Thinkific Reviews

Pros

A very easy to use application that projects your career as an instructor and educator, you can sell the courses to students or companies, allowing you to take better advantage as it allows you to enlarge your professional profile, showing the courses you have done and who and how many have seen, making you notice in the professional area, it is quite complete and easy to use, with an attractive cost for the market.

Cons

I think they should improve a little the visual and design area, to make it more pleasing to the eye, allowing you to customize more each course and let your imagination fly to catch a larger audience, doing this would improve even more this excellent application.

Pros

We researched many Platforms before choosing Thinkific.

We love that Thinkific is Canadian.

We love the journey that students take from first encountering the site landing page, going to the course landing page and then immersing themselves in the course.

I appreciate the helpful support from the Thinkific team. They do a great job of answering our many questions.

I am fortunate that Thinkific rebuilt their course editing software quite soon after we began developing our course. Their new software is quite easy to use and easy to revise.

I really like their flat-rate monthly subscription fee with no hidden costs.

Cons

I wish students could purchase this course in the currency of their own country.
I wish we could pay for our subscription in Canadian funds instead of American.
We have had to purchase a separate Discussion Forum because their Disqus Plug In is a social media plug in that is not confidential, and their built in Discussion Forum is very awkward and poorly organized with no ability to search, edit, or even manage posts.
Thinkific focuses much more on supporting marketing than on supporting online course development. We were fortunate that we had already taken two excellent courses in online course development that we could apply to the Thinkific Platform.
Thinkific is less responsive to good ideas for improvement than I would like them to be. For example, despite many, many requests from many course developers it is still not possible for the course author to copy, paste and edit quizes and so there is a lot of unnecessary labour involved in inputting quizes

Pros

Thinkific is easy to use. Add a new Module, one click to add content, module after module. So easy!

Better yet, I LIKE how it looks to the user. I LIKE how the site can look like mine -- not another platform. It does look different, but MY site name is on top, visible, so users know where they are immediately. I've tried others and never quite liked the look as I work with seniors who have retired... and wanted simplicity. This time I found just that. AND YET -- very functional, with every content option I'd like to add.

Thinkific has a great Facebook group too. Very active and helpful, learned how others are doing their classes so gives me new ideas. Some groups were full of people whining about what the software didn't do or needed to be corrected... that didn't work for me either, yeah, picky picky! :)

Cons

I only had to ask Support one question while adding my first course. My only question was: how to add a manual student who paid me privately (or complimentary class) if they didn't purchase through Thinkific itself. I know its there, just chose to ask instead of searching! :)

I didn't even use HELP pages to learn how to use it... it was pretty intuitive for me and I love that! Please don't think that means its not a fully integrated teaching service, it really is. They simply "got it" where the user (me, the instructor) and the other user (student) is concerned. Someone did the work to think about how both users will interact with the software. Kudos!

Pros

The way Thinkific presents content, from landing page to course completion page, is beautiful and appealing to the user. There are ample ways to connect with the user through various integrations if desired. It's also useful that you can customize the branding and even your own site theme if you have the available resources to do so! After switching from a sub-par LMS, our users are more engaged and more excited about signing in to consume our courses.

Cons

Reporting leaves much to be desired - best count on using Zapier to pull data into a 3rd party for analyzing user progress and completion rates. It's also frustrating that I have to wait for some reports to be emailed to me after requesting them. Perhaps the most frustrating part is that the front-end is designed using Liquid, which is difficult for a novice with basic CSS / HTML knowledge to navigate in order to make small text changes across the site.

Pros

It's mobile friendly for my students. It's a very simple to use a system which means even if you're, not super tech you can make it work.

I get awesome student feedback on how easy Thinkific is to use, especially on the go.

It's got great reporting and you get paid right away instead of having your money held up. Even on the free account which is awesome to better manage cash flow needs.

I also love that you can see how your students are progressing and where people might be getting stuck on your content.

Cons

Probably the only big negative for me is that is I want to include writing below my video training it doesn't show the student how long the video is or even that there's a video there at all.

