D2L Brightspace vs. Udemy Business

If you're an educational institution (K-12, Higher Ed, etc.), this is an amazing tool, and it will provide you all the functionality to support anything you may want and need it to do. If you are looking at Brightspace as a tool for corporate training, I'm not sure exactly how good or bad it will be for you. My guess would be that it likely depends on your organization's size. Along that line, what I can speak to is how we use it for our customized training and in-house professional development/training, and it works fantastically for that. While we primarily use it for normal higher ed coursework, we regularly do training and professional development for all of our employees and I manage those along with our HR department. Because we use it for many other things as well, all of our employees are familiar with the product, which makes our trainings go that much smoother and makes my job that much easier.

Incentivized

Udemy Business is well suited in some scenarios where it helps our team and new interns to onboard in team or particular project and helps in initial training , it provides certification and through learning , skills would be lifelong. I prefer it should be kinda more interactive and should have various platform like chats and all which could clear the doubts

Incentivized

• Allowing users to embed content links from YouTube or Google Drive enables learners to experience a richer lesson.
• Providing a powerful editor that allows developers to also include content from Adobe Stock as well as textbook publishers and cloud storage companies gives more power and creative ability to instructors.
• Providing scaling for mobile and traditional computer systems ensures students will not have issues on the go.
• The customization of home pages and groups enable courses to be used for small training sessions with breakout groups, large courses with separate sections, and even just more engaging courses that present themed icons and logos.

• Massive Course Catalog - Udemy has a tremendous selection of courses, enabling my reports to find pretty much any course they might be interested in.
• Multi-platform streaming - Udemy for Business offers apps across several different platforms, enabling my reports to be able to learn in the way they want to, at a time that is convenient for them.
• Learning Management - Udemy for Business offers me data and metrics on how my employees are engaging with their learning.

Incentivized

• One can feel a bit rushed on the Brightspace platform during the log-out period. Security requirements may require this, but it makes end-users more conscious about getting through content than taking notes.
• From my experience, there is not a direct connection between the platform and Outlook.
• Some content on the platform can feel redundant.

Incentivized

• The self learning part of assignments that I see in Udemy for Business are oversimplified and does not reflect actual complex scenarios that we see in major corporate offices. While it's easier to understand a course if the assignment is simple, Udemy for Business needs to have courses on more complex topics
• The content is generic in nature and is not tailored at an individual or professional level. For example, If I'm a product manager for pricing, I will find ton on courses which explains about existing pricing strategies. This is the basic thing and what i'm looking for is something that goes beyond these basic concepts
• there are too many courses that explains the same concept with almost 90% overlap. Finding the right content takes lot of time. It would be great if Udemy for Business could tell me what is the percentage overlap with the courses that I have already taken and recommend me better courses based on my needs

Incentivized

I would never give any system a perfect score. In the technology environment today we need to be constantly looking at ways to improve the user experience and LMS companies like Desire2Learn need to know that we have options today with other systems and they need to stay current with features and listen to their customers.

Udemy is integral part of the companies learning strategy to u-skill and cross skill workforce across departments and it is cost effective as well

Overall, the learning environment works as expected. However, there are plenty of bugs. For example, for a few versions, trying to print out a PDF from the Content screen in several browsers would produce a blank page. We inform D2L support about these issues, most of which are known issues. However, they are very slow to respond. D2L seems to spend more time selling than actually coding and testing their product. Most of the issues are not major -- however, there have been a few that are unbelievable. In fact, this past week we had a sudden issue where the "Submit" button in quizzes would not appear if users had a certain browser/operating system combination. This is a major problem, if students cannot submit their exams! D2L is slow to respond to these kinds of situations, which do occur more often than I would like.

First, creating custom courses was super easy and intuitive (unlike with their main competitor). Second, using Udemy to take courses was also intuitive and simple. Finally, though, the kicker for what makes Udemy super useful is its reporting and analytics. Again, Udemy's main competitor surprisingly lacks a ton of features related to reporting. I miss Udemy!

Incentivized

Both students and instructor enjoy the 24-hoiur access. After, all isn't that the point of online learning. As an instructor located in an Eastern time zone state it is great to connect with students located in a Pacific time zone state. I have gotten comments about the early hours I am in the course room grading assignments . . . 4:00 a.m. PST; 7:00 a.m. EST So, it's sleep time for my students and "first cup of coffee" time for me.

On a scale of 1-10, I would rate Udemy Business’s availability as a 9. The platform is highly reliable, offering on-demand access to courses anytime and anywhere, with very few reports of unplanned outages or application errors. Its robust infrastructure supports 24/7 learning for global teams, and users consistently praise its uptime and accessibility, though occasional minor issues may occur

Easy to navigate; little to no delay from one section of the course room to another; actually fun to use after overcoming the learning curve.

