7 Best Instructional Design Software for Elevating Your Courses in 2024

The right instructional design software is essential for success in the ID industry. Proficiency in software, combined with instructional design skills is the secret to better work performance. Whether you're a freelance instructional designer or part of a corporate team, this article is for you!

As an expert in the education tech industry, we spend most of our time researching online tools and software for educators across the web. That's why you can heavily rely on our recommendations on the best tools on the internet!

We understand the time constraints on ID professionals who have more critical tasks than researching instructional design software. Here's our curated list to help you choose the best ID software in each category:

Learning Management System - Teachfloor
Assessment and Survey Tool - PaperForm
Online Whiteboard and Design Tool - Canva for Education
Learning Video Creation Tool - Youtube
Authoring Software - SCORM Hero
Presentation Tool - Pitch
Content Management and Sharing - Padlet

The Best Instructional Design Software to Enhance Your Work Performance.

Teachfloor. Awarded as the “2023 Rising Star in Top Learning Management System”

FinanceOnline has recognized Teachfloor as the 2023 Rising Star in Top LMS. Teachfloor’s cutting-edge technology, easy-to-use platform, and useful functionalities stand out from the rest and have made it the favorite among instructional designers.

Furthermore, Teachfloor leads the way in creating collaborative and social learning environments. With several years in the education tech industry, our team meticulously designed the platform, incorporating valuable features like peer review to support instructional designers in their success.

Teachfloor stands out for several reasons as the most favored LMS of ID professionals:

User-friendly design: When it comes to LMS, simplicity in user interface and navigation saves time for both designers and learners. Teachfloor is known for its elegance and intuitive design that eliminates the distractions from ID professionals.

Good news! Teachfloor offers a 15-day free trial for instructional designers who are using our platform for the first time! Never miss this free trial and sign up now!

Seamless tool integration: With Teachfloor, you can effortlessly embed over 100 of your favorite online tools, creating a smooth learning environment without the need to switch tabs or ask students to sign up elsewhere. Embed tools effortlessly on Teachfloor!

Customizable learning: Teachfloor recognizes that effective learning isn't one-size-fits-all. Their flexible course builder, code blocks, tags, and localization functionality enable instructional designers to tailor transformative learning experiences to individual student needs.

Teachfloor Instructional Design Software

Ready-made course templates: Whether you're creating corporate training classes, Teachfloor offers pre-built templates like employee onboarding, self-paced, hybrid, and mastermind courses to expedite course creation."

Best Ways to Use Teachfloor in Your Course Creation:

Streamline employee onboarding training for your clients.
Foster community-based learning with Teachfloor's built-in community, direct messaging, and in-app notifications.
Expand various online courses using our flexible course builder, course calendar, and our automated payment collection.
Boost learner engagement through automated submission and peer reviews.
Gain access to resources written by industry experts in education and learning.

Workflow optimization and productivity are just two ingredients to better work performance as an instructional designer. Gaining a skill with the right LMS to execute this is a true gem!

After learning about Teachfloor, let's move on to other instructional design software that you also need to perform better at work. Bonus point: you can easily integrate them into Teachfloor's app! Ready? Let's jump in!

PaperForm. Not Your Typical Assessment Tool.

PaperForm is your partner when it comes to creating assessments and online forms. It’s flexible and easy to use. Yet you can create dynamic forms, surveys, payments, and more in just one go! Not only that, it’s beautifully designed with stunning templates. It has several uses:

Definitely replaces Google Forms, Typeform, and Jotform for surveys and assessments.
Schedule calls and bookings inside PaperForm and connect it to your calendar.
Sign documents and contracts with Papersign.
Connect to your favorite instructional design software.

The good thing is that PaperForm can be integrated into Teachfloor in 4 steps! How cool is that? Here’s a simplified guide on how to create forms for Teachfloor:

Sign up for a Paperform account (14-day free trial, no credit card needed).
Create your form with 500+ designer-made templates.
Watch the overview video or use the step-by-step guide to begin.
After creating your form, connect your Paperform forms to Teachfloor with Zapier.

