Choosing the best virtual classroom software for your school, institute, company, or organization is a challenging task to do. While choosing one should keep in mind the requirements like “Which software is easy to use?” or “Which platform enables me to teach the learners effectively?” or “Which one is least costly?” or “Which virtual software or platform will go on to be the most fun during teaching?”. The market for virtual classroom is vast and flourishing. You have a lot of options if you want to teach using an online virtual classroom platform.
Before we take a deep dive into how to choose the best virtual classroom software for your organization, it’s essential to understand what virtual classroom software is.
A virtual classroom is a video conferencing tool where instructors and learners engage with each other and with the learning material. The difference between a virtual classroom and video conferencing tools is that virtual classrooms offer an added set of essential features for the learning environment.
Virtual classroom software enables instructors to:
Communicate with students through audio/video and chat medium.
Display learning materials in documents, slide decks, or multimedia files.
Enrich the learning experience with screen-sharing and virtual whiteboard features.
Divide the learners into breakout rooms, which the instructor can join.
Engage the learners with polls, quizzes, and other mediums.
Record the sessions (and manage those recordings).
Examples of virtual classroom software can be MeritHub, Kaltura, etc.
You might have explored Zoom, Microsoft Team, or other tools Google Meet, etc. When it comes to online teaching, no platform in the world touches the depth that MeritHub provides. MeritHub is the most comprehensive, cost-effective, and globally used online classroom platform that covers all aspects of the tutoring business. Whatever you can think of in the physical classroom, you can do it in the online classroom.
It provides secure audio/video conferencing, online whiteboard, teacher and student management, scheduling, booking, drawing, pdf-ppt annotation, screen sharing, breakout rooms, and lesson recording in MP4 format. You can also store & share content, homework, assignments, and track all activities including attendance. No one can compete with the student engagement capabilities of MeritHub.
It can replace all disconnected applications like ZOOM, Google Meet, spreadsheets, Google Drive, and many other small apps that you are currently using to manage and track your business. It is already being used in 50 + countries and helping customers to enhance their teaching and learning experience.
Zoom is designed for online meetings but still works in Education. Zoom can help engage students, faculty, and staff for learning, collaboration, and administration no matter where education takes place. Zoom supports remote and hybrid learning environments for primary and secondary schools and higher education.
Zoom brings teams together to get work done in a frictionless and secure video environment. Its easy, reliable, and innovative video-first unified communications platform provides video meetings, voice, webinars, and chat across all devices and spaces.
Google Meet is one of the secure virtual classroom platforms available in the market. It’s a re-engineered service built for safe, high-quality business meetings. Google Meet uses the same secure-by-design infrastructure, built-in protection, and global network that Google uses to secure our information and safeguard our privacy.
Google Meet offers frictionless meetings as you have to set up an appointment and share the link with whom you want to meet. Google Meet is fully integrated with Google Workspace to join discussions directly from a calendar event or email invite. All the important event details are right there when you need them, whenever you are entering either from a laptop or mobile.
In this, we can prevent unwanted guests from entering the meeting with safety locks and automatic blocking of anonymous attendees. End sessions for everyone and prevent them from rejoining the call without the host’s permission. You can mute individual participants or everyone at once.
Webex is an online meeting platform that allows you to virtually meet with other people without leaving your home or office. Adaptable for any workstyle, role, or device so we can choose when, where, and how we work. It provides similar experiences for everyone regardless of geography, language, or communication style.
It is secure by design and private by default to defend against threats no matter where we work. It powers a new way of collaborating centered around the work we do. It provides interactive video conferencing features that encourage everyone to participate. It also increases productivity with AI-powered features, which help us get things done with fewer meetings.
It provides equal opportunity to everyone as it includes features that enable everyone to be seen, heard, and understood. It also reduces distractions and interruptions with advanced noise removal and speech enhancement. It also supports gesture recognition that uses simple hand gestures to express your feelings without saying a word.
If you wish for a virtual classroom that enables you to do everything you could do in a physical class and much more, then Adobe Connect is for you. You can also create storyboards to guide your participants’ visual attention to where you want on your stage. Once the perfect virtual set is ready, you can light it up with - images, multi-media, interactive courses, polls, quizzes, chats, or notes.
Hosts, presenters & participants can ‘walk in’ to persistent reusable rooms set up ahead of time. You can create and then re-use polls, quizzes, and content for a different audience or at another time. You can start with a blank whiteboard or overlay color, text, shapes & annotations to bring participants’ attention to where you’d like. Let your participants do the same & jam together on this virtual flipchart.
