Course management
Build and version courses, organize lessons, attach materials. Drag-and-drop reordering, locked-content gating, drip schedules.
Learning Management System
What is a modern LMS for live teaching?
Most LMS platforms were built for institutions running self-paced courses. Classentra is built for the way independent teachers actually teach: live, recurring, with real students who show up to real sessions.
What an LMS is
LMS, plain English
A Learning Management System is software that hosts courses, enrolls students, tracks progress, and (sometimes) handles payments. The term covers everything from institutional giants like Moodle and Canvas down to one-person solo-teacher tools.
Three product shapes dominate the category: classic institutional LMS (Moodle, Canvas, Blackboard) optimized for K-12 and university course delivery; self-paced course platforms (Teachable, Thinkific, Kajabi) optimized for solo creators selling pre-recorded courses; and a newer live-teaching-first category that bundles real-time video with the LMS workflow.
Classentra sits in the third category. The product treats live sessions as the primary unit of work — attendance auto-captures, assignments tie to sessions, parents see progress, payments route directly to your bank through Stripe Connect. Functionally it's a TMS + LMS in one — most 'LMS' tools require an external scheduling and instructor-management tool grafted on top; Classentra ships both natively. If your business depends on showing up live every week, the live-first shape fits.
Three LMS shapes
Pick the one that matches how you actually teach
Classic Institutional LMS
Moodle, Canvas, Blackboard
- Primary use case
- K-12 / university course delivery
- Live teaching
- Add-on or external (Zoom embed)
- Pricing model
- Per-seat enterprise contract
- Setup time
- Weeks; needs IT setup
Self-Paced Course Platform
Teachable, Thinkific, Kajabi
- Primary use case
- Solo creator selling pre-recorded courses
- Live teaching
- None native
- Pricing model
- Flat monthly + transaction fee
- Setup time
- Hours
Classentra (live-first LMS)
Live-teaching-first cloud LMS
- Primary use case
- Independent teachers running recurring live sessions
- Live teaching
- Native Daily / LiveKit video
- Pricing model
- Free + $19–$179 / mo + 0–3% Stripe Connect
- Setup time
- Minutes
Capabilities
Everything an LMS should ship in 2026
Six capabilities every live teacher needs — bundled, not bought as add-ons.
Live video
Native Daily and LiveKit sessions with auto-attendance, recording, and chat. No Zoom round-trip; recordings save to the course library.
Attendance tracking
Auto-captured per session. Late arrivals, excused absences, attendance trends — surface in the gradebook and parent reports.
Assignments + grading
Rubrics, AI-drafted feedback you review and send, file submissions, manual grade override. Half the grading time on language and writing subjects.
Payments via Stripe Connect
0% transaction fee on Pro, 3% on Solo. Payouts route directly to your bank — no platform middleman, no two-week hold.
Student communications
Announcements hit dashboard + email + in-app. Direct messages per course. Parent read-only links for K-12 students.
FAQ
Common questions about Classentra as an LMS
- What is an LMS?
- A Learning Management System hosts courses, enrolls students, tracks progress, and often handles payments. The term covers institutional tools like Moodle to solo-teacher tools like Classentra.
- How is Classentra different from Moodle or Canvas?
- Moodle and Canvas are designed for institutional course delivery — long setup, per-seat licensing, weak live-teaching support. Classentra is a cloud LMS for independent teachers running recurring live sessions, with native video, Stripe Connect payouts, and minutes-not-weeks setup.
- Is Classentra free?
- Yes. Free tier supports up to 25 students, $500 monthly GMV cap, 7% Stripe Connect fee. Upgrade to Solo ($19), Pro ($59), or Business ($179) for higher caps and lower fees.
- Can I run live classes on Classentra?
- Yes — native Daily and LiveKit video sessions with auto-attendance, recording, and chat. You can also embed Zoom, Meet, or Teams if you prefer your existing setup.
- Does Classentra replace my course platform?
- If your course is live-first (recurring sessions, attendance matters, assignments are graded), yes. If your course is fully self-paced video playback and you don't run live sessions, Teachable / Thinkific may fit better.
- Can I migrate from Teachable, Skool, or Thinkific?
- Yes. We offer manual white-glove migration — see /migrate-from-skool, /migrate-from-teachable, or /vs/thinkific for the specific flow. No automated importer yet.
- Does Classentra just embed videos, or is there a way for students to practice?
- Practice loops, not just videos. Assignments tie to sessions, rubrics tie to assignments, AI drafts feedback you review and send, and the gradebook tracks mastery over time. Course completion ≠ knowledge retention — Classentra makes the application half of learning a first-class workflow, not an afterthought.
- Is the AI an add-on or built into the product?
- AI-native, not AI-bolt-on. Announcement drafts, quiz generation, study-help streaming, redacted note suggestions, and action-log summaries all live inside the workflow they help — not in a separate chat sidebar grafted onto a legacy LMS. Every AI tool has an explicit token quota per plan and shows up in your usage dashboard.
Start with the LMS built for live teaching
Free forever for up to 25 students. Upgrade when you outgrow it.
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