Edly

Edly is an Open edX service provider and LMS company. It builds learning platforms on Open edX, the open source course software, for universities, K-12 schools, companies, nonprofits and businesses that sell courses, and it can host and run those platforms or support them on the client's own servers. The home page describes the offer as "an Open edX-powered learning suite," and the company's guide to open source learning systems says Edly has been an Open edX service provider since 2013. The same guide cites its official partner profile for more than 5,000 contributions to Open edX and work with organizations including edX, MIT, Wikimedia, Toastmasters and Philanthropy University. It also says Edly maintains Tutor, the official Docker-based Open edX distribution for production and local development.

The Edly product suite

Edly packages Open edX into named products. Edly LMS is the learner-facing platform. Edly Studio is "a centralized course authoring suite," and the home page says first-time content creators can build immersive courses without advanced technical knowledge. Edly Panel is "A single access point for all the tools you need to successfully run your eLearning platform." Edly Go is the mobile app, through which learners can complete quizzes, exams, assignments and certifications. Edly Discovery lets an organization white-label its LMS and build a storefront for its courses.

Branding is a large part of the pitch. The home page says platforms can use the client's logo, company colors, domain names and URLs, so the platform carries the organization's brand rather than Edly's, and it mentions localization, multi-sites and eCommerce for reaching learners in several places and selling courses. For organizations that do not need a custom build, Edly SaaS LMS is described as "An all-in-one eLearning ecosystem designed to get your hands on all the tools you need for your courses at the lowest cost and fastest turnaround."

Teaching and learning on the platform

The higher education page gives the most detail on day-to-day use. The Open edX gradebook lets teachers define the assessment type, whether quiz, assignment or exam, assign a weight to each, and grade on the platform, while students see their performance as they go. Course teams can run discussions, assess understanding with quizzes and assessments, generate certificates to reward learners, manage forums and collect feedback. The page recommends blended learning for courses that need demonstrations, and says learners get 24/7 access to course material and can return to it even after a course ends.

User roles are defined in four basic types, including staff and course author. The staff or administrator role controls the features and settings of the whole platform, while course authors create content and courses, and access levels can be set for each role. For accessibility, the page says the platform "is compliant with WCAG 2.0."

Reporting and analytics

Edly's built-in reporting covers learners from demographics to scores and completion rates, and the higher education page suggests comparing course enrollments against course completions to see how willing students are to finish. Learner analytics use Caliper, which the page calls a tool that visualizes useful data. The page cites the University of California San Diego, which it says used Edly's reporting "to analyze learners' performance, assess the usefulness of course content, and know about learning trends to devise learning paths for students."

Integrations and extending Open edX

The higher education page names three integrations: audio and video calls through Zoom and Microsoft integration, Turnitin for academic integrity, and Caliper for data analysis. Beyond those, the guide explains how Open edX itself is extended: reusable content libraries, LTI integrations, XBlocks for custom content and assessment components, analytics and platform extensions. Edly's own development services cover UX and interface customization, white-labeling, XBlock development, third-party integrations, Django development, mobile applications, analytics integrations, ecommerce, branding and theming. Its implementation work includes single sign-on and ecommerce integration.

Hosting, migration and services

Edly offers three ways to run a platform. It can host Open edX itself as managed hosting, it can deploy on infrastructure the client chooses, cloud or on-premises, and the menu also lists a self-hosted option. The guide quotes Edly's partner profile describing managed hosting on a client's preferred provider, including backup, recovery, maintenance and production monitoring. Managed services can also cover platform upgrades and learner support.

Migration is a separate service: Edly helps move learner accounts, enrollments, courses, assessments, completion records, certificates, historical data and integrations from another LMS into Open edX. The services menu adds Open edX installation, custom solutions, instructional design and course authoring by its pedagogy experts, LMS training and support, and Totara custom solutions.

The higher education page sets out the project process. It starts with a needs assessment through consultation calls and requirements sessions, followed by a proposal with the recommended plan, expected outcome, cost and timeline. An account manager then helps with deployment, the client tests features as they become available, and Edly provides five hours' worth of product and platform training.

Who it serves

The site addresses five audiences. Higher education gets the gradebook, roles, Turnitin and Caliper, and the page says Edly's solutions are trusted by "prestigious institutions like MIT and UCSD." K-12 schools are offered support for students at every stage of learning. Corporates can "easily train employees at scale while tracking learner progress to assess the success of training program." Nonprofits can create knowledge-sharing and upskilling programs, and businesses can turn learners into subscribers and paying customers with business-ready integrations.

Client quotes on the home page focus on the working relationship. Connor Diemand-Yauman, CEO of Philanthropy University, says that from the beginning the Edly team felt like members of his own team, "true partners rather than vendors." Pete Behrens of Agile Leadership Journey says "Our coaches absolutely love the new LMS!", and Philippa Wood of Change the Game says Edly was the right fit on flexibility around the timeline and what they wanted to build.

Pricing

The site has a pricing page and Edly Plans, a "Try for Free" option and guided demos. The higher education page says cost is set out in the project proposal after the needs assessment. Edly's guide is frank that open source is not free to run: organizations still budget for hosting, implementation, migration, security, integrations, upgrades and support, and an Open edX launch can cost more up front than a basic hosted LMS. Its argument is that Open edX does not depend on a standard per-learner license, which gives more control over long-term cost.

Who it suits

Edly suits organizations for which learning is important enough to justify a deliberate platform: universities building online programs, companies training staff at scale, nonprofits running public learning programs and education businesses that want a branded academy with a storefront. It is a strong fit for teams that want Open edX's control over data and hosting without building an internal Open edX engineering team. The company's own guide lists the cases where Open edX is less suitable, such as a small internal course library, completely standard requirements or a launch with almost no configuration; for those, the Edly SaaS LMS is the lighter route.