10 Multimedia authoring tools to make your training fun and engaging

Gone are the days of boring training that fails to engage learners. With the advancement of multimedia authoring tools, you can now transform your training into dynamic and interactive experiences, incorporating different types of media elements like photos, videos, and animations. 

Here, we'll explore the best multimedia tools and applications that can help you design and develop elearning materials that’ll leave a lasting impact on your learners.

1. SC Training (formerly EdApp)

SC Training (formerly EdApp) is a learning management system (LMS) known for its intuitive multimedia authoring tool. This tool is built to help design professional-looking courses that's sure to engage learners from start to finish. 

With this LMS for corporate training, you can easily bring a wide range of multimedia files into your courses, such as stunning images, captivating audio, and informative videos. By immersing your team in a visually-rich training environment, not only will they enjoy the learning experience but also retain and comprehend the content better.

Within your courses, you can also add games and quizzes. This makes your training not only informative but also fun and entertaining. It results in keeping your learners hooked throughout their learning journey. 

What’s more is that this multimedia tool is backed by interactive templates, so you can jump right into creating your training courses. From content and concept to games and assessment slides, you’ll find a diverse range of templates that’ll fit every learning style. 

Cost: Free (up to 10 users)

Key features: 

• Intuitive multimedia authoring tool
• Games and quizzes
• Interactive templates

Transform your training into interactive courses. Start using the best multimedia authoring tool today!

2. Lectora

Lectora is a popular multimedia authoring tool offered by elearning expert, ELB Learning. It takes pride in its built-in asset library, which offers a collection of over 120 million assets. Whether you need stock images, audio, or videos, this tool has everything you need to create professional-looking courses. It even allows you to upload your own files to make sure the content fits your training needs. 

Additionally, all multimedia courses created with Lectora are optimized for mobile use and accessibility. This gives your learners the flexibility to access their courses across devices.

Cost: 117 USD per author per month

Key features: 

• Built-in asset library
• 120+ million assets
• Mobile accessibility

3. Thrive Suite

Thrive Suite is the place to go if you’re looking for an all-in-one authoring software to help you build highly profitable online courses. With its powerful integration with WordPress, you can easily create not only your courses but also landing pages that are tailored to your specific goals. Plus, you can incorporate multimedia content into your lessons—text, videos, images, and more—to deliver an interactive learning experience.

Cost: 299 USD per year

Key features: 

• All-in-one authoring software
• WordPress integration
• Multimedia course content

4. Moovly

When it comes to creating internal training videos for training, Moovly easily tops the charts. This multimedia authoring tool empowers you to produce videos in any style, be it marketing, explainer, or video ads, without the need for a hefty budget or expert skills. Plus, you can customize every aspect of your content exactly the way you want. You can easily edit the text, colors, images, and video clips, it's all up to your needs. And with its extensive library of customizable video templates, you can dive right into creating your courses. 

Cost: 33.25 USD per month

Key features: 

• Video course creator
• Customizable video templates
• Multimedia course content

5. CourseArc

Looking to create captivating and interactive learning materials? CourseArc is also a reliable tool to check out. Here, you can seamlessly incorporate multimedia blocks into your content and enhance it with audio, image, and video elements. You can also make your courses even more engaging and interactive by adding activities like image hotspots, labeling, matching, and more. 

Plus, CourseArc offers the flexibility to integrate your own ready-made resources into your pages. Or, you can also take advantage of its HTML & Zip Embed blocks for enhanced personalization of your learning materials. 

Cost: 150 USD per month

Key features: 

• Multimedia blocks
• Interactive activities
• HTML & Zip Embed blocks

6. ActivePresenter 9

ActivePresenter 9 is known for its feature-rich content editor that allows you to create interactive e-learning content without the hassle of a complex authoring process. Here, you can seamlessly add images, videos, interactive assessments, and even educational games into your courses, making sure that learners stay engaged every step of the way. 

This multimedia authoring tool also features Smart screen capture technology, allowing you to record tutorials or assessments performed on screen. You can then enhance your content using the platform’s editing tools, effects, shapes, animations, and transitions.

Cost: 199 USD per license

Key features: 

• Feature-rich content editor
• Multimedia content with images, videos, assessments, and games
• Smart screen capture technology
• Video editing tools

7. Compozer

Compozer is an easy-to-use multimedia authoring tool that’s built to simplify the entire course creation process. It gives you the ability to design media-rich learning courses with interactive elements like images, videos, and audio into your courses, all without the need for extensive coding or design expertise. You can also access its extensive library of royalty-free images to quickly create and share your courses with your team.

Moreover, this tool houses pre-designed templates that can be easily customized to align with your branding guidelines. And for that extra touch of personalization, you can even install and utilize your own custom fonts.

Cost: Free; paid plans start at 99 USD

Key features: 

• Media-rich content creator tool
• Royalty-free images
• Pre-designed templates

8. Chameleon Creator

Chameleon Creator earned its popularity among the L&D world because of its intuitive multimedia authoring tool that you can use even without any training. When creating your courses, you can easily drag and drop your content and multimedia files. Or, you can tap into its vast library and import images to make visually captivating content. And for added convenience, you can take advantage of its pre-designed learning templates so you no longer have to start with a blank page. 

Cost: 125 USD per month

Key features: 

• Drag and drop authoring tool
• Image library
• Pre-designed learning templates

9. Composica

With Composica, you’ll experience the ultimate authoring freedom where you have complete control over your course's multimedia design and behavior. You can add interactive elements like images, videos, and audio. Additionally, every object file can be customized, styled, and modified just the way you want it. 

You can also bring in your existing PowerPoint presentations if you have them ready on hand. And here's the best part: the imported content becomes fully editable within the tool itself. That means you can add that extra layer of interactivity to create truly engaging learning experiences. 

Cost: 99 USD per month

Key features: 

• Course creator tool with authoring freedom
• Customizable files
• PowerPoint presentations

10. IsEazy

IsEazy is one of the most user-friendly multimedia authoring tools on the market today. Even without prior experience or expertise in content creation, you can easily design courses that are truly engaging. Additionally, you can include captivating interactive elements like videos, games, quizzes, and animations in your courses without the need for any complex coding. 

Here, you can also package your courses in SCORM 1.2, 2004 and Tin Can/xAPI. This is useful if you wish to track and deliver your courses on a different learning platform of your choice.

Cost: Free

Key features: 

• Easy-to-use authoring tool
• Interactive courses with videos, games, quizzes, and animations
• SCORM packages