CANVAS Reviews

Pros

There are so many great things about Canvas LMS. It's about fit of course, so I would never use it for corporate L&D... but as an academic LMS, it ranks at the top. I love the community forums (you can find help for literally anything), and the numerous tools that are 1) either provided by Canvas, or, 2) integrate nicely with Canvas.

I also like the ease of use. It might seem overwhelming at first, but learning to build and administer courses on Canvas becomes easier by the day. So at first it may seem tough, but stick with it! It gets much easier - quickly!

Cons

In order to upgrade the look and feel of it, without hiring a team of graphic designers, you need to use design service that integrates with Canvas.

Alternatives Considered

Moodle

Reasons for Switching to CANVAS

I started using Canvas as a student! Way back. When I became an eLearning developer, I already had the familiarity of it from university :)

Pros

One thing I love is that unlike Brightspace/D2L, Canvas has continued to develop and gain new features as long as I've used it. I also like how easy it is to transfer course materials from one course to another so that classes I teach each semester, or every other semester, can be easily copied over.

Cons

Some of the more advanced/useful features aren't always easy to use, and there isn't great documentation from Canvas. In fact, most of the documentation I've found has been from other university's websites.

Pros

Canvas is very easy organized! It is easy for me as a user to navigate between the different sites and features in Canvas. It dont take long to become familiar with it. I mostly use it on my computer, but I also like that it comes with an app.

Cons

I cannot think about anything that I dont like.

Pros

Learning & Teaching: Various useful features, e.g., upload/download files, page creation, announcement and discussion and valuable apps containing ubiquitous tools, like MS Team meetings, Panopto, Vimeo, YouTube, Dropbox etc.

Assessment: Huge variety of Quizzes, secured quizzes, quizzes SWOT statistics, lockdown browser, Assignments, anti-Plagiarism tools, Moderation, Marker Allocation, Grades,

Research: Conferences, collaborations, Canvas digital forum support.

Cons

Assessment of students: sorting may not be sync'd with local university database. i.e., downloaded grades and university's marksheet contains names of students starting differently. Imaging if you have 300+ names! this causes sorting issues while assessing online.

Quizzes are great but cannot create duplicate questions, some time academic need this feature. Also because quiz question can be an Essay therefore, this type of assessment must include anti-plagiarism tool (i.e., Turnitin etc), not available in Quizzes but only in Assignments.

Reference Manager and Library tools are not available but can be added, e.g., Talis, StudyNet etc. These features are necessary for cognitive learning and cresting your own Library does help. I need to use either Endnotes or Mendeley as an external app on my desktop or on cloud.

Its good to use integrated Email tool but its not linked to outlook or other email app. I cannot send email to other people outside my module, i.e., cannot do cc to manager, examiner etc but I need to permanently add in the list of people.
Also cannot add images etc in text but can attach files. Also cannot format the text but just plaintext is allowed. You cannot add http link to a text.

Pros

I truly loved Canvas since overseeing programming, both on a PC and phone was a simple. Seeing my grades and remaining focused of my tasks was simple.

Cons

Despite the fact that Canvas offers specific capacities for joint effort, it can't replace the one-on-one connection that happens in a regular study hall. It can affect inspiration and commitment when I feel far or alone from my understudies' teachers and individual students.While Material can connect for certain projects, it doesn't with each of the projects that understudies concentrating on computer programming use. Accordingly, the work process might become wasteful on the grounds that understudies might need to change between a few stages to take care of their responsibilities

Pros

In my view, their platform has an intuitive interface and customisable design options that make it easy for educators to create engaging online courses. It also has built-in tools for assignments, quizzes and discussions. I really think it could be a good choice for educators and institutions looking for an effective and interactive online learning platform.

Cons

Some users may find that the learning curve is steep when it comes to setting up more complex features.

Pros

Easy to use Available for all students i met more students from all country

Cons

Need more stuff to make it better than now the application need alot of time to open

Pros

it's easy to use I like it more and it is more effective

Cons

about new templates for presentations and logos

Pros

I love canvas! Super earth to use and not hard to nagigate

Cons

I don’t like when it sometimes tends to crash on me

Pros

make the education easy and very interactive

Cons

sometimes we can’t do the exam because it is required a good internet

Pros

If you work in a school or a scientific competition, or if you wish to teach a class, you can use CANVAS. It's an excellent application because the grade book offers an Effective Teaching option for tracking progress against a set of academic criteria. Students and teachers will benefit from this mobile-friendly and easy tool. The largest business would be distance education, although it performs excellently in general.

