What each free plugin hands you on day one
MasterStudy’s free listing is long. It names unlimited courses and lessons, a student dashboard, teacher profiles and a registration form, course reviews, a course player with a dark mode, and Q&A between students and teachers. Lessons can be text, audio, video or PDF, with video from several sources. Its quiz builder, certificate designer and earnings settings are free as well.
Learnomy Free overlaps heavily. It has seven lesson types (video, audio, PDF, embed, download, live session link and rich text), quizzes, certificates with a drag-and-drop designer, Stripe and PayPal checkout, coupons, memberships and instructor commissions.
So the real differences are narrower than either marketing page suggests. MasterStudy’s listing places subscriptions, memberships, coupons and taxes in its Pro add-ons. Learnomy puts memberships and coupons in Free. On the other side, MasterStudy’s free quiz builder lists more question types than we do. Neither side wins everything, which is why a test on staging pays for itself.
Selling one course, step by step
Picture a nutrition course with a one-time price, a launch coupon and a monthly membership that includes it.
In Learnomy Free you set the pricing model on the course, create a coupon with a usage limit and an expiry window, and make a recurring membership plan that includes the course. Stripe or PayPal handles the money. Students can cancel a plan at the end of the billing period from their account.
In MasterStudy, the listing says free monetization covers selling courses plus earnings and withdrawals, while coupons and memberships are part of Pro. Count those as part of your cost when you compare. Also note that its Pro licence is described as including the same features on every plan, with the plans differing by number of sites, and there is a lifetime option. That is a genuine point in its favour if you dislike renewals. Our Pro is a yearly licence.
Quizzes and certificates in practice
MasterStudy’s free quiz builder lists eight question types, including image-based ones, with a timer, attempt limits and randomised questions. If a visual or language course leans on image matching, it has the edge today.
Learnomy Free has six question types and two layouts, with partial credit and an essay grading inbox. Pro adds more question types and layouts. Timed exams autosave and resume at the exact question after a dropped connection.
Both have drag-and-drop certificate designers in the free plugin. Our difference is the public check page. Each certificate is signed, and anyone with the link can confirm the course, the date and the issuing academy without logging in. Test that page from a phone, since that is how an employer will see it.
Instructors, payouts, students and data
Both plugins let teachers earn commission. Learnomy lets you set a global rate and override it for a course or an instructor, with a request-based withdrawal queue. Pro adds Stripe Connect for automatic payouts.
For student data, both run on your WordPress database. Ours can export a student’s data on request and erase learner records across tables, keeping orders and audit rows unlinked for accounting. Ask the same questions of any plugin before launch: where does each record live, who can export it, and what happens on an erase request?
Students, themes and the player
MasterStudy’s listing mentions a course player with a dark mode, a student dashboard, teacher profiles and a registration form for teachers. These are the sort of details a student notices first. Open its demo course on a phone and compare it with ours in the same way.
Learnomy gives students an account area with a dashboard, a course library, quiz results and certificates, and a lesson player with progress tracking. Instructors can apply to teach, and an owner can approve or decline with a reason that the applicant sees. Reviews and ratings are in Free.
Both work with page builders and themes, so the practical test is your own theme. Check the course archive page, a single course and a lesson in it, at desktop and phone widths. Pay attention to long titles and to the quiz screens, because they hold the most text and break first.
Cost, and what happens when you outgrow free
Think about the total over three years, not the first month. MasterStudy’s free plugin is generous, and its Pro licence either renews yearly or is bought once. Learnomy’s Pro is a yearly licence, and Free has no time limit.
If your plan only needs what Free offers on either side, the cost is zero for both and the choice is about fit. If you will certainly need Pro features, price the one-time against the yearly option for your own timeline, and check the vendor’s current terms because those change.
What happens when you outgrow the free plugin
Both plugins have a paid tier, so ask what the first paid step looks like. For MasterStudy, the listing describes Pro add-ons for drip, assignments, a gradebook, SCORM, live streaming and group courses. For Learnomy, Pro adds drip, cohorts, learning paths, assignments, a gradebook, SCORM and xAPI, H5P and webhooks.
The lists look alike, and that is useful. It means the choice does not lock you into a very different future. Pick the one whose free tier fits today, and check that the Pro tier covers the next two things you expect to need.
Moving between them
Neither plugin imports the other. Our importer reads LearnDash, Tutor LMS and LifterLMS, so there is no MasterStudy source. The honest options are rebuilding by hand or scripting a move.
A hand rebuild suits a catalogue of a few courses. Copy lesson text, re-embed videos, recreate quizzes and design the certificate again. Image-based questions will need extra thought, since we have no image matching in Free.
A script suits a large catalogue. Read from your MasterStudy tables and create courses, lessons and quizzes through the Learnomy REST API, or run it with WP-CLI on the server. Create everything as drafts. A short checklist for either route:
- Back up and work on staging.
- List every course, lesson order and quiz.
- Rebuild one course, then script or repeat the rest.
- Bulk-add students by pasting emails or uploading a CSV.
- Recreate memberships, coupons and prices.
- Test checkout and a certificate before you cut over.
Who should not switch
Stay with MasterStudy if image-based quizzes are central to your teaching, if you want a lifetime licence, or if a Pro add-on such as live streaming or its AI course drafting is something you already use. We do not offer built-in live video.
Stay if your site works and your students are happy. A move saves little if you already pay for Pro.
Switch if memberships and coupons are what you need and you would rather have them in the free plugin, or if a public certificate check is a requirement from employers.