You can use a Q & A pod to have complete control over the visibility of questions, answers, and participant identities. Manage hundreds of questions in large webinars efficiently by assigning them to the right expert in the room.
WizIQ is another virtual classroom platform available in the market. You can get all the tools you need to train your students, customers, or partners. You can use WizIQ to create and sell your self-paced or live classes. Take your tutoring operations online into new markets through WizIQ with minimum investments. You can expand your reach and enroll students from across the globe.
WizIQ mobile apps for Android and iOS make learning portable and accessible 24/7 on personal hands-on devices. WizIQ can help engage students teachers for learning collaboration and administration, no matter where education occurs.
WizIQ K-12 education software offers schools a low-risk, quick and affordable way to take learning operations online. It helps you create a 24/7 digital learning environment, and you can integrate the WizIQ plugin to deliver live classes with your existing website, LMS or CMS. It offers a variety of blended learning and distance education courses.
WizIQ is an easy-to-use integrated learning delivery platform complete with a Virtual Classroom module, an in-built test creator, a report generator, a payment portal, and more. WizIQ helps you replicate the offline teaching experience online with its staple online classroom tools like a feature-rich digital whiteboard, breakout rooms, polling, raise the hand and live chat features.
VEDAMO is just another virtual classroom platform with which you can conduct live online classes with their virtual classroom, regardless of your location. You can also create your online academy to manage your courses, content, and learners. You can easily manage and blend traditional face-to-face tutoring with online learning.
Freelancers, consultants, mentors, etc., trust its flexible cloud-based services. It provides a live video-conferencing tutoring environment. You can create an unlimited number of live interactive online sessions and work with up to 50 users per session. You will also have complete control over your tutoring environment.
VEDAMO provides a platform for managing your courses, schedules, learners, and content in which you can:
Create and manage your courses and users from any device
Schedule, manage and blend virtual and face-to-face sessions
Keep all records of both online and traditional training in one place
Kaltura’s virtual classroom platform provides an easy-to-use experience purposely built for online instruction, standalone, or integrated into your LMS. Instructors and learners can engage with one click as if they are in the same room, and no installation is needed. Engage your learners through interactive tools like a whiteboard, screen sharing, breakout rooms, real-time notes, live quizzes, and more in an environment fully branded for your institution. Whether you’re teaching, conducting office hours, tutoring, or learning in a study group – Kaltura’s Online Classroom platform provides you with a dedicated learning environment.
Video drives student engagement, interactive learning experiences, and better learning outcomes. Kaltura Video Cloud Platform for Education is a single platform purposefully built to power real-time, live, and VOD experiences for online programs and virtual learning. The Kaltura Video Platform for Education includes a range of products for virtual classrooms, lecture capture, webinars & live events, and student outreach — all designed to create engaging, personalized, and accessible experiences on campus and beyond.
Fully customizable and designed to support unique experiences at scale. Kaltura Virtual Events platform provides the full range of video technology to support any event of any size. Multi-day or multi-track, live keynotes, webinars, lectures, workshops, or 1:1 chat. Kaltura Virtual Events platform provides the full video tech stack natively built into the platform.
LearnCube works in any browser, and we can use it without any downloads. It is explicitly designed for tutors and teachers. It has reliable audio, and video support optimized automatically on slow connections. It also has a feature of an online whiteboard in which we can draw, highlight and collaborate with students in real-time. It will automatically optimize the screen and video chat to focus on the quality conversation.
It also has a TextChat feature which allows us to do real-time chatting with other participants. It also offers private classes for 1:1 tutoring. Virtual hand raises & virtual ticks make learning in a virtual classroom fun. You can also upload your logo choose your platform's color and background. One can also share files & media, including Images, Video, Audio, PowerPoint, PDFs. If some students are absent in a class, then you can share past class content with them for review, including whiteboard annotations & files.
It works on Android as well as on iOS. You can easily schedule the classes and sync them with the calendar. You can also explore Features like track attendance, minutes taught, talk time, past sessions/classes, and more on LearnCube. You can also get high-quality learning material and lessons on the platform.
Teachers can also assign and manage personalized homework per student. LearnCube makes it easy to upload, save, and access your multimedia content instantly. It allows you to record live sessions; thus, organizations or schools can also see recordings to ensure teacher quality.
It is also a type of virtual classroom flooded with various features.
