Zenclass

What Zenclass is

Zenclass is a Russian platform for creating an online school: a course builder, a student area, payments and marketing tools in one cloud service, aimed at experts, online schools and course producers. Its home page leads with "Безлимит по объёму файлов и ученикам, от 2560 руб/мес", unlimited file storage and students from 2,560 rubles a month, and with payments from 1.5% in Russia and worldwide through a built-in online cash register and bank installment plans. The company's blog post on distance learning systems puts its main strengths as a fast start, responsive support and clear pricing, and says a course and an online school can be set up in about an hour without technical specialists. The platform is cloud-based, though the same post says a boxed, self-installed version can be set up on request.

The company behind the site, ООО «Дзенкласс», says it sells licenses and develops the software under an agency agreement with the rights holder and owner of the Zenclass trademark, ООО «Дзенкласс Софт». The home page also notes that Zenclass is a resident of Skolkovo and is ranked by RBC among the top 80 Russian EdTech companies.

Building courses

Lessons, assignments and tests are built in the course constructor, and the home page says student knowledge is assessed through homework and test checking. The blog post adds detail: courses can be synchronous or asynchronous with any number of stages and lessons, and any number of students can be invited without changing the price. Knowledge checks can be tests, free-form answers or file uploads, with automatic test grading, teacher comments, and a "stop lesson" (стоп-урок) that keeps the next lessons locked until the student completes the previous assignments.

Content can be audio, video, text or images. You can embed Google Docs presentations, spreadsheets and documents or any HTML code, and attach files for download. Videos can be pulled from YouTube into the built-in video hosting by link, or moved in bulk, and the media section manages uploaded files. Video is protected from downloading by the most common browser plugins. Webinars and conferences run by embedding them via HTML code; the blog post says plainly that Zenclass does not yet have its own webinar service.

Staff accounts can be given different roles (administrator, teacher, editor) and access to specific courses. Students and teachers can talk in group and private chats, and the platform has a mobile version adapted to different screen sizes.

Analytics, marketing and automation

The analytics section covers both learning and marketing: you can download reports and view detailed statistics, including lesson opens, assignment completion and progress reports. On the sales side, the home page lists automatic payments, promo codes, tables holding the student database, sales automation and management of your own price plans.

Automations work as conditions, triggers and actions. Messages go out by email or Telegram to nudge people who have not yet bought a course, offer the next course when a student finishes the current one, and send your own welcome letters. Integrations cover email newsletters, a Telegram chatbot, database work and issuing certificates, and anything else can be connected through the API and webhooks, including a CRM.

Payments

Payments are the feature Zenclass leans on most. The built-in acquiring has a commission from 1.5%, free connection and no monthly fee, a free built-in online cash register, and acceptance of foreign cards. It connects in 3 minutes and suits the self-employed, sole proprietors (ИП) and companies (ООО). Schools can sell courses on credit and through bank installments, run their own installment plans, and take recurring subscription payments, with the size of the first payment and the billing interval set by the school. The home page says Zenclass works with Russian and foreign payment systems and in more than 200 countries, and the blog post adds that third-party payment systems can be used alongside the built-in acquiring.

Customer testimonials on the home page return to this point again and again. One school owner writes that the previous platform had no online cash register and took 8-10% of each payment, while on Zenclass it is "всего 3,5%", just 3.5%.

Plans and trial

All plans include unlimited file storage and unlimited students; according to the blog post, price depends on the number of staff and published courses, and external products are not charged. The plans on the home page are:

• Start (Старт): listed as Бесплатно, free of charge, with unlimited staff but only "внешние продукты", external products. An external product is a card you embed on your own site or send as a link, for someone who already has a course elsewhere and only needs payments and student records.
• Basic (Базовый): 3,200 rubles a month or 30,720 rubles a year, 1 staff account, 3 published courses.
• Advanced (Продвинутый): 4,400 rubles a month or 42,240 rubles a year, a staff limit of 10, 10 published courses.
• Business (Бизнес): 6,800 rubles a month or 65,280 rubles a year, a staff (Сотрудники) limit of 20, 30 published courses.

Paying for a year gives a 20% discount, and a Corporate plan with individual terms is available through the corporate department. The trial runs 14 days free; the blog post says it allows up to 5 GB of uploads and any number of students, and that trial terms can be discussed individually. Moving from another platform is free, and the blog post says Zenclass is also free during the move to offset the plan you have already paid for elsewhere.

Scale and support

The home page counts 2,500+ schools that chose Zenclass, more than 1 million students who completed courses there, and more than 1.6 billion rubles earned by its clients. Support is a point of pride: the blog post says 97.8% of users rate the technical support as excellent, and there is a knowledge base with instructions for every function. Testimonials from school owners such as Николай Воронин («Разместил курс за 10 минут, и можно продавать», he posted a course in 10 minutes and could start selling) and Дарья Баринова of Nimax School praise the quick start and the team's habit of building requested features. Zenclass also publishes «Понятно», a magazine for online school owners.

Who it suits

Zenclass fits a Russian-speaking expert or online school that wants to launch quickly and take payments legally without assembling acquiring, a cash register and installments separately. Because students and storage are unlimited on every plan and pricing scales only with staff and published courses, a school with a large or fluctuating student base pays the same fee. The free Start plan also suits someone who already hosts a course elsewhere and only wants checkout and student records. It is a weaker fit for anyone who wants built-in live webinars rather than embedded ones, or who needs an English-language interface, since the site and product are in Russian.