Adobe Connect is a web conferencing platform that enables users to create presentations, online training materials, and learning modules. The product is entirely Adobe Flash-based and has several add-ons for customizing its software to suit each users’ unique needs.
$50
per host/per month
Camtasia
Score 8.9 out of 10
N/A
Some video solutions on the market are super-easy to use, but deliver lackluster results. Others deliver professional quality video, but the learning curve is extreme. Camtasia aims to enable anyone to quickly start creating pro-quality videos in minutes with no video experience needed. Camtasia can capture everything happening on the screen with just a few clicks, and offers drag-and-drop editing and visual effects features to transform screen recordings into polished software…
$299
one-time fee per user
Pricing
Adobe Connect
Camtasia
Editions & Modules
Meetings
$50
per host/per month
Webinars & Learning
$130
per host/per month
Small Meetings
Free
Forever free for up to 3 participants
Education
$212.99
one-time fee per user
Government & Non-Profit
$269
one-time fee per user
Business
$299.99
one-time fee per user
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
Adobe Connect
Camtasia
Free Trial
Yes
Yes
Free/Freemium Version
No
No
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
No
No
Entry-level Setup Fee
No setup fee
No setup fee
Additional Details
—
*Discounts available for purchases supporting a large volume of users.
Adobe Connect provides a higher level of participant interaction and flexibility in creating small groups and discussions. It also provides a consistent and persistent virtual meeting room where all content and engagement tools can be saved and reused. The ability to export and …
It is a great resource for evaluating, refining, and combining abilities and essential experiences in the growth of the sales team training; It is productive and lucrative in terms of distance knowledge transfer, and it reduces employee training financing and expenditures. I really like the ability to collaborate as a group on a huge research project even when we are not in the same country.
Camtasia is so easy to use that I recommend it over Adobe Premiere, Captivate, Storyline, and other tools. The only problem is the price. Due to the fact that I purchased this for education purposes, and educational prices have gone up exponentially, it has been difficult even at $179 to upgrade, as an educator and the organization is not always willing to reimburse the purchase, it would have been more economical. It was less than $100 (Black Friday) when I bought our updated version in 2019. Camtasia profile accounts aren't the best setup, however. My profile account does not reflect when I was a user or show past invoices, and I wanted to see how long ago I was a user.
The overall connection and lag sometimes are disruptive. This may not be due to the platform as a whole, connectivity, and strength of the signal is probably a factor but it can get glitchy sometimes.
More features for remote desktop options, whiteboarding, or screen sharing to actively resolve issues would be great while collaborating.
Online support or forums to help assist with issues aren't as prevalent as you think they'd be. More individual resources to assist with issues would be helpful.
USB Microphones can sometimes cause a problem if they become accidentally unplugged during a recording session. This can corrupt some of the files that the Camtasia Recorder application uses to capture directly to .avi mode.
You'll sometimes get a message when you next try to record that .avi mode isn't available and the only way to fix this is by completely uninstalling and reinstalling Camtasia (with a reboot in the middle of these two actions).
This bug only manifested after Camtasia 8 was released, but still seems to cause an issue right up to and including Camtasia 2021.
I'd like to see more standard Annotation options. The existing ones are pretty good, but variety is a little lacking.
More 'Behaviours' would also be really welcome as these are a great feature and make Callouts a bit more interesting and lively. I've not seen any new Behaviours over the past few versions (since Camtasia 2018).
The longer you use Adobe Connect, the longer you are likely to use it. Because you can build more and more resources over time, creating rooms that you re-use, recorded content you can repurpose, and tools that form the basis of ever increasing productivity, the more you use Connect, the more productive you become. Unlike competing products where, with every meeting you essentially start over -- setting up your resources for each meeting -- in my Connect rooms, I have highly tuned tools to accomplish my knowledge transfer goals. When I want to conduct another session - I send a link out to the appropriate room and instantly we are all focusing on getting a job done together. This ability of Adobe Connect to make you productive at an ever quickening rate is a competitive advantage
Each release of Camtasia has added just enough functionality to justify the upgrade to the new version. I like that Camtasia is not a subscription-based product as we have more flexibility and control over our spend on the product. We can also purchase support packages that include the next version when released.
As sophisticated a product as Adobe Connect, the ease of use is outstanding. In my experience, even a user with very little knowledge of Adobe Connect can begin using and even leading sessions with very little training to get started with the basic features. Additional training is needed to become comfortable with the number of available features, but learning curve even for those is no steeper than would normally be expected from similar software.
I haven't used another video recording and editing tools that is as comprehensive and straight-forward as Camtasia. Typically, if you want a user-friendly video editing tools for novice users, you have to compromise on features. Camtasia solves this problem by offering extensive editing features in a simplistic, user-friendly environment. Highly recommend
The customer support of Adobe connect is professional and well-skilled for resolving our minor and major issues. Moreover, it has almost all the features that will provide you a secure connection, with people across the world. Education institutes can also implement this software. On the basis of its quality and technology, I will surely advise you to try it once.
With the latest version (Camtasia 2020), I actually had problems with an Imac with HighSierra, but from the first moment they answered and guided me to solve the problem, even before making the purchase (with some doubts I had). And they have support in English and Spanish, I really liked that.
The ability to have most of the functionality of a full LMS at a fraction of the cost is huge. I can create manage and deploy both synchronous and asynchronous training based on the situation and all of my training is tracked through a series of easily created reports
Prices do not seem to vary much among resellers of the Adobe Connect hosted license; the only price variation you're likely to find are among the audio providers. When implementing, you may also wish to look into expanding the amount of storage you are allowed on the server to avoid any problems later on as your library of files starts to build up
Actually, it was the other way around....we were using Adobe Connect, company-wide, then switched over to Zoom, mostly, I think, as a cost-cutting measure. But some Learning & Development folks campaigned to be allowed to retain some Adobe Connect licenses (for example, one L&D area had literally over 250 room layouts that their course facilitators could just jump into and use to deliver a course on short notice), which also allows some of us to continue to publish Presenter and Captivate modules to the Adobe server. (But, even those of us who still have Adobe Connect licenses use Zoom for most regular business meetings.)
I've tried several freeware recorders, too. If all you want to do is literally record your screen, and nothing else, you don't need Camtasia. There are literally dozens of apps that will do that. If you want an app that will record your screen while capturing mouse clicks, follow you, record your voice while you capture, and annotate when you're done, Camtasia has no equal. Plus, it doesn't stop there. You can add professional intros and outros (many already created to choose from), lower thirds, etc., leading to videos with very high production value. This is THE program to buy if you want to produce training videos of very high quality.
Save on time - our instructors and people that use the platform can teach more classes and more often than in-person training and time traveling.
We cut down on spending. When we offer training using Connect - we do not have to spend on meals, hard copy materials, and reserving a venue to deliver training.
We increase our training sales significantly but offering Connect as an alternative - any unforeseen cancellations to a public class can result in transferring to a remote online Connected class.