Cons

It can be tough to cope with at first when using the application, and it takes a long time to publish a post on the student page.
Students occasionally carried assessments in the incorrect location and took time to get acquainted with the mobile phone application.

Alternatives Considered

Microsoft Teams and Canva

Reasons for Choosing CANVAS

I found CANVAS is an organized program in dealing and communicating with Students than other Programmes

Switched From

Google Classroom and Moodle

Reasons for Switching to CANVAS

In general, I prefer to use the program, especially in making exams for students, because it appears if the student opens other programs with him, which confirms to me the credibility of dealing and the absence of cheating

Pros

I've mentioned quite a few technological pluses in the rest of this review, but for this particular response I think the most important thing was how friendly the system was. It handled tens of thousands of us constantly logged in at my university, relayed grades instantly, never crashed while administering tests, and simply had an aesthetic layout (using our college colors!) that didn't treat you like a criminal (think of other test monitoring software) or unduly freak stressed students out with how they present grades, feedback, deadlines, and more.

Cons

Honestly, I found no faults with the software while using it as either a student or TA. Given the option however, I would have suggested integration options with other, lesser tools we used as TAs such as timesheets and hour submission portals.

Pros

Most useful feature is revisiting the previous courses and going through the material that was covered in those courses. Typically, in other similar software, this is disabled after a certain period of time but Canvas keeps this feature open. The product is definitely easy to use as apart from showing the current courses, it also displays the upcoming deadlines and announcements that comes in very handy as soon as a user logs into the system and navigates to the home screen

Cons

The worst thing about this product in a lack of search functionality. Manually going through the complete list of options/courses/documents or whatever is present in the Canvas to find one required element is time-intensive process. A search feature would have been really useful in quickly searching what we are looking for.

Pros

My college has been using Canvas for the last several years. It is so instructor and student friendly. We are able to upload assignments, create videos, and grade with such ease. Also, students are able to navigate the platform very easily.

Cons

There are a couple of features that I think could be improved, and they are deleting old emails and sending emails to all of my classes. I wish that I could highlight all of the emails and delete in small batches. Also, it would be great to email several classes at one time.

Pros

1. Communication Tools: CANVAS has robust communication tools that allow me and students to easily communicate. This includes messaging, discussion boards, and video conferencing.2. Integration with Third-Party Tools: I can integrate CANVAS with a wide range of third-party tools, such as Google Drive, YouTube, and Dropbox. This makes it easy for me to incorporate multimedia into their courses and for students to submit assignments.3. Analytics and Reporting: CANVAS provides me detailed analytics and reporting features that allow to track student progress, identify areas where students are struggling, and adjust my teaching strategies accordingly.

Cons

1. Limited Customization: I have found that it is not as flexible as other learning management systems. This can be a challenge for teachers who want to create highly customized courses.2. Technical Issues: Like any online platform, CANVAS can experience technical issues that can disrupt the learning experience. For example, I experienced slow load times and difficulty accessing certain features.3. Lack of Mobile Optimization: I have found that it is not as fully optimized as they would like. This can be a challenge for students who want to access course materials on their mobile devices.

Pros

Canvas is flexible and has great integration with certain add-ins, including Microsoft Office, Zoom, Ally (an accessibility checker tool), and Echo360, which are the ones I use the most. It allows authors to integrate a variety of content in a way that makes sense, and the grouping of modules and content is convenient and easy to change. The support forums are also typically very helpful. There are plenty of tools that I haven't even gotten around to using to their full potential, i.e. the calendar, chat features, rubrics. I haven't used them this way yet, but the Mastery Paths feature would be excellent for providing personalized learning experiences or implementing pre-tests.

Cons

I wish there was a more sophisticated way to subscribe to certain types of notifications (e.g. certain threads within discussion topics). There's limited ability to author courses within the LMS, and you mostly have to rely on content you create or import yourself. When used for nontraditional purposes (e.g. providing a central hub for students in an honors program, rather than students in a particular class), there have been some issues with our SIS integrating correctly with Canvas. This also may just be an issue with my campus' implementation of Canvas, but I wish that you could have 1 page linked to multiple courses and that updating it in one place made the updates in all the courses in which the page existed; this would help for centralizing information. There are no templates or pre-created objects and libraries, which again may be an issue with my particular campus rollout, and also just a general downside of open-source products.

Pros

As a student who used to use Blackboard, I immediately saw Canvas' UI and overall look-and-feel as a huge upgrade. I like that it's based on modern UI design patterns, with features like the sidebar and the single flush column of content. It makes the web app inviting and fun to use for young students like me who are on their phone for most of the day.