Canva for Education: The Ultimate Design Tool for Free

Canva is renowned for its user-friendly, drag-and-drop interface and extensive customization options, transforming ordinary content into extraordinary creations. With a vast template library and collaborative features, it's the preferred choice for instructional designers.

Moreover, Canva for Education is a no-cost instructional design software available to eligible schools, benefiting teachers and students. Here are some ways to leverage Canva in online courses and training design:

Create video presentations with Canva AI in minutes.
Generate various graphics and presentations for live sessions.
Facilitate collaborative brainstorming with students using Canva's online whiteboard.
Utilize ready-made templates to craft animations, GIFs, and infographics.

Lastly, integrating Canva into Teachfloor is effortless. Here's how:

YouTube: The Instructional Design Software for Learning Videos

While other tools like Loom, Movavi, Vimeo, and Invideo are excellent, we recommend YouTube as the top choice. Many instructional designers are now venturing into edutainment, combining education and entertainment in their videos, a popular trend on YouTube.

What sets YouTube apart?

Though YouTube is known for public content, this is advantageous for instructional designers. You can recommend to your clients to share learning videos by building and growing a YouTube account. It's free and could be an additional income stream for institutions and schools.

On the other hand, if you prefer privacy, YouTube offers unlisted and listed features. Unlisted ones ensure the content remains private unless you share the link with non-students.

Moreover, you can seamlessly embed YouTube videos in Teachfloor or any other web app. Whether it's for your client or freelance work, YouTube is the ideal choice for learning videos. Learn how to create a YouTube channel here!

SCORM Hero. The Easiest E-Learning Authoring Tool for Free.

If you’re looking for a straightforward authoring tool for SCORM files, look no further than SCORM Hero. This free SCORM converter excels in handling content from PowerPoint, videos, documents, or starting from scratch. With an impressive 4.8/5 rating from real users on Capterra, it's a reliable instructional design software.

Here’s how it operates:

Upload your file (PowerPoint, video, or PDF) to their website
Customize your course (quiz, videos, and audio)
Download and publish to your favorite LMS

👉🏻 Here’s an easy-going guide on how to publish your SCORM file in Teachfloor.

Pitch.com. Your Modern Instructional Design Software for Presentations

Pitch.com, a cloud-based presentation software, is an excellent rival of Google Slides. Pitch gains popularity due to its real-time collaborative capabilities, extensive high-quality 3D and 2D media library, and integrated communication features.

Unlike Google Slides, Pitch allows for dynamic teamwork while creating presentations. It offers a diverse array of visual assets to enhance engagement, simplify communication within the platform, and eliminate the need for external chats or video calls. Moreover, Pitch is a strong competitor in the presentation software arena.

Here’s a short clip on how to embed Pitch into Teachfloor:

Padlet. Versatile Content Sharing Software for ID Professionals

Padlet stands out as a versatile content-sharing and management tool. It's a freemium platform that simplifies the collection, organization, and presentation of various media like images, links, text, and videos, making it a valuable asset for instructional designers.

Notably, Padlet has introduced an innovative feature where it generates images, enhancing the creative potential of its users. By selecting the 'I can't draw' option and entering your desired text, Padlet produces custom images, akin to DALL·E, a text-to-image generation tool.

This new dimension adds to Padlet's utility, allowing instructional designers to explore and enhance their content in creative and engaging ways, making it an essential tool for the field.

And like other tools, Padlet can be directly embedded into Teachfloor’s platform:

Have a Better Work Performance with this Instructional Design Software Toolkit!

Now that we've come to the end, we could say you're now fully equipped to perform better at work. Being an instructional designer can be challenging, especially when you're not familiar with the best instructional design software.

We hope you gain something from our efforts. These may not be the most complete tools, however, you will never go wrong with these tools to improve your work performance.

Other articles we've written to help you in your instructional design journey:

‍