Thinkific and Kajabi are two platforms that stand out in this space, each offering a suite of tools tailored for educators and course creators.
These platforms often find themselves compared due to their significant roles in the market. Each brings unique strengths and features to the table, and choosing between them is a common dilemma for many.
If you are one of the people looking to find out which one is better. Then in this article, I will do a direct comparison between Thinkific vs Kajabi.
By the end of this exploration, you’ll have a clearer understanding of both Thinkific and Kajabi, which will help you make an informed decision for your online course business.
So, let’s get started.
What is Thinkific?
Thinkific is a platform that allows you to create, market, and sell online courses. Known for its user-friendly interface, it helps educators and entrepreneurs like you to transform your expertise into dynamic online learning experiences.
It provides flexibility to design courses that match your vision and offers effective tools to connect with and educate your audience effectively.
In the Thinkific vs. Kajabi comparison, Thinkific stands out for its simplicity and cost-effectiveness, making it ideal if you’re looking for a straightforward solution without extensive marketing features.
Additionally, with WooCommerce Thinkific integration, you can enhance your course selling capabilities and facilitate your operations.
Best Thinkific Features
Below are some of the best Thinkific features you can use to sell courses effectively:
- Drag-and-Drop Course Builder: Easily create courses with a user-friendly interface.
- Diverse Content Types: Supports videos, quizzes, and interactive content.
- Customizable Design: Tailor the look and feel of your courses to match your brand.
- Integrated Payment Gateways: Simplifies course sales with built-in payment processing.
- Marketing and Sales Tools: Equipped with features to help you promote your courses.
- Detailed Analytics: Track your course performance and student engagement.
- Responsive Customer Support: Quick and helpful support for any queries or issues.
Pros of Using Thinkific
- User-friendly interface and course creator
- Own your brand, content, and student data
- Wide range of integrations with popular tools
- Scales alongside your business growth
Cons of Using Thinkific
- Can get pricey on higher tiers
- Less flexibility in page templates than competitors
- Limited built-in email and sales funnel features
Let’s now look at its popular alternative – Kajabi.
What is Kajabi?
Kajabi is a comprehensive platform that serves as a one-stop shop for your online course creation and marketing needs. It stands out for its all-in-one approach, integrating course creation, website building, and marketing tools in one package.
It simplifies your process by allowing you to manage everything from a single dashboard. This makes it an excellent choice if you’re looking to simplify your workflow and centralize your operations.
Best Kajabi Features
Kajabi’s standout features make it a powerful tool in your online course creation process. Here’s a look at what sets Kajabi apart:
- All-in-One Platform: Combines course creation, marketing, and sales in one place.
- Powerful Course Builder: Offers advanced tools for creating engaging course content.
- Integrated Email Marketing: Features built-in tools for email campaigns and automation.
- Customizable Website Templates: Provides a range of templates for a professional web presence.
- Robust Marketing Funnel Tools: Includes tools for creating effective sales funnels.
- Comprehensive Analytics: Delivers detailed insights into course performance and student engagement.
- Membership and Community Features: Supports building a community around your courses.
Pros of Using Kajabi
- Simplified Course Management for handling all aspects of your course in one place
- Advanced Marketing Capabilities to effectively promote your courses
- High Customization Potential to align your courses and website with your brand
- Strong Community Building to foster student interaction and loyalty
- Effective Sales Funnel Integration to maximize course sales and conversions
Cons of Using Kajabi
- Higher Price Point reflecting its comprehensive feature set
- Learning Curve due to the breadth of features available
- Limited Course Marketplace requiring reliance on external marketing
- Fewer Third-Party Integrations compared to other platforms
- Heavier Platform which might be more than needed for simpler course setups
Thinkific vs Kajabi – Comparison Table
To give you a clearer picture of how Thinkific and Kajabi stack up against each other, let’s analyze a side-by-side comparison through the following table.
| Features | Thinkific | Kajabi |
|---|---|---|
| Course Creation | User-friendly course builder | Comprehensive course creation suite |
| Customization Options | Custom branding & site design | Advanced customization capabilities |
| Marketing Tools | Basic marketing tools included | Robust marketing & sales pipelines |
| Sales Pages | Built-in customizable sales pages | Optimized sales funnel integration |
| Student Engagement | Quizzes, surveys & student discussions | Community building features |
| Multimedia Support | Supports various multimedia formats | High-quality video hosting & streaming |
| Integrations | Wide range of third-party integrations | Integrates with major tools & platforms |
| Pricing Plans | Flexible pricing tiers | Fewer but comprehensive plans |
| Customer Support | Email and phone support | Extensive customer support options |
| Analytics & Reporting | Basic reporting tools | Advanced analytics & insights |
Thinkific vs Kajabi: In-depth Key Differences
Let’s look at the detailed comparison of Thinkific vs Kajabi, focusing on key aspects that matter most to you as a course creator.