One relatively minor feature that I greatly appreciate is the in-app PDF previewer, which saves me from wasting time having to download the file or opening it in a new tab and cluttering my workspace. Just this feature alone was enough to show me that Canvas' developers really had the end-user in mind.

One last big net positive I want to mention is the integration with the mobile app. It's great! Notifications show up on time and don't duplicate or perform other wonky stuff. Having a seamless experience between desktop and mobile goes a long towards making students like feel in control of their learning.

Cons

While there's a lot to like about the UI, I do have some minor grievances with it in a few places. The one thing that really stands out is how some blue links are clickable but don't actually do anything. For example, discussion threads have a clickable subtitle that shows which Lecture Section they're intended for. If it's for "All Sections", then clicking on it does absolutely nothing. I know this is a minor nitpick, but you would not believe how many times I've ended up accidentally clicking on that link intending to go the discussion board.

Pros

My institution uses Moodle, which I have found to be extremely cumbersome. So a few years ago, I switched to the free-for-teachers version of Canvas, and have never looked back. My favorite specific feature of Canvas is the Speed-grader, which changed my life when I switched from Moodle. I also like the way the online quizzes work. More generally what I like about Canvas is the unified design. Where as open-source course management software feels like a hodgepodge of different options and designs Frankensteined together, Canvas feels like there is a design team actually thinking through the way it should look and operate. I appreciate the flexibility it gives me with regard to the layout of the home page, how I can control what the students see, etc. Also, over the six years that I have used Canvas, I've seen features get improved in response to user suggestions. Always a good thing.

Cons

Like all course management software, there are times when I feel that too much clicking is involved to accomplish basic tasks, or little things that should be possible are not. For example, when making rubrics for assignments, there is no way to shuffle the order of the categories. If you want to add a new line in the rubric between lines 2 and 3, you'd have to delete all the lines after 2 and start over from there. Little things like that, which aren't a huge deal, but sometimes do leave me scratching my head. Also I wish the question banks for quizzes were a little easier to manage.

Pros

I've used the Canvas learning management system (LMS) as both a student and an instructor for years now, and I can say with a high level of confidence that it is, by far, the best LMS available today. It strikes a good balance between available features and ease of use, meaning instructors have a reasonably high level of customization at their fingertips at the course level, but students won't be confused or overwhelmed since every Canvas course retains certain similarities that can't be altered (e.g., navigation). There also appears to be a great deal of control that can be exerted by administrators in terms of locking down (or opening up) features, so it can be tweaked accordingly for any given institution. There are a LOT of features available to instructors in Canvas, and those can be expanded indefinitely by adding third-party integrations.

Cons

There are a range of frustrating quirks, missing features that require hack-y workarounds, confusing user interface issues, and inexplicable limitations that regular users will run into with routine use. For example, if you create an assignment and enable peer reviews of that assignment, it is difficult for students to figure out how to access the documents they are supposed to evaluate. Once they do find them, the embedded document editor is buggy and limited, and occasionally fails to save student edits. On top of all of this, if peer reviews are set to "anonymous," the embedded editor is disabled entirely--not just for students, but for the instructor as well, making it impossible to make inline comments or suggestions. Even more frustrating is the Canvas/Instructure support website, with its arcane, verbose design and overreliance on "community" message boards instead of dedicated agents to solve problems.

Pros

This platform provides the best tools to expose information and constantly train our support staff, it is these students who benefit from the easy integration of CANVAS that allows them to understand much of the information guide that we want to teach them, there are many benefits when you have a program that would train you with the new co-workers who request an opportunity to operate within the company, imparting the knowledge that could be reinforced thanks to the support of this program, I really like how practical and dynamic each one of the projects that are taught by this means, this with the aim of approving the student body to reinforce their skills in this area, CANVAS is undoubtedly one of the best spaces where it allows us to teach order and administrative efficiency when working and performing in our company.

Cons

This program may be a bit basic, this is because the tutorials and guides for its users may be very limited, having the opportunity to further expand its functions in other areas, that is, it may be a bit more versatile for the training of other types of more complex programs that require more practice and theory before implementing them in the company, the potential that this program has is very great, although it also does not have the integration of more common programs in the use of administrative offices, this can be a great point that play against them.

Pros

I've been using Canvas as an instructor at a university for the past 7+ years. The best thing about Canvas is that it's better organized than Moodle, which I've also used. I encountered Canvas when I came to work at my university. Before I started my job I was only familiar with Moodle, which I thought was an awful ed-tech application. I found Canvas to have a better interface, and was easier to navigate as a user. As an instructor, there are all kinds of features that you can use to set up a class, foster engagement, track student progress and assess completion of assignments. You can set up discussions, assign students to groups and even enable them to meet virtually. Canvas also works well for asynchronous learning in that you can create a course that is self-paced and students can step through each assignment on their own time.

