Today, it can be rather difficult to find a single course provider that would suit all of your wants and needs. This is why people often turn to online reviews to help them decided whether or not an e-learning platform is good for them. Today, we are going to analyze some LinkedIn Learning reviews (and I’ll also pitch my opinions in, as well).
By doing so, you will become better informed about this platform, and to answer the question - is LinkedIn Learning worth it?
We’ll start off by talking about the company, and later we’ll move on to the actual analysis of the user LinkedIn Learning reviews. There are a lot of aspects that we can view the platform from, but I’ll focus solemnly on the main ones, or else this article would be of the same length as J. R. R. Tolkien’s “Lord of the Rings”.
Also, if you're in need of some high-quality courses, make sure to check out Udemy - a platform that's considered to be one of the best LinkedIn Learning alternatives.
So, what are you waiting for? Let’s jump right on in!
Pros
- Professionally made
- Easy to use
- Nice features
Cons
- No accredited certification
- No pricing options
- Lack of specific course difficulties
Table of Contents
LinkedIn Learning Reviews - Introduction
If we want to successfully analyze LinkedIn Learning reviews, we’ll first of all have to get an idea of what kind of a platform are we talking about, in general. If you’ve never even heard about LinkedIn Learning, and have only stumbled across this review by accident, then you might be confused about what are we even talking about.
To put it very simply, LinkedIn Learning is an MOOC provider. MOOC stands for Massive Open Online Courses. So, in this aspect, LinkedIn Learning is very similar to platforms like Udemy, edX, Coursera and other well-known online course providers.
The site (LinkedIn Learning) itself is a subsidiary to LinkedIn. The “learning” version of the site is designed to help people learn useful and even essential skills that would help them do better in building their career paths in the current job market. The website provides courses on various different topics, starting from business and technology, all the way up to creative and artistic ones.
Back in 2015, LinkedIn purchased Lynda.com - a MOOC provider with a huge database of courses. All of the content that Lynda possessed (and still does) has been transferred (shared) with LinkedIn Learning. Even though all of the courses and learning paths are still available on Lynda.com, the site itself advises people to go to LinkedIn Learning.
Now that you have some context about the platform, it should be easier for us to analyze the various LinkedIn Learning reviews. We’ll start off trying to answer the question “is LinkedIn Learning worth it?” by analyzing the usability and design parts of the website.
Ease of Use
Ease of use is a very important aspect of any website, let alone an online course-providing one. If you come across a MOOC provider online and go to visit its website, you are probably going to judge the entire platform based solemnly on the homepage. This is true both when it comes to the design and the usability of the platform.
And, honestly, that’s fair game - if the front page of a website looks great and feels intuitive to use, chances are that the rest of the site will also be up-to-par.
Because of these reasons, I have chosen to start the analysis from LinekedIn’s homepage, and make my way up from there. That’s the most common method that I follow when writing MOOC reviews, and I have found that it is also one of the most effective ones.
There aren’t many LinkedIn Learning reviews that would talk about the usability of the site, and I can see why as soon as I enter the front page. If you were to imagine an online course-providing website, a pretty generic view that you could visualize would probably be a great representation of the LinkedIn Learning’s homepage.
I’ll admit that the page does look professional and avoids some of the industry cliches that are prominent in some other websites of a similar concept, but it still feels very cold. LinkedIn Learning’s front page is devoid of a personal touch, and that’s honestly a sad thing!
Visual matters aside, the page works perfectly fine - just as you would expect it to. Since it belongs to LinkedIn (which is a huge and well-known name all by itself), one would probably expect nothing less. Since the site follows a pretty standard layout, everything is where you would expect it to be - learning options on top, featured and recommended courses in the middle, and some self-promo in the bottom of the page.
Since I didn't find a lot of information about it in the student LinkedIn Learning reviews, I wanted to test out how the actual course pages themselves look and feel (are there any glitches, bugs, loading time difficulties, etc.). For the sake of this review, I chose the creative section, and the “Writing with Flair: How to Become an Exceptional Writer” course. The platform has many different courses, though - if web design is more 'up your alley', you can take that as an example, too.
The course pages are pretty standard, as far as online course providers go. What I did like is the instructor info section - you can actually find out quite a lot about the person that will be teaching you from that part of the course page. Other than that, you have the pretty standard course descriptions, lecture lists, lesson previews, and so on.
All in all, the website is definitely easy to use and navigate around. If you’ve ever used a service similar to that of LinkedIn Learning, everything is on the platform is going to be quite intuitive to use, since it doesn't really stray away from the norm.
The visual side of the website is, well… Honestly, it’s almost non-existent. As I’ve mentioned earlier, it’s evident that the site aims to look professional, but all that I see is a cold and bleak design with little creativity put into it. This is also something that a couple of user LinkedIn Learning reviews picked up on, too.
I do, however, acknowledge that visuals are just that - they don’t really get in the way of the overall learning experience (especially if the platform has everything else in order).