So sometimes people have missed training parts because of the formatting of their system. Not the biggest deal, but I like to streamline my lesson by putting a small blurb under the video and the easiest way to do this means it doesn't show up as a video on the sidebar for the student.

Pros

I searched and searched for an affordable way to host my free Fearless Budgeting training program for compulsive spenders. I tried a couple of sites before launching, but they all had problems and were difficult to use.

When I found the free plan on Thinkific, I was blown away. It was so easy to set up and everything just flowed. I had one issue with the sort order of multiple download files. Customer service was great and helped me figure out how to sort them properly within a couple of hours.

It was incredibly easy to set up the two courses (total of 50 lessons) and two additional products. My products and courses look professional. Oh, and I love the student discussion forum, which I've used to let students know about an update to one of the courses and an upcoming Q&A call. Plus, I was able to easily integrate my mailing list into the program.

I couldn't be happier with the service and support. I heartily recommend Thinkific. For me, it blows away the competition!

Cons

Nothing. Not one thing. It's perfect for my needs.

The fact is, I'm amazed at all the features I get with the free option. It's working out great for me and my students.

Pros

I deploy Thinkific to my clients who need to an online course, but don't have the expertise or resources to recruit someone with technology skills. It's really easy with a short learning curve. If building a website with drag/drop tools is easy to you - this is even easier.
Their support is fantastic! Their response time is quick, their team is helpful, and their reply is always clear and coherent. I've spoken to them as both a user, and a developer - and they were always willing to find a way to help me solve things.

Cons

For the scenario of building a training program - Thinkific is great - no issues. If I had to say something, like anything - the only thing I can think of is, as a developer - I wish I can build add-ons to extend Thinkific's features. I'm probably in the 1% who wants it, which shows how much Thinkific really thought things

Pros

Very easy to use and has excellent customer support

Cons

For the plan I am on it is a shame there certificate functionality is not available

Pros

I LOVE all the features Thinkific has to support my online course. Completion certificates? Check. Achievements? Check. SINGLE SIGN ON FOR WHEN I SELL TO CORPORATE CLIENTS? CHECK!

But really, the feature list is pretty long and extensive. And the price is pretty good compared to other platforms.

Now, Thinkific won't host all your marketing needs, but it will nail your online course, and I'm a big fan of that.

They also offer GREAT webinars and opportunities for professional development, which I really appreciate. I really do feel like they want me to succeed.

Cons

I wish there were more options for how my course pages are laid out. It's pretty much all standardized with the course online on the left of the page and the content on the left. That course outline is ALWAYS there. Now, that might be really handy for students, but I wish I had some options and maybe could make things a little prettier. (It's not ugly or anything, I just would like another option or two to choose from)

Pros

User and admin interface are easy to use and very intuitive. I feel like it's much better than Teachable or Kajabi in terms of UI. Also very easy to design your curriculum and draft your courses. You can make a sales page with a countdown timer in minutes, which is great to use for quick launches.

Cons

Page blocks for sales pages are not as customizable as I want it to be, although honestly, it's very clean design-wise.

Pros

Relatively easy to set up - as long as you don't want to have helpers.

Cons

HORRID for anyone working with a few helpers... they want to rape you on fees for additional admins.
Can't remove/archive past offerings
Customer service SUCKS.

Pros

The Thinkific interface is so user friendly. The weekly trainings with Aaron have been critical to building my confidence in working with Thinkific and getting started. I love the left side bar menu - so easy to use for setting up and building landing page. The ease of integration is also well done.

Cons

I'm experienced at building websites with Wordpress and have a fair bit of experience with HTML coding, and yet, I find having to customize the landing pages with HTML (i.e. finding the line of code, etc.) way too complicated and time consuming. I'm looking forward to the upgrade that I hear is coming out soon. That is the only con I can think of at this time.

Pros

I like that it has a lot of features, but the way the arranged them is not easy to use
The homepage is more customizable than other programs

Cons

I don't like Thinkific for some reason the design is not appealing to me what so ever...
I wish it was because some of my clients prefer this program over others.

