Comparison of CourseDirector with Moodle

Moodle, the open source LMS, is the clear leader in the ‘Learning Management System’/'Course Management System’ market with an estimated 55% of the market share. Due to Moodle being the dominant LMS we are often asked to provide a comparison of the CourseDirector LMS with the Moodle LMS so this post will attempt to do that briefly.

Simplicity of use/functionality:

It is important to say from the beginning that CourseDirector is fundamentally a far simpler, lightweight system than Moodle. Due to this, training and time getting up to speed with CourseDirector for teachers/faculty and students is minimal. Teachers can create and maintain their courses using only the in-line help and FAQ’s and students can quickly access their courses with no assistance required.

Integration with Google Apps:

The big advantage of CourseDirector is integration with Google Apps. With Moodle there is limited integration, generally single sign on (SSO) and some embedding of GMail, Calendar, Docs etc. into Moodle. With CourseDorector students and staff work natively in Google Apps, so for example course sites are created in Google Sites, coursework is submitted to Google Docs etc.

Cost of set up/use/support:

In terms of cost CourseDirector is far and away cheaper than Moodle, but it is important to quantify this. Our pricing is fixed at $499/year for up to 450 users and $999/year for up to 1000 users. We don’t charge extra for set-up, support, customisation, and any training sessions for key users if required (we generally deliver these online via ‘gotomeeting’) In terms of custom features required we are developing CourseDirector using ‘Agile’ methodology based on the needs of our existing clients, so we push enhancements through on a weekly cycle (any new features are always optional so as not to change the user experience). As CourseDirector is cloud based there are no server costs.

The cost of Moodle cost can vary widely depending on many factors, such as: (1) The version of Moodle (2) The amount of features enabled (3) If Moodle is hosted on your servers or virtually (4) If you have Moodle expertise in-house or need to engage consultants for set-up and support contracts (5) If you need to pay for custom enhancements to Moodle. Typically Moodle will cost $16/user to set up and customise initially and the annual fee per user will have a huge variation based on the factors listed above. CourseDirector pricing is fixed at $1 user/year with no up-front set-up charges.

Its important to say finally that our system is modular, so admins can quickly turn on and off any features they wish to use. Also to mention that you can initially try $199/year plan for up to 50 uses so you can pilot CourseDirector in your school to see if you wish to use it further (which of course we hope you will) and to see the quality of our support and developing enhancements for you.