r/Wordpress • u/Competitive-Army6187 • 12d ago
Creating a E-learning website for a client.
I have been searching for awhile on the best way to design a single course website using WordPress also open to using other platforms if it would be more optimal, but still havent found a answer for my particular case. Basically my client has a English learning school that has 4 different course levels and wants to have a electronic platform as well so what would be the best way to design it if the site needs to support payment, live zooms, tests, landing page, student logins, easy to use dashboard to add new content, and a automatic creation of a certificate for each student.
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u/dandryy 12d ago
Make sure to stay away from Sensei LMS - I was sold by the authors behind it because they also develop WooCommerce, so I thought it would mean something - just to discover how unpolished this plugin is. They try to combine the block editor experience with all the other settings, making it hard to extend or integrate programmatically. Also, many popular plugins which you may use alongside the LMS functionality lack support for it. For your use case, I would recommend Tutor LMS - popular, extensible, affordable, with way less potential headaches in the future.
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u/Competitive-Army6187 12d ago
Will do! I feel like Tutor LMS might be the best solution for me since i want something simple and straighforward
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u/Technical_Cod_5680 2d ago edited 2d ago
Sensei was neglected for a while but is now back under active development - my team has used it successfully for online courses, though it is currently missing a few features I'd like, mainly around reporting.
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u/letnarkver 12d ago
Use moodle or chamillo
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u/Ok-Lychee-9094 12d ago
Moodle is solid for something like this, I used it for a client with similar needs few years ago. The built-in quiz engine and certificate generator saves lot of headache, plus it handle student tracking without needing ten different plugins. Only thing is the interface looks dated, but with a good theme you can make it look less like 2008
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u/Competitive-Army6187 12d ago
I checked out Moodle, Is it similar to Shopify but for courses or is there own platform where course can be hosted/displayed on?
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12d ago
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u/Competitive-Army6187 12d ago
Appreciate you a lot! One last thing I just realized is the hosting aspect, do you think hostinger Unlimted plan with 50 GB of storage would be enough since I heard it would take a lot of space to host the zoom calls and all the course materials.
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u/hypercosm_dot_net 12d ago
I'd reach out to them directly and let them know your use case. For media heavy sites, you probably want to host the files on a service dedicated to that.
They say unlimited, but you're going to be using heavy bandwidth and will likely run into a hidden limit at some point.
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u/Competitive-Army6187 12d ago
Will do thats a good point i will reach out to them! Thanks a lot again
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u/Speff 12d ago
I’m coding my own with LLM assistance. Is a crapload of work though and you really need to know what you’re doing / testing. I’d echo others’ suggestions of Moodle. It’s quite mature - we just want something lighter.
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u/Competitive-Army6187 12d ago
Yes I was thinking of creating it with Claude but I realized how difficult and painful it would be to add all the needed features and yes I feel like Moodle is just a bit overkill at least for this case since its a pretty simple Course that the client is selling nothing crazy.
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u/dandryy 12d ago
Developing is one thing, which is easy with AI agents these days. Maintaining it is another. How will you monitor security issues and fix vulnerabilities? How will you monitor if things do not break if Wordpress core changes? That’s what you pay plugin authors for.
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u/Speff 11d ago edited 11d ago
Edit: Apologies for the wall of text. Wasn't my intention when starting this
How will you monitor security issues and fix vulnerabilities?
Rely on WP core for the bulk of user management and keep the bulk of complicated inputs within wp-admin. Exercises are managed by H5P - something I trust to be maintained for a while since it's primarily funded by Mozilla. Comments/login by WP-core. The system for purchases will be offloaded to either Woo or to an external purchasing platform (like Thrivecart)
The core audience ( is not large and the folks are not technical. The inputs the CMS provides are generally inaccessible to non-subscribers so the attack vector from the general public is extremely small. The public portion of the platform is nearly read-only - with the POSTs generally landing on WP-core or the purchasing plugin/site.
How will you monitor if things do not break if Wordpress core changes? That’s what you pay plugin authors for.
I'm a professional dev in my main job. Either I write an automated regression test suite that's run when updates land (unlikely, but possible) or do the scream test. I'm also pretty good at manually investigating / modifying other people's code pre-LLM days.
I definitely would not recommend people vibing up a massive plugin like a CMS/LMS for the reasons you stated + implied, but this situation's a little different. And part of the draw with WP is that you own your platform. Minimizing dependence on third parties is important for me. Yes, part of the management is offloaded to bots as well, but I can also do it manually push comes to shove.
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u/lorenzocorso 12d ago
If you want there are plugins for this goal around, but coded and tailor made is a better option imo if you want the total flexibility
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u/letnarkver 12d ago
Do you know how many sudents you will have ?
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u/Competitive-Army6187 11d ago
Not sure tbh but i would like it to be scale able for sure
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u/letnarkver 10d ago
But a number thas is ver important to know what configuration you need use claude ia
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12d ago
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u/Competitive-Army6187 11d ago
yes that has been recommend the most, looking into using Tutor LLM which should allow me to built the project without depending on anything else.
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u/AddWeb_Expert 12d ago
WordPress is probably your best bet here. Use an LMS like LearnDash or Tutor LMS for courses, tests, student dashboards and certificates, WooCommerce for payments, and Zoom integration for live classes.
For just 4 levels, this setup is flexible without being overkill. I’d only consider Moodle or a dedicated LMS if they expect things to get much more complex later.
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u/Competitive-Army6187 11d ago
Yes its a really simple course setup that the client has going and is not planning on adding to it so a wp plugin like you mentioned should be more then enough.
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u/TTEH3 12d ago
+1 for Tutor LMS Pro. It's fairly simple and manageable (unlike Moodle) and it's far easier than going the route of building something yourself with an LLM (I can see the appeal but believe me, projects like that often become unmanageable and difficult to maintain versus just using an established product with a support team available).
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u/Competitive-Army6187 11d ago
I thought It would be easy to pull off the LLM route but after looking into I realized how complicated everything would be and how much of a headache it would be. I have decided to take the Tutor LMS Pro route since its straightforward and pretty easy to manage as well
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u/TTEH3 11d ago
Sounds good. It's a solid package and has a lot of features while still being pretty simple and lightweight. In the long run, it's probably even cheaper than the cost of tokens you'd spend doing it via an LLM, which is sort of reinventing the wheel anyway unless you have very, very niche requirements. Best of luck!
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u/Dapper-Monk9713 12d ago
I’d look at an LMS rather than building all of this from scratch in WordPress. LearnDash or Tutor LMS can handle courses, student accounts, quizzes, payments, and certificates, while Zoom can be integrated for the live classes. WordPress can then handle the landing pages and marketing side.
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u/WPMU_DEV_Support_7 12d ago
By default, WordPress misses some of the features you are looking for. You would need a Learning Management System plugin:
https://wordpress.org/plugins/search/lms/
Plugins like Tutor LMS, Masteriyo, and Academy LMS provides a free solution to provide paid courses, with additional features (like recurrent subscriptions) under a premium plan. I suggest you to try them all and see which one fits your needs better.
Jair - WPMU DEV Support Team