add-ons available to monitor student progress and to award certificates.

Learners will once again have their own eLearning space to track their courses. This function is included, and no extra add-ons are necessary.

This advanced learning plugin is free of charge.

Masteriyo

Masteriyo has all the features of an advanced WordPress learning plugin. Yet, it is one of the simplest and most intuitive course building panels you can find. You can use it to create all sorts of lessons, courses, quizzes, and informative events.

The contemporary interface is powered by React, and so are the most advanced features. This plugin enables both an excellent frontend and an excellent backend experience for all users.

Once you’ve designed your course, you can post it on the website either paid or for free. There is even a specific function that lets you post free courses only for registered users.

The ordering system is very practical. Each user has a cart where they can save interesting courses, and pay for them through a standardized checkout process. You can process and receive these payments right away, and you don’t need an eCommerce plugin to make this possible.

These are the key takeouts when it comes to Masteriyo:

• Learning pages without distractions
• A progress bar for each course and every user
• A great quiz builder
• An advanced Q&A section
• Compatibility with all WordPress themes and plugins

There is a free version of Masteriyo that you can download on WordPress.org. Yet, it is the paid plan that offers the most advanced functionalities, and you can get it for $79.75 per website.

Teachable

Teachable is not a plugin, but a sub-domain online course creator. You can use it independently or as a sub-domain of your current WordPress website. It enables the creation of both free and paid courses, or for sharing of promotional content of any kind.

The marketing tools of Teachable won’t disappoint you either. You can use powerful marketing integrations, affiliate marketing, and analytics. You can further enhance the experience of each prospect or attendee, by involving them in discussion forums.

Teachable will also take over all payment and monetization issues. You can offer paid-for courses and process the payments with tools such as Stripe and PayPal. Note, however, that a 5% transaction fee will be deducted from each payment.

These are the features to expect:

• Integration of drip courses
• Support for custom domain users
• Possibility to engage audiences with promotional codes and coupons
• Feature rich email marketing panel
• Discussion forums for online courses

The base features are available for free. There are three premium plans, the cheapest of which costs $29 per month.

LifterLMS

LifterLMS will help you create a professional website for learning and business. You can turn students into paying clients and involve them in private coaching. This plugin is a recognized tool to sell courses to potential clients with just a few clicks.

The most competitive edge of this WordPress plugin is the ability to offer multiple payment types. You can either charge one-time payments, membership subscriptions, or custom payment plans. Check out their library to learn how to upsell private coaching to interested buyers.

These are the most prominent features:

Custom coupons with fixed or percentage discounts. You can use these for both single and recurring payments, and introduce expiration dates.

Special member-exclusive pricing for your best customers

Possibility to enhance the tool with additional functionalities. For instance, you can buy the necessary add-on for $120 each. Follow the marketplace for special offers and add-on bundles. The price varies between $360 and $1200 per year.

Course Catalog

If you are looking for a premium WordPress eLearning tool that won’t break the bank, you’ve found the winner.

Course Catalog sticks with the ear and only has positive reviews. It is indeed a catalog of multiple courses, each accompanied by images, descriptions, and current schedules. The browsing feature is more than engaging and leads subscribers where you want them to be.

Visitors can look up courses by entering keywords. They can search for lecturer names, specific dates, or categories. There are even additional search filters, such as Required Degree or Course Type.

The visuals of this plugin can turn a standard WordPress theme into an advanced virtual classroom. You can choose one of the three appealing catalog templates and insert your content.

Better yet, there are add-ons for charging attendees. We recommend it for college websites, or to individual coaching clients looking to enhance their business.

The pricing scheme is very simple: you pay $49 for a single website or $119 for 10 websites at once.

LearnPress

If we look at statistics, LearnPress is by far the oftest downloaded eLearning plugin on WordPress.org. The reasons are pretty obvious: there are many advanced features that you can use for free, among them even social media integration.

Another distinguishing function is the setup wizard. It lets you customize the theme features and come up with a truly personalized website.

You can generate courses and create quizzes very easily. These courses can afterward be shared and exported on any page, as long as you are using LearnPress on it. If you want to extend these features, check some of the paid add-ons. As it turns out, the plugin can also support WooCommerce, bbPress, and other membership plugins. You would also need a paid add-on to enable grading and scheduling.

In essence, LearnPress can be used for free. The pricing for add-on bundles varies between $49 and $249, depending on the themes you are using.

Thrive Apprentice

It may as well be that your business or life coaching website doesn’t only focus on learning. In this case, check lightweight alternatives such as Thrive Apprentice.

This plugin is developed for marketers who use simple courses to engage their client base. If you are running a serious educational institution with more complex learning processes, this is not the solution for you.