ClassIn app help teachers streamline summative and formative assessments. For example, you can use the platform to quickly create, distribute, and collect digital exit tickets or auto-graded assessments. Teachers also can pose discussion questions for quick insights into what students are thinking.
ClassIn started building a classroom online, where learners and educators can come together without regard to geographical barriers to learning and connecting. ClassIn is dedicated to building classrooms for the future. ClassIn virtual classroom is a student-centered environment where learners can connect with teachers, interact with educational content, and acquire knowledge through active learning behaviors.
Microsoft Teams is a widely used online platform for meetings. We can schedule online appointments with high-quality audio and video ahead of time or start one instantly. People inside and outside of your company can join from anywhere. Chats and files shared before, during, and after meetings are always available so that people can refer to them at any time. With free cloud storage included, shared files are always available across your devices, so it’s easy to work together in real-time or on your own time.
Your information is protected with data encryption, so you can collaborate without worrying about a data breach. Meet and chat about group assignments and collaborate on Word, Excel, and PowerPoint files in real-time. Teams also connect with many Learning Management Systems to help students collaborate.
Microsoft Teams is available on any device and has features designed to make students feel included, even if not in the classroom. Recorded classes are available so students can revisit content at their own pace. It also supports the social and emotional growth of your class. Get insights and connect each student with built-in tools that help connect student wellbeing to day-to-day class activities.
Create engaging assignments and customized learning experiences with office and other apps, websites, and content. Support literacy with reading progress, a free built-in tool designed to improve reading fluency.
Lesson Space is another virtual classroom software designed for students. Lesson Space is not just video conferencing software but a digital classroom with purpose-built tools for teaching subjects. Remotely control what your students can see and change using leading tools and locking functionality. Grab visual resources straight from the resource library without leaving the window. No fumbling with file uploads during a lesson.
Students are not required to download, install or update anything. Even no sign-up is required. They have to click the link to join the lesson. It consists of a top and locking feature in which you as a teacher can lock changes, mute, and force students to see what you see as you teach. Then unlock when it’s their turn to write or speak.
You can also configure your student’s tools to set what tools and features are available to your students in each space via the admin panel so that they only have access to what’s necessary.
The software uses various subject-specific multiplayer tools to teach visually on an infinite whiteboard. You can also upload your worksheets, images, or documents to annotate or import resources directly from the Resource Library.
This platform allows you to create, market, collaborate and sell your online courses, adaptive tests, and live classes. BrainCert is an all-in-one unified training platform that enables companies to conduct any custom training online. It also allows companies to deliver self-paced blended courses, certification exams, video conferencing, compliance training, skills development, customer training, new hire onboarding, and real-time collaboration using an integrated virtual classroom.
BrainCert is a social-learning platform designed for instructors to sell courses, tests, and live classes in the global marketplace with built-in social networking tools. It’s a complete white-label platform for organizations to quickly onboard, engage, collaborate, and retain customers with role-based access control. It offers real-time web conferencing powered by collaboration tools with a fully branded personalized link and vanity domains.
WebRTC based high-resolution audio and video conferencing with remarkable resiliency and multiple total HD participants without installing additional plugins. Server-side session recording without installing any other software or browser plugins. You can share and play them online for attendees.
You can also create interactive courses easily using their drag-and-drop course builder. Set one-time or recurring subscriptions, schedule live classes and deliver an engaging learning experience. You can also upload your background image or choose from their image library to customize your course theme to attract and engage new and existing students.
Blackboard Collaborate is a virtual classroom solution. Educators can encourage student collaboration in new innovative ways through interactive whiteboarding, chronological hand-raise notifications, extensive chat features, on-demand polls, moderated breakout groups, and more. Real-time feedback features mean instructors aren’t left guessing if their lesson is hitting the mark, and instructors can confidently engage their entire class through group discussions.
It helps instructors and students save time through their virtual classroom tool, which flattens the learning curve, typically requiring extensive collaboration software education. Blackboard Collaborate is an optimal virtual classroom solution, and when combined with Blackboard Learn, you can unlock a next-level digital learning experience.
Perhaps most importantly, Blackboard Collaborate establishes a safe, secure and reliable learning environment. Its virtual classroom solution enables faster online classroom access through browser-based use. Blackboard Collaborate eliminates app installation barriers, allowing learners to join anywhere on any internet-connected device. In addition, instructors and student collaboration are also restricted to only authorized educators and learners.