Pros

1) Thinkific is one of a kind platform that has something to offer to everyone. Even if you have zilch money to start with, thinkific has a plan for you. The free plan has so many features that one has to wonder at times if he needs to upgrade ever :) . Many other free plans try to give you a taste of the software and then nudge to upgrade. Not thinkific . They give you all the tools you need even on a free plan and then when you decide to upgrade , they add awesome value to your investment.

2) Ease of use is just awesome . They have explained the tiniest details with videos . Learning curve at best can be surmounted in a single day with the resources they offer.

3) The course player is just terrific and can host almost anything imaginable including content made on authoring tools . The interface is very mobile friendly.

4) Unlimited video hosting even on free plans ! This is as good as it gets . The video player is high quality . I suspect they use Wistia for playing videos .

5) Customer support is great and very responsive

Pros

Creates beautiful courses and has many options for layout, colors and questions. It links with Zapier and has hundreds of ways to integrate.

Cons

It took a bit to understand how to do what I needed to do. I found it easier after watching some of the help videos.

Pros

I really like that Thinkific offers a free trial option. This helps you determine if it is the right choice for yourself or your company. It is easy to add modules and alter the material on these modules. You can customize as you see fit and upload the materials needed without issue.

Cons

This product does cost. The trial version gives you that first taste, but the cost could be prohibitive for many.

Pros

They are constantly improving and have great training webinars and videos. They have a more down-to-earth "vibe" than other similar programs, and you can post just about any kind of teaching material you can think of in lots of ways - video, audio, quizzes, surveys, multimedia, etc.

Cons

It is hard to navigate, a little too busy, and syncing the sign-ups I get with my email software has been confusing. Also, replying to student posts doesn't always go through - a student never got my response to her long post.

Pros

I highly recommend Thinkific to anybody who wants to build an online course. Other LMS platforms are focused on enterprise space, or require a bunch of tech professionals to set it up for you. For thinkific, I recommended it to 50+ year old teachers who were able to navigate the platform and build courses. It's incredibly easy!

Cons

Not much. Thinkific does have a short learning curve, which they cover in their training. But it's pretty drag and drop.

Pros

Easy to use. Seemed like a good idea.

Cons

They do not test updates enough and twice have completed changed our landing page without our knowledge or consent (rolled back to old data or knocked out customization completely). Is too steep to pay for something we can't trust our business to.

Pros

It's easy to use and very intuitive if you've never built an LMS before. I had a good experience with it compared with similarly priced software.

Cons

There were some feature that did not always work as they should. For example, sometimes video would not upload properly.

Pros

It was impressively easy to walk through a course at my own pace, keep track of where I was at, and learned a lot along the way.

Cons

I can't think of any cons from my experience taking a course that used Thinkific. The entire experience was a positive one.

Pros

You can start absolutely free and develop your own html pages with their online tool.
In addition, you get great support even from the owner himself.
Nothing like this ever existed.

Cons

Perhaps adding support to develop with npm might be a nice addition.

Pros

When I was researching all the different software for course hosting, I liked that this had a place to upload documents in the discussions. That might be really important for people teaching code or other products. Then I'm glad I choose this one because others take a % of income AND you have to wait longer for money.

Cons

The layout isn't as clean and modern as others - I'm hoping that will be updated at some point. It's a little ugly.

Pros

Thinkific covers course the basics very well. It also provides strong administrative functions to support the student and teacher. Payment works well too.

Cons

The question import and question change functions need to be improved. Currently, they are unwieldy and time consuming. Support could be easier to connect to. But, as seems to be everywhere, you have to start with an email or chat.

Pros

Free to get started
Get paid via Paypal without being charged by thinkific
Perfectly beautiful themes
Add anything you can imagine, quiz, pdf, presentation, text, anything
Support for Rich text e.g. make important words bold or italicized
Available to anyone, not just Oxford or Harvard Professors
boy, i am in love with literally every feature of thinkific

Cons

user statistics are (so far as I understand) not recorded with quizzes. this could have been very great. so that students would know the level of difficulty of the quiz.