Canvas vs Moodle: Sleek ride or Custom build?

Like buying a car, it feels like a big decision… until you realise the driver still matters more.

Welcome to the LMS used car dealership… You are greeted by a friendly but suspiciously enthusiastic salesperson who seems to know a bit too much about your needs. They wave you over to two cars parked side by side. “Take your pick” they say…“Both reliable. Both have features. Depends what kind of ride you’re looking for”

You sit down in the first car... The seat is ridiculously comfortable. You think, oh yes, this is it. I could drive across the country in this bad boy. Who needs lumbar support when the whole seat feels like it was modelled after a Michelin-starred mattress?

That’s Canvas…

Everything is exactly where you'd expect it to be. The dashboard is clean, the controls are intuitive, and the radio doesn’t require a postgraduate degree in cryptography just to switch to Bluetooth.

But then you hop into the second car … (oh the decisions…)… Well… the seat feels... fine? Not bad, not great, just... there. You adjust the wheel (when you finally find the knob). You poke at a few buttons. The UI is clearly designed for someone with way more patience than you have. You think, nah, the first car was better.

That’s Moodle…

It feels clunky at first. Slightly unforgiving. Maybe even (dare I say it… ugly)… especially if you’re the type who refuses to use anything unless it looks like it was designed by Apple and smells faintly of minimalism.

But then, just as you’re about to declare Canvas the winner, (the friendly but suspiciously enthusiastic salesperson) leans in and points to a hidden dial under the seat.

“Try this”

You turn the dial.

The seat adjusts in about twenty different ways. Lumbar, tilt, support in places you didn’t even know needed supporting. Suddenly, it’s more comfortable than the first car.

… You just didn’t know how to use it properly.

And that, my friends, is the state of most LMS debates in higher education.

The Honda Civic… smooth, predictable, and won’t scare you

Canvas is the LMS equivalent of a Honda Civic.

It’s modern. Slick. Inoffensive in the best possible way. It starts the first time, the wipers do exactly what wipers should do, and the indicators don’t require a tutorial.

You sit down and it just works. No manual needed. No midnight Googling (or Bing-ing for fairness) for answers. No wading through ancient forum posts titled “Why is my LMS punishing me for existing?”

You upload a syllabus. You post some assignments. Your students click. You breathe. The coffee is still warm.

But like everything in life… there is a catch...

Ever tried seriously customising a Honda Civic? Not just sticking a pair of novelty dice on the mirror… I mean actually tweaking it?

That’s when you realise everything is locked down.

Canvas doesn’t want you playing with its guts. It likes being clean. It likes being safe. It will let you drive straight, but the moment you try to do something even vaguely creative … conditional logic in quizzes, detailed analytics, multi-layer grading… suddenly you’re out of road.

Canvas is brilliant for instructors who just want a smooth ride… upload the syllabus, drop in some assignments, set the dates, and go. It’s perfect if your course structure is fairly standard, your needs are predictable, and you don’t want to spend time digging around in settings menus.

But if you’re a university with layers, multiple departments, blended delivery models, executive education on one side and first-year undergrads on the other, or faculty who want to experiment with adaptive pathways or non-linear learning… Canvas starts to feel boxed in.

It’s not that it can’t handle complexity. It’s just that it doesn’t particularly like it. The system is built for consistency, not creativity. And when you try to build something even slightly outside the manual… you start to hit friction. And that’s when the “No, we can’t do that” responses begin. Not because your ideas are too ambitious, but because Canvas simply wasn’t built for out-of-the-box thinking. What seems like a small, reasonable request

• “Can we track X behaviour?”

• “Could we automate Y journey?”

• “Can this assignment behave differently for two cohorts?”

…often results in an awkward pause, followed by a gentle “not really” from your learning tech team. It’s not that they don’t want to help. It’s just that the system was designed for uniformity, not nuance

The Toyota Hilux: The workhorse that refuses to die

Moodle does not care what you think of it.

It’s been around since dial-up modems. It has powered everything from universities to nonprofits to institutions you didn’t even realise were institutions. It has outlived more polished, better marketed LMSs by sheer force of resilience. And it will still be here when the sun explodes.

But… just so you know… It doesn’t make things easy … at least, not straight away.

You open the gradebook and immediately question every life choice that brought you here. The settings menu has more layers than an onion. And the interface? It’s like walking into a house built by five generations of eccentric DIYers who all had very strong opinions about shelving.

However...

Once you learn it… really get into it… Moodle can do things no other LMS can.

• The quizzes? Better.

• The grading? More flexible.

• The analytics? Terrifyingly powerful.

There’s a plugin for almost everything. And if there isn’t, someone in a Moodle forum has duct-taped something together that gets the job done. But where Moodle really comes into its own is at the institutional level. If you’re running a university that isn’t one-size-fits-all … where different departments have wildly different assessment models, delivery methods, or tech requirements… Moodle lets you say yes to things Canvas would politely decline.

Moodle, however just shrugs and says, “Sure. Just tell me how weird you want it”

It’s not out-of-the-box. But it’s not supposed to be. Moodle assumes that you know what you want to build, and it hands you the scaffolding. With enough care (and maybe a good learning technologist on speed dial), it becomes a powerful, modular, and wildly adaptable system. Yes, it’s clunky. Yes, it will occasionally crash because someone installed a plugin written by a German grad student in 2011. But if you’ve got ambition, complexity, or a faculty that thrives on innovation, Moodle is the LMS that’s built to handle it.