To give you an example, you wouldn’t be able to introduce drip-fed content or issue awards and certificates. Nevertheless, there is a nifty integration with ThriveCart, WooCommerce, and SendOwl. In this way, you can monetize your learning content with ease.

These are the features to consider:

• A simplified course builder where you can divide content into lessons, modules, and chapters
• Excellent integration with eCommerce tools: ThriveCart, WooCommerce, and SendOwl
• Frontend landing sales pages with excellent design
• Support for all widely used membership plugins

If you are a personal development coach, you can use Thrive Apprentice as a standalone solution and pay $97 per year. The full membership package would cost you $299 per year.

Namaste! LMS

You can also optimize your learning WordPress posts with this simple solution. It may not be the best choice for advanced online learning providers, but it still handles the basics of e-content.

More focus on learning and managing course material is provided in the Premium version. What we like the most about it is unification, as its modules cater to each niche. If you want to organize quizzes and exams, you should consider integrating the Watu add-on.

Creating courses for a life coaching website, for instance, will be as easy as creating your regular WordPress page. With the right integrations, you can charge for these courses and manage long-term subscriptions. The tool even lets users embed video content.

As expected, the core plugin is offered entirely for free. We recommend you consider their premium course design package priced at $47 per year.

WP Courseware

WP Courseware is also quite limited when it comes to advanced learning functionality, which explains the lower price. The difference is that it excels in providing multiple payment options. Some of them are not even supported by more expensive plugins.

To give you an example, WP Courseware enables recurring subscriptions and installment payments. Begin with the free courses, and lead your prospects’ way into making a purchase. To see how this works, check the free WP demo that explains the process in detail.

WP Courseware is also unusually cheap for a tool that lets you design an unlimited number of courses. Note, however, that the marketing features are quite limited.

Their lowest full-featured plan costs $129 per year, and it lets you use their plugins on two different websites.

Sensei

Sensei is Automattic’s best-known eLearning tool that pairs perfectly with WooCommerce. The integration with the payment gateway is not an absolute must – the free version will still let you design courses and offer them for free.

Participants can be charged individually or on a subscription basis, depending on your needs. This makes monetization very flexible, which is not always the case with LMS plugins for WordPress.

The plugin offers all learning features users expect, such as courses and quizzes. Keep in mind that customization of quizzes is limited, but you can still set up a timer and decide how much time is necessary for each question.

Compared to similar tools, Sensei doesn’t offer that many third-party integrations. You can only integrate it with another membership plugin since there is no add-on for this.

Next to the free plan, there is Sensei Pro which costs $149 per year for a single website.

MasterStudy LMS

The MasterStudy LMS plugin comes with WYSIWYG editors. This means that it features great creation tools tailored to every user. It doesn’t matter how much experience you have – you can still design the most amazing lessons with slides and video content. Management of courses will be just as easy.

If this is not enough to convince you, note that all its key functions were developed by Vue.js. This leads to smoother page transitions and excellent response times.

Here are the main reasons to choose MasterStudy LMS:

• You can organize subscriptions and recurring payments. This is made possible by Stripe and PayPal integration
• You can enhance social networking feeling among your clients by inviting them to participate in message boards and forums.
• You can organize quizzes with real-time Q&As, and set up timers.
• You can ask users to rate courses with built-in features
• You can issue certificates automatically

The base plugin is offered for free. Their premium plans start at $54.99 per year.

teachPress

Teachpress will help you manage courses like a professional. Thanks to its fully optimized BibTex integration, you can publish your courses and let users contribute to your research. Therefore, we recommend this plugin to professors and academics.

teachPress is dedicated to institutions for higher education. It offers all necessary enrollment, assessment, and documentation features. You can use it to upload publications directly to the WordPress website and run an RSS feed. Better yet, you can create an archive coach template and use it as your learning database.

These are the features to look forward to:

• Multi-user publication management powered by BibTeX
• Import files powered by BibTeX
• Publications via BibTeX and RTF export
• Seamless data import via NCBI PubMed
• An RSS feed for your publications
• Multiple ready-to-use modules for enrollment, assessment, and documentation
• Downloadable XLS/CSV course lists
• A variety of shortcodes for sharing content across pages
• A dynamic all-in-one metadata system for your students

Best of all, the plugin is free of charge.

Final thoughts on using a WordPress coaching plugin

As you see, many WordPress plugins can help you enhance your life coaching website and bring profits your way. Most of them can be managed and put into action even if you don’t have developing skills.

Finding the right plugin for your WordPress site can’t be tricky, as they all have different learning functionalities. For instance, you may get the most advanced GS coach plugin packed with features but still miss integration with a payment gateway.

What all of these plugins gave in common is the possibility to engage audiences without sending hours in front of the screen. They will manage your client base and update events in real-time, and even help you rank higher in search engines. Try them out and choose the best GS coach plugin for your needs.

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