Wondering how Open edX® became so popular in less than a decade? Seeking information about what is Open edX? What makes it better than the competition? Why are organizations shifting towards it? Don’t worry, we have all the answers for you!
In the past decade, online education has shown great potential by enabling eLearning platforms like never before. The eLearning industry is constantly growing, and it is yielding a lot of revenue for companies. According to Forbes, the eLearning market is expected to reach $325 billion by 2025, showing the huge potential of the ed-tech market.
eLearning platforms and MOOCs like Coursera and Udemy have revolutionized the ed-tech landscape in a short time with the help of technology. Online courses by eLearning platforms have become a part of learners’ daily lives, followed by educational institutions that have also started to offer online degree programs. Seeing all the progress, Open edX® came into being to facilitate online education worldwide.
What is Open edX?
Open edX® was created by the joint efforts of Harvard University and MIT for the well-known learning platform edX. It is an open-source, learning management system (LMS) that empowers organizations worldwide to design customized and engaging online learning platforms. Open edX® enables companies to host MOOCs with useful features such as virtual classes and training programs.
The Open edX® project by edX caters to higher education institutions, government organizations, and enterprises of all sizes. The flexibility and diversity of Open edX® make online learning a breeze. Since it is open-source, it is constantly evolving and improving its offerings with the aid of a robust group of technology partners.
Read more about what is Open edX here.
What is an open-source platform?
Open-source platforms are software whose code is free to use and publicly available, and it can be modified and redistributed. The biggest advantage of an open-source learning management system is its flexibility to be customized according to the clients’ needs. Open-source platforms are highly secured and provide the ownership of the data with high-quality services.
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Who are the competitors of Open edX?
Open edX® is not the only open-source LMS. There are other players in the ed-tech industry that can classify as the direct competitors of Open edX®. However, Open edX® is the leading not-for-profit LMS platform. Some of the most prominent competitors of Open edX® are mentioned below:
- Moodle
- Canvas
- Thinkific
- Sakai
- TalentLMS
- GoSkills
Who is currently using Open edX?
Open edX® powers over 380 websites by providing an open-source learning management system. As discussed earlier, the platform is used by various educational institutions and organizations. The following type of users use Open edX®:
- Big giants like Google, Microsoft LaaS, McKinsey use Open edX® for their employees’ training and onboarding process.
- Top universities of North America, the Middle East, and China use Open edX® to provide engaging and interactive learning content to their students. Moreover, Open edX® helps them track the students’ progress, and the open-source nature of it helps them modify the interface.
- Small and Medium-scale organizations use Open-edX to meet their specific goals and objectives. They can be creative and innovative thanks to Open edX®.
What makes Open edX better than others?
Open edX® is the only last generation open-source platform that has complete features for online learning. One of the primary reasons for the success of Open edX® is the popularity of learning management systems in general.
Organizations are looking for a better alternative to their existing LMS system, and an open-source LMS is a perfect alternative as it provides much more powerful features. Moreover, organizations can leverage Open edX community xBlocks to enhance the functionality of their LMS. Open edX LTI tools can be used for communicating with external software, making Open edX better than many other platforms. Let’s explore the possible reasons why Open edX® is used worldwide:
1. Adaptive Learning
Open edX® allows content creators to interact with their learners synchronously and asynchronously and provide individual support to each learner. It also helps them generate engaging and interactive content for their students that helps them build better concepts and solve problems. McKinsey has established their online academy using Open edX®.
2. Rich Variety of Content
The other convenience of Open edX® is its powerful features such as polls, wikis, social media tools, videos, exercises, and much more. The wide variety of content types enables the content creators to design content that increases the students’ skills and competencies.
3. Self-Paced Progress Dashboard
Students can learn at their own pace on Open edX® powered platforms. They can keep track of their progress and receive instant feedback from their course instructors. The Open edX® dashboard is informative and straightforward for both learners and instructors.
4. Powerful Analytics
Insights and analytics give Open edX® comprehensive edge over its competitors. Reports can be generated to detect problems faced by students. The insights provided by the reports can be used to improve the course and can help the course creators by providing real-time feedback.
Open edX® is being used worldwide from Japan to China and from France to the United States. Its flexible nature and ability to customize make it suitable for most of the companies out there.
If you are planning to start your own eLearning business using Open edX®, don’t hesitate to request a free demo.