This comparison will help you understand the nuances of each platform, guiding you to make an informed choice based on your specific needs.
i. Ease Of Use (Learning Curve)
Kajabi stands out for its integrated design. it offers an all-in-one platform that simplifies the creation and management of online courses, membership sites, and more.
Its simplified approach means you can manage everything from a single location, saving time and effort. Especially if you’re not keen on dealing with the complexities of plugins or extensions.
In contrast, Thinkific is celebrated for its user-friendly nature, boasting an intuitive drag-and-drop interface that makes course creation straightforward and accessible, even for beginners.
While Thinkific is easy to use without coding skills, it also offers the flexibility to add custom code, providing an avenue for more personalized course experiences.
On the grounds of ease of use, Thinkific is much easier comparatively due to being focused on the core necessity – creating and selling courses.
Kajabi which is a popular alternative to thinkfic comes with a lot of features. But that just means it takes more time to learn.
ii. Course Creation & Hosting
Kajabi excels in course creation with its array of features. It includes the ability to upload videos and audio files, create quizzes and assessments, and issue course certificates.
It stands out with customizable templates and user-friendly design tools, facilitating the course creation process. This makes Kajabi ideal for those who seek a comprehensive, feature-rich platform for developing diverse and interactive courses.
On the other hand, Thinkific offers a more straightforward approach, providing essential course creation tools and ready-to-use templates. This is particularly beneficial for new course creators, as it simplifies the process of organizing and transforming expertise into marketable courses.
While Thinkific can not have as many advanced features as Kajabi, its user interface and ease of use make it a strong contender, especially for those starting their journey in online course creation.
But as you grow your business, Kajabi is a better tool when you consider scalability and control over various types of courses that you may want to create.
iii. Course Page Customization
Kajabi takes the lead in course page customization with its extensive design tools. It allows you to create highly personalized and branded course pages.
This platform is a perfect match if you prioritize detailed customization and want your courses to stand out visually.
On the flip side, Thinkific offers a simpler approach to customization. Rather, they expect you to use their ready-made templates for easy-to-build, professional-looking course pages.
So, if you want more customization options, Kajabi would be your ideal choice. But if you are a beginner and want an assisted approach, Thinkific can be a good choice.
iv. Sales and Marketing Features
Thinkific offers a solid foundation for sales and marketing, providing tools to track orders, create discount coupons, and set up subscriptions.
It also includes the option to run an affiliate program with custom payment terms. This setup is great if you need essential sales tools to support your courses.
On the other hand, Kajabi steps up in marketing with a focus on sales funnels, pipelines, and sales automation, incorporating email marketing tools as well.
This approach integrates courses into a comprehensive marketing strategy, making Kajabi a strong choice if you’re aiming to use advanced marketing techniques and want your courses to be a central part of your sales process.
So, while solely selling courses is easy with Thinkific, Kajabi makes it much easier for advanced promotion and business growth.
v. Email Marketing and Automation
Kajabi stands out with its built-in email marketing software. It enables you to craft effective email campaigns directly within the platform.
It offers a range of features like one-off broadcasts and automated email sequences, which are triggered by specific actions taken by your audience.
This integration is particularly useful if you’re looking to simplify your marketing efforts and keep everything under one roof.
In contrast, Thinkific provides the basic functionality for email broadcasts but doesn’t include built-in email automation.
However, it compensates by offering extensive integrations with popular email marketing tools such as MailChimp, ConvertKit, Constant Contact, AWeber, ActiveCampaign, and EngageBay.
Comparatively, Kajabi is definitely the better choice out of the two if you require email marketing with no additional costs.
vi. User Experience and Interface
Thinkific is known for its straightforward and intuitive interface, making it a great choice for those new to online course platforms. Its simplicity ensures that you can focus on creating and managing your courses without getting bogged down in complex settings.
