Embedded LMS
What an embedded LMS is, how it differs from a standalone LMS, and when it makes sense to build training into your own product.
What is an embedded LMS?
An embedded LMS (learning management system) is learning functionality built into another software product, so people take training, and sometimes create it, without leaving that product. Courses, progress tracking and reporting appear inside your own application under your own brand, instead of on a separate training site with its own login.
How is an embedded LMS different from a standalone LMS?
| Standalone LMS | Embedded LMS | |
|---|---|---|
| Where learners go | A separate training site or portal | Inside the product they already use |
| Sign-in | Usually a separate account | The learner's existing account in your product |
| Branding | The LMS's interface, with some theming | Your product's interface and brand |
| Learner data | Held in the LMS and exported or synced out | Tied to your own user records and available to your systems |
| Typical owner | L&D or HR team | Product, customer success or engineering team |
| Typical use | Internal employee training | Customer education, partner enablement, in-app guidance, training features inside software products |
A standalone LMS suits training that is its own activity, such as a company-wide compliance programme. An embedded LMS suits training that belongs next to the work, such as learning a feature while using it.
When does an embedded LMS make sense?
- Customer onboarding and education. New customers learn your product inside your product, at the point they need it.
- Training as a feature of your software. HR, workforce, compliance or community platforms let their own customers build and deliver courses to their people.
- Partner and reseller enablement. Partners get certified inside the portal they already use to work with you.
- In-workflow guidance. A short lesson or knowledge check appears in the middle of a task, rather than in a separate course catalogue.
- Multi-tenant platforms. Each of your customers needs their own courses, learners and branding, kept separate from everyone else's.
What does an embedded LMS need to do?
- Deliver content in your interface, as components you place in your own pages.
- Identify learners with your own user IDs, so there's no second account to manage.
- Track progress and results, and make that data available to your product through an API or events.
- Separate tenants, so each customer sees only their own content and learners.
- Support authoring, either by your team or by your users, if your product lets people create training.
- Meet your security and accessibility requirements, because the training runs inside your product.
How does Coassemble work as an embedded LMS?
Coassemble puts course creation, delivery and tracking inside your product or platform through a REST API and a set of embeddable components.
- Player components deliver a course, a collection of courses, or a single screen to a learner.
- Card and List components show a course or a browsable grid of courses.
- Builder components let your users create and edit courses, or a single screen, in your interface.
- Analytics components show course, collection and user-level reporting.
You identify each learner with a stable identifier from your own system when you load a component, so activity is tracked against your users without them needing a Coassemble account. A client identifier scopes users and content to each of your tenants. Your application can listen for in-page events as a learner moves through a course, receive webhooks when a course is created, started or completed, and read tracking data through the API. Because the components load inside your product, training is served from your own domain.
You create API keys, manage webhooks, review API requests and track usage for each tenant in the Developer console. People with the Owner or Developer role open it by selecting Developer in the navigation.
The same infrastructure sits behind it as the rest of Coassemble, with SOC 2 Type 1 and Type 2 reports, and the Classic learner experience independently verified as conforming to WCAG 2.2 Level AA. The full developer reference is at developers.coassemble.com.
Frequently asked questions
Do learners need a separate account?
No. Learners are identified by the ID your product already has for them.
Can I use existing SCORM courses in an embedded LMS?
In Coassemble, yes. You can upload an existing SCORM package and host it alongside authored courses, with attempt tracking and question-level results, or convert it into an editable course.
Can I still use a standalone LMS as well?
Yes. Coassemble courses can also be exported as SCORM 1.2 or SCORM 2004 and run in another LMS, so the same course can be delivered inside your product and in an LMS.