Cons

The biggest challenge with Canvas is that it's not easy to use, unless you've been trained and know what you're doing. I had to learn Canvas completely on my own and it was a bit of a nightmare, even for someone like me who is very comfortable with technology. It's not entirely intuitive, especially when you're building a course from scratch. It's basically a website and you have to learn how to link pages, websites, documents, etc. You don't need to know how to code or use HTML, but it's still very painstaking to set up a class, even if you copy a previous class from year to year and just need to update it. The grading feature was also "updated" and it's more annoying now and less easy to use. The one big drawback though is the interface in that it's not all that graphical. You have to learn work arounds to make the interface more appealing to students. It's still better than Moodle! But still, it would be great if they could make it more like a real graphical website and less like a Word document on a website.

Pros

We use the Free for Teacher edition. When it comes to setting up courses, having assignments, files, students, deadlines, and grades set up, it's pretty simple. Not a lot of trouble getting things put together. You can integrate videos, there's a conference capability called Big Blue Button that allows all the members of the course to video in with each other and you can share screen and everything. It has been a big help allowing our students to have a portal to do their assignments, and connect with everyone in the class.

Cons

One of the nuances to Canvas that is difficult is limiting what teachers can see. By that I mean we have two different types of courses that we run.

One is an individual cohort of a few students and a director. The only way to make these closed down to just these members is to create a duplicate of the course and put those members in. Not a terrible thing, but then the courses start to stack up with all the different cohorts you have going. Plus, there's not really a way to have any updates filter down into all the same semester courses. So if we want to make an update on Semester 1, we have to go into each individual course and update it. There's also no way to update deadlines when you copy a course. So I have to change every assignment's due date so it fits in the new semester's timeline.

The other kind of course that we have is an open course that anyone can jump into, and then we assign a TA to grade certain students. The problem with this is that there's no way to limit the TA's view of who is in the course. So it shows them that there are dozens of students' work that needs to be graded in their To-Do List and makes it difficult for them to know when their assigned students have actually submitted anything. Haven't been able to find a work around for this yet.

Pros

This software is great for keeping courses all in one place and adds easy communication between instructors and students. As well as communication between students themselves is easy and straightforward. Being able to have quizes, assignments, and anything else from the course on Canvas makes it neat and organized. Also, the customization within the app makes it great for unique use cases.

Cons

Recently I was having an issue with a footer banner when testing in "student view". The banner sits on top of some of the navigation buttons from the left side and therefore hides them. I used to be able to double click on it to hide the banner, but a recent update makes it so that additional steps have to be taken to hide this banner. It has made it inconvenient to click on the button that I need to access from the navigation bar.

Pros

Canvas is a remarkable online learning management system that facilitates collaboration and communication among students, which is crucial in any online learning environment. The collaboration and communication features are the most impactful, allowing students to share ideas and work on group projects seamlessly. The mobile access feature is also helpful, making it easier to stay connected and engaged with the course content. The assessment and grading tools are user-friendly and customizable, allowing instructors to create a variety of assessment types, saving them a lot of time and effort. The product is easy to use and very customizable, with an intuitive and straightforward interface. Finally, the integration with Microsoft Teams is seamless, making it easy to incorporate Canvas into existing business processes.

Cons

As a user of Canvas, I have found the platform to be a comprehensive and intuitive online learning management system. While I do not feel that there are any significant missing features or areas that need improvement, one aspect where I think Canvas could do better is by making the mobile app available offline. This would enable students to access course materials and assignments even when they are not connected to the internet, which would be particularly useful for those who have limited connectivity.

Pros

I have my own business in addition to a full-time Revenue Cycle Manager position with a large company. I am very happy to have discovered Canvas. I started out with what can be done for free online, having not a lot of money to spend as a start up.

I could not have been more pleased! They have so many templates and specifics that you can create. From business cards to posters to flyers. They have great options within the free (something that you do not always see) for font types and size and colors to choose from.

Cons

The one thing that I had trouble with, to this day is how to create without a template. For example, If I want a plain background and add simple text. You cannot do it (that I have seen) without using something that doesn't fit for what you are doing and working with it to create. For example, I would have to choose a poster or business card but tweek to what I wanted. I have seen other software, that let you start from scratch to make what you want without a defined template. It would be great if Canvas would do that too.