So, we’ve established that the website is easy to use. That’s a great start! However, the true test of a MOOC-providing platform comes when you take a look at its content quality. Let’s take a look at what user LinkedIn Learning reviews have to say about that.
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Yes! Show me the Comparison ChartContent Quality
There’s an old saying that goes something like this - “content is king”. This couldn’t be more true than when we’re talking about online course providers. Courses are the only reason why people come to the sites - it’s only logical that the company would have the best and strictest quality control system in place.
And it doesn't even matter what those courses are, either - programming (general), HTML, Python, writing, arts, or whatever else. The same standard of quality should apply to all of them!
According to a lot of LinkedIn Learning reviews, however, it seems that the platform can’t really say that it has the best courses out there. On the contrary, students claim that the courses are actually pretty mediocre, on top of other concerns that they face.
First of all, there’s a significant amount of LinkedIn Learning reviews that are disappointed with the lack of more advanced courses on the site. Students claim that beginner-oriented courses dominate the platform, and it’s very difficult to find something that’s a bit more advanced. Furthermore, quite a few people note that you could easily find other, free online course providers that would offer similar quality for free.
However, by far the biggest complaint that emerged from the LinkedIn Learning reviews was concerned with the lack of accredited certification on the site. Perhaps this wouldn’t be as big as an issue, if LinkedIn Learning wasn’t a paid service provider. According to LinkedIn Learning reviews, most other, similar platforms offer certification at a similar price.
Features
When it comes to e-learning platforms, features are a tricky topic. It’s usually one of the two - either a site has a lot of different features (almost too much to keep with), or it lacks them, altogether. It is advised to search for the middle ground, however. This is because interesting and original features can really help a site attract new customers and maintain the interest of the old ones.
This isn’t exclusive to online course providers - many different businesses think the same.
As a lot of LinkedIn Learning reviews pointed out earlier, the platform does lack a huge feature that many others offer - accredited certification. You can, indeed, display a type of a “certificate” on your LinkedIn profile once you’ve finished a course, but that’s quite far from what the people who are complaining have in mind.
The three big sections that LinkedIn Learning offers to the students are called “Higher Education”, “Government” and “Business”. You could also add a fourth one - that would be the general student population; people who have come to the site with a single topic in mind, looking for a specific type of a course.
Each of the above-mentioned sections deals with very different subject matter. Higher education is aimed at academia, while the government and business sections offer advanced learning strategies to the different kinds of employees (and employers).
LinkedIn Learning also offers students a month of free trial, offline course viewing options, LinkedIn Learning-exclusive certification, quizzes, recommendations, and so on. None of these features are unique to the site, but it’s still nice that they’re there.
Price
If you were to take a look at the majority of LinkedIn Learning reviews found online, you would probably notice that people aren’t all that happy with how the site deals with their pricing.
There are two major complaints that can be extracted out of the LinkedIn Learning reviews. First of all, students say that the fact that you have to register your credit card and buy a subscription to get a free trial is a bit… Well, annoying. However, this is the smaller problem - the main issue comes up with the pricing plans themselves.
A monthly subscription over at LinkedIn Learning costs $29.99. With it, you get all of what the platform offers - over 13,000 courses, offline viewing options, tasks, recommendations, mobile support, etc. Now, you might be thinking - that’s pretty good! And, honestly, it does seem that way. So, what’s the problem?
Well, the main problem that a lot of LinkedIn Learning reviews point out is the exact same one we’ve already discussed earlier on in this article - the lack of accredited certification. Still, if you're not looking for certification, specifically, and are just interested in learning or improving some skills, then it's still a certain bargain.
Learning Experience
To sum up all of the LinkedIn Learning reviews that we’ve covered, let’s try to answer the question “is LinkedIn Learning worth it?” by talking about the overall learning experience that you’ll get if you choose to enroll in the platform’s courses.
In general, it would seem that students are quite split when it comes to the learning experience on LinkedIn Learning. Some of them say that they’ve enjoyed the courses, others - that they were somewhat disappointed. However, the majority of users agree that the platform truly is one of the better options when it comes to online learning.
Still, whether it was the pricing or the variety of course difficulties - there’s always room for improvement!
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Conclusions
So - with that, we have reached the end of our LinkedIn Learning review. I hope that the information presented in this article was useful for you! If you do decide to try LinkedIn Learning out, do keep in mind that there’s a mandatory registration for that free month!
All of that being said, though, LinkedIn Learning is still a decent choice for anyone who wants to improve their skills in a particular area. It's even better if you're a complete newbie, and want to find a great place where to start learning! For an even better place, though, make sure to visit the aforementioned Udemy - perhaps your ideal course is waiting for you there?
Whatever you might decide to do, I wish you the best of luck!
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- + Professionally made
- + Easy to use
- + Nice features
- - No accredited certification
- - No pricing options
- - Lack of specific course difficulties
A good online learning platform, especially for beginners in some specific fields.
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