On the other side, Kajabi offers a more integrated user experience. While it might present a slight learning curve for newcomers, its sleek interface seamlessly combines course creation, marketing, and sales tools.
This integrated approach is beneficial if you’re looking for a platform that offers a wide range of features but is still accessible and user-friendly once you get the hang of it.
Both Thinkfic and Kajabi are great in terms of UX and UI and can be stated as equals in this matter.
vii. Memberships & Community
Kajabi’s recent addition, Kajabi Communities, brings a strong set of tools for building and monetizing an engaging community.
It’s packed with features like live calls, challenges, and real-time chat, enhancing the interactive experience. This makes Kajabi a strong choice if you’re looking to create a dynamic and interactive community around your courses.
Thinkific, in comparison, offers Thinkific Communities, allowing you to create a dedicated space for members to connect and collaborate on specific topics.
You have the flexibility to integrate these communities into your courses or offer them as standalone products. Additionally, Thinkific Memberships enable you to create exclusive membership sites.
Both Thinkific and Kajabi are close competitors in this matter, and we don’t think either of them can be stated as better in this regard.
viii. Analytics & Reporting
Kajabi’s analytics offers a comprehensive view of your course performance, including metrics like net revenue, offers sold, and page views.
It goes further by providing advanced metrics such as Monthly Recurring Revenue (MRR), Average Revenue per User (ARPU), and Churn Rate. This depth of analysis is invaluable if you’re focused on closely monitoring the financial health and growth of your online course business.
In contrast, Thinkific’s analytics focuses on giving you a clear picture of orders and student engagement. The Orders Report in Thinkific allows you to track trends and get an overview of total orders over a specific period.
This feature is particularly useful for understanding student purchasing behavior and identifying your most popular courses.
While Thinkific can not offer as extensive financial analytics as Kajabi, it provides essential insights into student engagement and course performance, which are crucial for refining your marketing strategies and enhancing the overall student experience.
So, which one can be considered better in this regard totally depends on your business goals and requirements.
ix. Pricing Plans Comparison
The pricing structure of your chosen course platform is a critical factor, directly impacting the cost and potential profit of your courses. Let’s compare the pricing models of Thinkific and Kajabi to see how they align with your budget and business needs.
Thinkific offers four distinct plans, catering to a range of needs from beginners to more established course creators. Each plan is designed to scale with the growth of your online education business, providing flexibility and options to suit different stages of your journey.
On the other side, Kajabi presents three pricing plans. These plans are structured to accommodate various levels of course creation and marketing needs, from basic setups to more advanced, feature-rich requirements.
As you can see, Kajabi is very expensive due to offering so many extensive marketing features along with course creation and selling. Thinkific is cost-effective for it comparatively, but it may get more costly as you add more marketing tools to your course promotional strategy. You can also consider Kajabi vs Teachable to get better insights.
The Better Solution For Course Selling – A Third Option To Explore
As you saw, in the comparison of Thinkific vs Kajabi, they both have their unique advantages. But if you are looking for something that can give you the best of both of these tools? Then you should look into a third option for your course funnel – Hosting the course site on WordPress using WPFunnels & TutorLMS.
Is WPFunnels & TutorLMS A Better Solution?
While Thinkific and Kajabi are powerful platforms, WPFunnels and TutorLMS bring together the best of both worlds. They offer a comprehensive solution for your course creation and marketing needs.
WPFunnels lets you create customized sales funnels, a feature that mirrors Kajabi’s effective marketing tools. It allows you to design and implement effective sales journeys, guiding potential students through a journey from purchasing an initial course, to purchasing more courses down the line as upsells.
TutorLMS, on the other hand, offers a user-friendly course creation experience similar to Thinkific, making it easy for you to develop and manage your courses.
Together, WPFunnels and TutorLMS provide a potent combination. They offer the simplicity and ease of course creation found in Thinkific, while also delivering the advanced marketing and sales funnel capabilities of Kajabi.
This makes them an attractive alternative, especially if you’re looking for a solution that balances user-friendliness with advanced marketing strategies.
WPFunnels & TutorLMS Pricing
Let’s see the pricing plan of both platforms:
WPFunnels Pricing:
- Small Annual Plan: $97/year
- Medium Annual Plan: $147/year
- Large Annual Plan: $237/year
TutorLMS Pricing:
- Individual: $199/year
- Freelancer: $399/year
- Agency: $799/year
Pricing Comparison
| WPFunnels + TutorLMS | Thinkific | Kajabi |
| Starting at $25/month ($296/year, billed annually) | Starts at $36/month ($432/year, billed annually) | Starts at $119/month (1428/year, billed annually) |
WPFunnels and TutorLMS appear as cost-effective solutions, especially compared to Thinkific vs Kajabi. Their pricing plans are significantly lower. It makes them accessible to a wider range of users, from individual educators to larger educational institutions.
