9 Great eLearning Authoring Tools (2023 Update)

Content development can be a long and arduous process, depending on what you’re looking to help your users achieve.

That’s why you need to be working with the right content development tools. These can make your life a lot easier by driving up efficiency and productivity, enhancing your designs, and adding the right functionality to your training courses.

Whether you’re finding content development to be a struggle, or you’re just looking for ways to improve your processes, our award-winning design team has shared some great suggestions!

Here are nine eLearning content development tools that will help you take your course-making efforts to the next level.

Articulate Storyline 360 and Articulate Rise 360

Articulate Storyline 360 is one of our personal favorites as well as one of the best-known names in eLearning authoring. It is clean and modern with powerful features. It allows you to storyboard your online courses and lay down the path that your learners will take.

While a sibling of Storyline, Articulate Rise 360 is a mobile-responsive focused content creator tool. It enables designers to create courses that are compatible with every type of device.

Gomo

For learning designers that don’t want to compromise between sophisticated features and fully responsive content, Gomo is a fantastic best-of-both-worlds solution. Gomo’s powerful learning assets use a simple drag-and-drop system, ensuring that every user can create polished and engaging content fit for any device. Plus, Gomo’s multilingual capabilities and instant updates allow users to deliver first-class content at lightning speed—no matter where their learners are based.

Adobe Captivate

Adobe is a well-recognized name in the photography and design industry. Many eLearning authors love Adobe Captivate for its feature-rich tools. With Captivate, you can storyboard your courses, and tap into an extensive interactions library that includes transitions and triggers. Create your courses quickly and easily with their user-friendly interface.

iSpring

If you’ve ever wanted to take your Powerpoint presentations and turn them into eLearning courses, you’ll love iSpring Suite. It offers plenty of course templates and themes, backgrounds, and more. It can also integrate with most popular LMS platforms, including

Open LMS EDU, Open LMS Work(a business LMS solution), or Moodle™.

Elucidat

Elucidat is a cloud-based authoring tool that focuses on simplicity and is super user-friendly. With a full package offer on features and tailor-made for collaboration, it works similarly to Google's business suite, Google Workspace, allowing multiple users to work on the same piece at once without worrying about version control.

H5P

If you’re looking for a free-to-use, open-source authoring tool, you’ve found it! Many of our clients use H5P as a software plugin for their Open LMS EDU, Open LMS Work, or WordPress sites. H5P offers support for a variety of content types and is also mobile-friendly—that’s a big tick for us!

Unity 3D

Unity has captured the attention of eLearning designers with its ability to build games and experiences the utilize VR, and AR technology. As the future of online learning evolves, tools like Unity can push the limit of what is possible for learners to experience. For new eLearning designers, using Unity can be a daunting task at first—but the possibilities are endless!

Echo360

Echo360 helps transform your material and subject matter expertise into dynamic courses that capture attention and spark conversation. Alongside analytics to measure the impact, the tool comes with templates, a content library, interactive video production, image editing, and collaboration features.

Composica

Another authoring tool that focuses on a smooth collaboration, Composica enables your team to work on projects at the same time. Composica’s simple interface is very reminiscent of Powerpoint and similar presentation creation tools, making new users feel at ease. You can add different users, assign tasks, and always have the most up-to-date version of your content ready to go. It also has competitive pricing, so it’s a relatively affordable option for your business.

In Conclusion—Which Tool Is Best for You?

Look for tools and solutions that are right for you. Ultimately, no one can tell you which authoring or LMS content development applications are best for your specific needs. The real answer depends on your team size, your resources, your technical knowledge, as well as what you’re comfortable with.

Fortunately, there are plenty of easy-to-use solutions available, making it possible even for beginners to get started in course authoring without a lot of fuss.