On a scale of 1-10, Udemy Business’s performance rates around 9. Pages and course content typically load quickly, and reports are generated in a reasonable timeframe, even for complex data. The platform’s integrations with other systems generally do not cause noticeable slowdowns, and users consistently praise its responsive interface and reliable speed for both learners and administrators

I have had excellent support from Desire2Learn. Any ticket that I submit is acknowledged immediately and the correction is usually almost as quick. We use this for thousands of classes and it is pretty well liked by both faculty and students. We have been using it for almost 4 years now and most of our instructors have become pretty proficient with it.

I haven't had to contact Udemy for Business for support reasons. I gave a 10 here because of it's availability across numerous platforms: Web, Windows, Mac, iOS, Android, even smart-tv apps make it trivially convenient to do some learning wherever you are. This helps my reports engage better with their learning, especially if they prefer to defer the training until the couch at home after work. It just makes for great user experience.

Incentivized

Did not participate in the in-person training due to distance; training was completed online

The training provided online did not, necessarily, fit the version of the system that I was using. Screens were somewhat different and not all options were readily available. This could have been due to customization on the part of my institution however, I rather believe it was due to version changes and training materials not yet being updated.

fter purchasing Udemy Business, you can rate courses using a star system and leave feedback. Courses maintain a high-quality standard with a minimum average rating of 4.4 out of 5. These ratings help organizations and learners assess the effectiveness of the training hence it we are making sure the online material will help us onboard better and set it up better. there will be room for improvement but I am sure the Udemy product team will do well

The D2L implementation team listened to our concerns and built a system based upon our needs. We wanted to keep them after the initial implementation.

mplementing Udemy Business typically involves setting up your organization’s account, integrating the platform with your existing systems, and customizing learning paths to align with business goals. Administrators can create tailored learning journeys by combining Udemy courses, custom content, and external resources, making it easy to onboard teams or upskill employees for specific projects. The process is supported by an intuitive user interface, seamless system integration, and access to customer success partners who help ensure your learning programs are effective and aligned with organizational objectives. Analytics and reporting tools provide actionable insights to monitor engagement and adjust learning strategies as needed, resulting in a flexible and impactful workforce development solution

I have used Blackboard Learn 8 and 9. I am currently learning about Canvas. Blackboard is overall much clunkier and lacks the intuitive feel in some parts of D2L. Its grade book is much harder to control and manipulate than D2L's. Its navigation menu can be more radically modified from the default than D2L's, but this doesn't seem that useful to me. Discussions in Blackboard can be more easily reorganized than in D2L, but no grading of discussions is possible. Blackboard Assignments is a good innovation which allows markup directly in the students' submissions, but it displays student work in a confusing manner that doesn't allow for any customization, and its markup options need further tweaking. Furthermore, no rubrics can be used in Blackboard in any way to grade any kind of work (that I am aware of). Overall, I would choose D2L over Blackboard.

Because it was very accesible and the courses offered were of interest to us specifically financial education and courses related to our investment banking office, which round our team's general knowledge of every single transaction made. This is an opportunity given to those who earn it and want it, not offered to everybody, we use it as an incentive.

Incentivized

n a scale of 1-10, Udemy Business’s contract terms and pricing structure would rate around 8. The pricing is transparent, with the Team Plan costing $360 per user annually for 2-20 users, while Enterprise plans for 21+ users are custom-priced through sales negotiation. Billing is typically annual and prepaid, which may limit flexibility but supports predictable budgeting. Additional fees apply for certain add-ons like Udemy Business Pro and language-specific course collections. Overall, the pricing is competitive and scalable for organizations of various sizes.

During my first semester working with Desire2Learn the integrated learning management system was more down than up. This meant reconfiguring assignment due dates, frustration for both the instructor, students, and help desk staff. After an upgrade, Desire2Learn has been reliable.

On a scale of 1-10, Udemy Business rates a strong 9 for overall scalability. Its enterprise-ready features, such as customizable learning paths, advanced group management, API integrations, and multi-language support, enable seamless deployment across departments and global sites. The platform is designed to grow with organizational needs, supporting both small teams and large enterprises efficiently

Based on user reviews and industry analysis, Udemy Business’s professional services are generally rated between 7 and 8 out of 10. Users appreciate the platform’s onboarding support, training resources, and customer service commitment, but some have noted slow response times and less comprehensive support compared to competitors. Overall, professional services are solid but may not match the depth offered by more specialized enterprise learning vendors.

• I cannot speak to whether this system is less expensive than the more fully featured Blackboard, but employees are far less efficient, frustrated, and require frequent calls to the help center to set up fairly simple course templates.
• I have been asked to consider teaching courses which will be completely online at my current institution. I have done such online courses several times at other universities, but I have decided Desire2Learn is too frustrating and cumbersome to do so. I am now exploring using Google Drive to teach a course online. Otherwise, I will not teach online until required or I find an alternate system.

• We trained more than 300 managers participating in our Leadership Academy through curated Udemy content that we articulated with live sessions
• When a project ends, we send our developers to a training academy so they can catch up on the latest industry trends and get ready for their next challenge, this has help us to reduce attrition

Incentivized