Skip to content
Z Zendikt
M
Education LMS Software · Rank #5 of 10

Moodle review and pricing

Global open-source LMS default; dominant in non-US higher-ed.

By Moodle Pty Ltd · Founded 2002 · Perth, Australia · private

Moodle, founded 2002 by Martin Dougiamas, is the most-deployed LMS globally with hundreds of millions of learners across over 100,000 sites. The core platform is open-source under GPL and freely self-hostable; Moodle Pty Ltd. (the commercial steward) sells MoodleCloud (managed hosting), Moodle Workplace (the corporate-focused fork covered in our [Top 10 LMS Software](/top-10-lms-software) ranking), and works through a global network of Moodle Partners for institutional implementations. Moodle dominates European, Latin American, Indian, and African higher-ed. Strengths: open-source flexibility, no vendor lock-in, largest plugin ecosystem in any LMS, data sovereignty for self-hosters. Trade-offs: "free" understates real cost at university scale (hosting, sysadmin, plugin maintenance, security patching, accessibility audits); UI is functional but dated compared with Canvas; partner-quality varies widely. The honest message: Moodle is free software with real implementation cost at scale.

Visit Moodle Vendor pricing Compare to Blackboard Learn (Anthology)
Best for

Universities and educational institutions globally that want open-source flexibility and data sovereignty, especially in EU, Latin America, India, Africa where Moodle is the default higher-ed LMS.

Worst for

Small K12 districts (overkill, Google Classroom or Schoology better), institutions without dedicated LMS sysadmin resources, buyers wanting polished commercial product with single-vendor SLA.

Vendor Trust Score

Is Moodle a trustworthy vendor?

8.3/10
High trust
Pricing transparency
Published rates; no hidden fees
7.5
Contract fairness
Reasonable terms; no auto-renew traps
8.5
Incident response
How they handle outages and breaches
7.0
Post-acquisition behavior
Customer treatment after M&A or PE
9.0
Executive stability
Leadership churn over 24 months
9.0
Roadmap honesty
Public commitments held
8.5
Trust signal log
  • 2002-08-20
    Moodle 1.0 released as open-source GPL LMS
  • 2024-09-22
    Founder-led for 23+ years; open-source LMS market leadership maintained globally
Vendor Trust is scored independently of product quality. A great product from an unfair vendor still earns a low trust score.
Review Intelligence

What 3,700 reviews actually say

Synthesized from G2, Capterra, Reddit, Trustpilot. Patterns >15% prevalence shown.

Last synthesized
2026-04-29

Praise patterns

  • Open-source flexibility and plugin ecosystem unmatched
    81% →
  • Data sovereignty for self-hosters
    71% →
  • Lowest license cost at large scale
    64% →

Complaint patterns

  • UI feels dated vs Canvas
    51% →
  • Total cost of ownership higher than "free" implies
    44% →
  • Moodle Partner quality varies widely
    38% →
Sentiment trend (6 months)
76/100 0 pts
12
01
02
03
04
05
Patterns are extracted from review corpus and human-verified. We surface trends, not anecdotes.
Verified Pricing

What buyers actually pay

220 anonymized deal disclosures · last updated 2026-05-01

Contribute your deal price

No verified pricing data yet for Moodle.

Be the first to contribute →
Verified pricing is crowdsourced from buyers under anonymity guarantees. Vendor-listed prices are validated against actual deals quarterly.
Compliance & Security

Auto-verified certifications

Verified 2026-05-01
SOC 2 Type II
ISO 27001
HIPAA
GDPR
CCPA
PCI DSS
FedRAMP

Editorial: Strengths

  • Open-source GPL with no vendor lock-in
  • Largest plugin ecosystem in any LMS
  • Self-hostable for data sovereignty
  • Dominant in European, Latin American, Indian, African higher-ed
  • Lowest license-cost ceiling for large-scale deployments
  • Strong LTI 1.3 + standards support

Editorial: Weaknesses

  • "Free" understates real hosting + sysadmin + plugin maintenance cost at scale
  • UI is functional but dated vs Canvas
  • Moodle Partner implementation quality varies widely
  • No central commercial support unless via paid partner

Key features & integrations

  • +Open-source core LMS
  • +Largest plugin marketplace in any LMS
  • +Gradebook with multiple grading scales
  • +Assignments, Quizzes, Forums, Workshops
  • +LTI 1.3 + Caliper support
  • +Mobile app (official Moodle App)
  • +Multi-language (100+)
  • +BigBlueButton web conferencing native plugin
2000+ integrations
Microsoft 365Google WorkspaceZoomBigBlueButtonTurnitinH5PMahara
Geography supported
Global; dominant in EU, Latin America, India, Africa higher-ed
Best fit
50–500,000+ students employees · Universities, schools, corporate (via Moodle Workplace)
Editorial deep-dive

Read our full ranking of Education LMS Software

Moodle ranks #5 in our editorial review of 10 education lms software platforms. The deep-dive covers methodology, comparison tables, decision matrix, migration scoring, and FAQs.

Read the full ranking

Closest alternatives in Education LMS Software

#4
Blackboard Learn (Anthology)
Legacy higher-ed enterprise incumbent; renewal-only story in 2026.
★ 3.7 opaque
#6
D2L Brightspace
Higher-ed leader in Canada and Australia; strong K12 and corporate adjacencies.
★ 4.1 opaque
#3
Schoology Learning
PowerSchool-owned K12 LMS with strong gradebook and SIS pairing.
★ 4.2 opaque
Help the next buyer

Contribute your verified deal price

Pricing in B2B software is opaque because vendors want it that way. Verified buyer prices fix that, anonymously. Share what you actually paid for Moodle; we’ll add it to the verified pricing dataset on this page (with company size band only, no identifying details).

Submit anonymously