Which are the Favorite eLearning Authoring Tools?

Posted by Nicole Fougere on . There have been 5 comments.

Here are some more interesting figures from a different Tagoras report this time called “Association E-Learning: State of the Sector” (my last post focused on a report about LMS costing / implementation time). This one was released over a year ago in March 2009 so the figures may have changed a little, but this time they are in relation to eLearning authoring tools and who’s using what.

From the summary: The report is primarily based on a survey of associations from November 20 – December 19, 2008. Out of the 488 responses received: 61.1 percent were from individuals who indicated that their organization is currently using e-learning. An additional 26.2 percent indicated they plan to start using e-learning within the coming 6 to 12 months, while 12.7 percent indicated they have no plans to start using e-learning in the coming 12 months.

Anyway – on with the interesting figures that reveal who’s using what to design their online learning content:

  • 60.4% Microsoft PowerPoint
  • 24.8% LMS/LCMS tools
  • 13.5% Articulate Presenter
  • 8.1% Adobe Captivate
  • 7.2%  Camtasia (Techsmith)
  • 3.7% Adobe Connect
  • 1.4% Lectora (Trivantis)

Looks like PowerPoint is still the favorite by a long shot, probably because Microsoft Office would be the all-purpose product suite of choice for most organizations – even before moving in to eLearning – so it’s a natural extension. Plus, it is the base tool that many of the others listed above build on and also because of the familiarity we have with using Microsoft tools.

I see they have done a February 2010 follow up to this report but I couldn’t find an update to these particular figures; it would be interesting to know how things are changing. Maybe it’s time to put together another survey…I’ll work on that.

 @Schnicker

Posted in:

  • http://www.adobe.com/products/elearningsuite/ Allen Partridge

    Nicole, nice to see you researching in this area. You might want to look at a couple of 2010 eLearning Guild reports … I think both are authored by Patti Shank. A chart in “Getting Started in e-Learning:Rapid eLearning” lists 2010 Guild Survey results (a larger sample) and shows some interesting growth.

    68.8 % reported using Adobe Captivate, while 25.7% reported using Articulate presenter. Growth in both cases compared to PPT use which seems to be on the decline over the past few years for eLearning content authoring. (Disclaimor, I’m the eLearning Evangelist for Adobe).

    It’s an interesting perspective that focuses more on rapid eLearning. Anyway – look forward to hearing how your own investigation goes.

    –Allen

  • Maisy

    Hi Nicole, I found this article answered a couple of concerns that I have. I am torn between which tool to use. Currently I have Captivate, but as I am about to embark on a huge eLearning project, I am keeping my fingers crossed that I have chosen the right tool. I found the comment above interested that more people are using Captivate, is this information correct? I’m torn between Presenter and Captivate!

  • http://www.litmos.com Nicole Fougere

    Hi Maisy and Allen – thank you both for your comments.

    @Maisy The usage figures I quoted are correct from that particular report. You can find them re-listed again in the Tagoras report on LMSs (http://www.tagoras.com/docs/Tagoras-Association-LMS-Report-Overview.pdf)

    It is also worth checking out the February eLearningGuild report Allen mentioned in his comment as it is more recent and the numbers are different again. You will need to sign up if you aren’t already a guild member, then that report is available here: http://www.elearningguild.com/research/archives/index.cfm?id=139&action=viewonly

  • http://twitter.com/tagoras Tagoras – Jeff Cobb

    Nicole – Thanks for mentioning the report here. I’d emphasize that these figures are from trade and professional associations, and the sector is still in pretty early days with respect to e-learning (at least as compared to corporations and academia). The biggest delivery method by far is Webinars, which were included in the definition of e-learning for this report, and that alone probably explains the major emphasis on PPT.

    The 2010 follow up was more of an interim step. We will, in fact, be running the full survey again soon to measure how much has change in the figures above as well as in the many other areas covered by the report.

    Jeff
    http://www.tagoras.com

  • Anonymous

    Interesting stats there even if they’re almost 3  years old. I would bet that PPT is still on top but I’m doubtful that it’s the best tool for the job.