Moodle is messy, but it’s your mess. If you’re willing to spend the time, you can build something genuinely remarkable.

Just don’t expect it to be pretty out of the box.

The seductive myth of the platform switch

It usually starts around week four of the term. Mid-meeting. A heavy sigh. A dramatic pause for effect. Then Stephen leans back in his chair and says: "Can’t we just switch to Moodle? Or Canvas? That would fix everything."

No, Stephen. It really wouldn’t…

Switching LMSs is the academic equivalent of trading in your car because the cup holders annoy you or you don´t like where the volume knob is… only to realise the new car hides the handbrake under three touchscreen menus and resets your seat every time you start the engine. Yes, the dashboard looks cleaner. And yes, the interface might feel more modern. But give it a week. Maybe two.

That new system glow… it fades fast.

Soon enough, you're muttering about missing features, hunting for familiar workflows, and wondering how your gradebook now resembles something devised by a sleep deprived tax accountant. Your course materials don’t quite copy across the way you hoped, your team is relearning how to do the basics and once tidy folder structure now resembles a digital rummage sale of half-migrated PDFs and broken links, version conflicts, and mysterious missing videos

The harsh truth is that… switching platforms always feels like progress, but more often than not, it’s just movement disguised as improvement. Because the real frustrations we carry into an LMS… the clunky workflows, the lack of creativity, the awkward assessments… aren’t always about the system itself. They're about how we’ve been using it. Or how we haven’t.

Many institutions treat their LMS like a digital filing cabinet… functional, and utterly uninspiring. Uploading the same PDFs, post the same weekly announcements, reuse the same templates for years on end… and then blame the platform for feeling stale. As if a shinier interface will make better teachers, or switching brands will somehow unlock pedagogical magic…

But unless the switch comes with new habits, new training, and a deeper understanding of what the platform can actually do, it’s just a reshuffle. A change of scenery with all the same baggage packed neatly inside.

It’s tempting to believe that the problem is the platform. It’s much harder to admit that the problem might be how little we’ve explored what the current one is capable of.

And unfortunately, no LMS on the market will ever save you from your own design shortcuts.

So... Which one should you pick?

Before we get to that question… a quick disclaimer!

I’m not an LMS expert. Not really. There are far smarter people out there … platform specialists, who know your LMS inside and out, especially the quirks of how it runs in your institution. They’ve seen things. They probably have preferences and strong opinions. And yes, I’m simplifying a lot here. I know that. But if you asked those people… I’d like to think they’d agree with me on this…

Platforms are just tools. They don’t teach. People do.

And when things aren’t working, it’s rarely because someone chose the wrong LMS. It’s more often because no one was shown how to use it properly… or why it mattered in the first place.

So, which platform should you pick?

Well… here’s the harsh truth…

There is no perfect LMS.

Canvas is clean, consistent, and doesn’t ask much of you. Moodle is powerful, adaptable, and expects you to roll up your sleeves. Both platforms can support brilliant teaching. Both can also leave you muttering into your keyboard.

But neither one… (no matter how shiny or customisable) will fix a confusing course.

An LMS won’t save you from unclear instructions, from assessments that don’t quite align, or from that moment your students message you in week four asking what the actual point of the course is.

• It won’t give your module a structure if it never had any.

• It won’t write your learning outcomes for you.

• It won’t magically turn a list of readings into an engaging learning experience.

Because the platform isn’t the pedagogy. It’s just the frame. The vehicle. It can get you somewhere… but only if you already know where you're going.

Switching to a new system might feel tempting, especially when frustrations bubble over. But LMS changes aren’t about personal preference. They’re about strategic, collective decisions. Ones that require buy-in, planning, training, and support.

So yes, it’s a choice. A big one. But it’s not about whether you like Moodle or prefer Canvas. It’s about what your institution needs, what your educators are ready for, and how committed you are to using whichever platform you have.

Whatever you choose, the real work is the same:

• Design with intention.

• Communicate with clarity.

• And never assume the system will do the teaching for you.

Before you switch platforms, try knocking on the right door

This is the twist in the story and it is the part that is often forgotten…

Your institution already has people who know how to make your LMS work better.

They’re not mythical creatures. They’re not hidden in basements (well, not all of them). They go by many names, like digital learning specialists, instructional designers, learning technologists, pedagogical advisers, course whisperers, faculty therapists… Whatever their title, they are the people who actually know how your LMS works… and how to make it behave.

They’re the ones who…

• Can configure your gradebook so it behaves like a gradebook, not a trap.

• Know exactly what that terrifying settings panel actually does.

• Can show you features you didn’t know were tucked under three layers of menus.

• Understand why your students keep asking the same questions about your course... and how to fix it.

These people aren’t just technical support. They’re translators. Architects. Quiet co-pilots in your course design.

… And they’re already on your team.

So before launching a campaign to switch platforms… or declaring Moodle a lost cause or Canvas too rigid, try this instead… walk down the hallway, send the email, book the time.

Because the seat that felt uncomfortable at first?

There was a knob hidden under it the whole time.

You just had to adjust it.

LMS stories for the road…

Canvas or Moodle? or perhaps something else?

Sleek simplicity or messy brilliance? Have you lived through an LMS switch, led one, or quietly watched it unfold while sipping coffee and pretending not to panic?

Have you, perhaps… been like Stephen?

Tell me your LMS stories in the comments. I won’t judge.

Borgþór Ásgeirsson 24/03/2025

Learning Design Manager at Cambridge Judge Business School