While offering competitive features like Thinkific and Kajabi courses, WPFunnels and TutorLMS provide a budget-friendly alternative to increase enrollment without compromising essential functionalities needed for successful course creation and sales funnel management.
So, if you’re a startup or seeking a cost-effective solution to sell courses, moving to WordPress with these plugins will deliver high ROI and better scalability for your business.
Thinkific vs Kajabi vs WPFunnels & TutorLMS – Which One Should You Use?
If you’re searching for a platform that’s straightforward and ideal for beginners, Thinkific is your top choice. It offers a user-friendly experience with an intuitive course builder, making it easy to create simple video courses and profitable online courses.
Whether you’re using their basic plan or exploring Thinkific’s high marks for course creation, the platform is designed to help course creators at every level.
Thinkific pros include great features like Thinkific website builders and assignments, as well as integration options such as Thinkific-Brillium integration.
For those who need a more integrated solution with advanced marketing and sales tools, Kajabi stands out. Offering top features and powerful tools, Kajabi courses cater to experienced course sellers looking for more features beyond just course creation.
However, comparing Kajabi vs. Thinkific is important to see which platform aligns better with your goals, especially if you’re considering Kajabi customization or seeking the best Kajabi alternatives.
On the other hand, if you’re looking for a blend of simplicity and marketing sophistication, WPFunnels & TutorLMS offer a great balance. These platforms provide the ease of Thinkific with the marketing power of Kajabi.
Plus, if you’re working with a tight budget or are an SME, WPFunnels & TutorLMS offer affordable options. They don’t compromise on essential features like course review sections, digital downloads, and even self-guided courses.
For small to medium-sized businesses, or if you’re new to course creation, WPFunnels & TutorLMS are particularly compelling. They provide a third-party platform that combines ease of use with robust course-building capabilities, helping you create stunning courses that attract and engage students.
Conclusion
To sell more courses using sales funnels, it’s essential to focus on each step of your funnel, from attracting potential students to converting them into paying customers.
By optimizing your lead capture forms, providing valuable content, and guiding prospects smoothly through the buying journey, you can significantly increase your course sales.
Understanding the differences is key if you’re considering options between Thinkific vs. Kajabi. Whether you’re drawn to Kajabi courses with their extensive marketing tools or Thinkific courses for their user-friendly platform, each has its unique strengths.
To simplify this process, WPFunnels is a great tool to help you design and implement effective sales funnels tailored to your needs. you can create custom funnels that maximize conversions and boost your online course sales.
** FAQs **
What is better, Kajabi or Thinkific?
- Choosing between Thinkific vs Kajabi depends on what you need. Kajabi is ideal if you want advanced marketing features and Kajabi customization. But Thinkific is better for straightforward course building and offers a more budget-friendly approach. If you’re new to creating courses, Thinkific might be the simpler option to start with.
Who is Kajabi’s competitor?
- Thinkific is a primary competitor to Kajabi, especially for Thinkific courses and Thinkific funnels. Other notable alternatives include Teachable, LearnWorlds, and WPFunnels & TutorLMS. They offer varying features for those looking at the best Kajabi alternatives or exploring Kajabi comparison options.
What is Thinkific good for?
- Thinkific excels in course creation capabilities and is perfect for Thinkific offer creators looking to build and sell online courses efficiently. Its features, including the Thinkific app store and integrations like WooCommerce Thinkific integration, make it a solid choice for SMEs and those focused on hybrid courses.
What’s cheaper than Kajabi?
- If cost is a concern, Thinkific is cheaper than Kajabi and provides essential features for course creation. Additionally, WPFunnels & TutorLMS on WordPress offers a more budget-friendly alternative with flexibility. It makes them great if you’re searching for affordable options with high ROI.
Is Thinkific still free?
- Yes, Thinkific offers a free plan, which allows you to start creating and selling Thinkific courses with some limitations. This plan is ideal for beginners who want to explore Thinkific’s core features without initial investment and see if it meets their needs before opting for a pro plan.
