Apporto

What Apporto ExamSpace is

Apporto is a browser-based virtual desktop company, and ExamSpace is its assessment product: a complete exam environment that runs in any browser and gives each student exactly the applications, files, websites and AI tools an exam allows. It is sold to colleges, universities and other testing programs rather than to individual instructors or learners. The company describes itself as "an employee-owned software company", founded and led by CEO Antony Awaida, and its leadership page says its cloud platform serves institutions across the US, Canada, the UK, Australia and Europe.

ExamSpace sits on top of the company's older business. Apporto started with Desktops-as-a-Service: virtual Windows, Mac and Linux desktops delivered in the browser for computer labs, remote work and cybersecurity training. The exam product reuses that delivery layer, which is why the ExamSpace page leads with "100% browser-based" and promises "No software for students to install and no dedicated exam-device fleet for IT to maintain."

How an exam is set up

Faculty build each exam as a workspace. They choose the applications, working files, datasets, reference materials, websites, network services and approved AI capabilities the assessment needs, and everything outside that policy stays unavailable. Policies go deeper than a browser tab: the page lists controls for clipboard use, file transfers, printing, screen sharing, storage visibility, peripherals and connectivity, under the line "Lock the workspace. Not just the tab." A finished setup, with its applications, resources and policies, can be saved as a reusable template for later courses, sections and testing periods.

The workflow on the page has three steps. Faculty configure the workspace and save it as a template; students launch the assigned workspace through the LMS or a browser; and faculty and authorized staff review session activity afterwards, including timestamped policy events and blocked actions. The sample session on the page shows entries such as a blocked unauthorized site, a blocked clipboard action and an approved AI tool being opened.

Students can sit the exam on institution-managed or student-owned devices. The page stresses that there are no downloads, plug-ins or VPN, that every student gets the same faculty-configured workspace whatever device they bring, and that IT manages one central environment instead of software on each machine. ExamSpace lists native LMS integrations with Canvas, Blackboard, D2L Brightspace, Moodle and Sakai.

Practical and open-resource exams

The point of the product is assessing what students can do with real software, or in the page's words, "Assess what students can do, not just what they know." The ExamSpace page groups its examples by discipline:

• Coding and computer science: students write, run, test and debug code with development tools and terminals, with VS Code, Eclipse, PyCharm and IntelliJ IDEA named.
• Data science and analytics: datasets, spreadsheets, notebooks and statistical tools such as Jupyter, Spyder, RStudio, Stata and MATLAB.
• Engineering and technical programs: specialized applications including SolidWorks, AutoCAD, ArcGIS, Ansys and Multisim.
• Open-resource and AI-enabled exams: class notes, textbooks, documentation, reference files, Microsoft 365 and approved AI, with anything outside the exam policy blocked.

The sample configuration on the page, a biology practical final, gives students RStudio and Python 3.11, two data files, two science reference websites and a course AI assistant.

The page sets ExamSpace against what it calls legacy lockdown browsers: a complete cloud exam workspace instead of a restricted browser session, practical and AI-enabled exams instead of mainly browser-delivered tests, and a browser launch instead of a dedicated browser, application or extension, with the caveat that "Capabilities vary by product and configuration." It also cites a Princeton Alumni Weekly report from May 2026 that Princeton ended its 133-year tradition of unproctored exams amid concerns about cheating and generative AI, and frames ExamSpace as a digital route forward for institutions otherwise returning to proctors, paper and blue books.

Proctoring by controlling the environment

For a reader comparing proctoring tools, the difference is the method. ExamSpace secures the environment rather than watching the student. The company's blog describes it as creating "a controlled testing environment where students can access only the tools, applications, and resources approved for the exam", and says institutions that want continuous live human proctoring or surveillance-driven monitoring may find the approach different, with some combining it with additional proctoring measures for certain high-stakes exams. What ExamSpace records for review is the session itself: policy events, blocked actions and relevant activity.

The rest of the Academic AI Suite

ExamSpace is one of four products the company groups as its Academic AI Suite. CoTutor is an AI tutor that brings the course, assignment, rubric and faculty expectations into each conversation. Faculty choose a level of help per course or assignment along a range from open exploration through structured support and Socratic questioning to an "Attempt First" mode in which students must try before it responds. It works inside Microsoft Word, Google Docs, VS Code and LMS course tools, with sign-in through the institution. The CoTutor page cites, as independent research, a randomized study of 194 Harvard undergraduates published in Scientific Reports in 2025, in which students using a structured AI tutor achieved more than twice the median learning gains of students in an active-learning classroom.

PowerGrader helps instructors evaluate work and give consistent, rubric-aligned feedback. TrustEd makes the learning process visible through behavioral context and explainable evidence, connecting a student's revisions to the final submission. Beyond the suite, Apporto sells virtual computer labs, cybersecurity labs for hands-on practice in a safe sandbox, and digital workspaces.

Security, scale and buying

The ExamSpace and CoTutor pages list the same trust credentials: SOC 2 Type II with independently audited controls, FERPA, a completed HECVAT Full 3.06 assessment, and WCAG 2.2 AA accessibility support with a VPAT 2.5 available. Both state that "Student data is never used to train our models." The ExamSpace page shows a 4.9/5 rating on G2, "3.5M+" desktops delivered across higher education and a reference to the Gartner Magic Quadrant for DaaS. The partners page says Apporto "currently has 2M virtual desktop seats running daily", and the company page claims more than 350 customers.

Under the hood, the platform runs on HyperStream, which the partners page calls Apporto's own delivery protocol for a near-native experience, on vendor-assembled and vendor-managed infrastructure with backup, recovery, management and monitoring included. The same page says 24/7 support is included and that Apporto installs, tests and hands back production-ready environments in about two to three weeks. The company timeline adds that its first LMS integration, with Canvas, passed the class roster and role information automatically.

The site publishes no prices. The company's blog says ExamSpace uses custom pricing based on institutional requirements, exam volume, deployment scope and support needs. Institutions can request a demo or start with a pilot program, which the site describes as "a quick proof of concept" to test the fit.

Who it suits

ExamSpace suits colleges and universities that want practical, software-based exams in programming, data science, engineering and similar subjects, where students need real tools rather than multiple-choice questions, and that want to allow notes, documentation or a course AI assistant without opening everything else. It fits institutions already running Canvas, Blackboard, Brightspace, Moodle or Sakai, and campuses with bring-your-own-device policies that do not want a lockdown install on student laptops. The company's blog also names certification providers and testing programs as a fit, particularly for exams that need specialized software or virtual labs.

The caveats are about method and buying. Programs that require live human proctoring for high-stakes exams may want to pair it with another measure, as the company's own blog acknowledges, and the price only comes through a sales conversation or a pilot.