Adobe Captivate Educational Services Reviews & Insights

Score6.8 out of 10

296 Reviews and Ratings

Community insights

TrustRadius Insights for Adobe Captivate are summaries of user sentiment data from TrustRadius reviews and, when necessary, third party data sources.

Pros

Multi Tenanting Configuration: Users have praised Adobe Captivate's Multi Tenanting configuration for its seamless navigation and user-friendly interface, enhancing the overall experience within the software. This feature allows users to efficiently manage multiple tenants or clients within a single instance of the software, streamlining workflow and organization.

Industry-Recognized Standards: Many reviewers have highlighted the value of Adobe Captivate adhering to industry standards such as SCORM files, ensuring smooth integration and optimal performance in eLearning development. By utilizing these recognized standards, users can create content that is compatible with various learning management systems, promoting interoperability and efficiency.

Flexibility and Creativity: Users appreciate the flexibility of Adobe Captivate, enabling them to unleash their creativity and maintain control over various aspects of lesson creation process. The software offers a wide range of customization options, empowering users to design engaging and interactive learning materials tailored to their specific needs and preferences.

Adobe Captivate Reviews

28 Reviews

Educational ServicesHigher Education6Education Management6E-Learning16

Review of Adobe Captivate

Rating: 7 out of 10

Incentivized

October 24, 2022

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

Elearning of language learning to foreign military.
ESL

Using video photos and audio and test knowledge

Pros

organize media
text knowledge
ease of using

Cons

better use of multiple videos
graphics editing
speech to text

Likelihood to Recommend

Educational training Task Based knowledge. Engaging media in learning

Debra Munoz

ITU designer in Research & Development at DLIELC (E-Learning, 501-1000 employees)

Vetted Review

3 years of experience

Captivate review

Rating: 9 out of 10

Incentivized

October 7, 2022

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

I use Adobe Captivate to build customized eLearning for companies. Sometimes the units are for a wide audience such as for new hire orientation, while other times the lessons are for a small and specialized group of roles. It's been shown that when adult learners have some control over their progression, that they are more likely to engage with the material. So I strongly appreciate that I can use advanced features to build flexibility and user choices into the lessons. I also frequently use the multi-state potential of objects to visually show progression through a sequence.

Pros

Multi-state objects, changing states upon triggers helps make otherwise dry content much more dynamic.
I really appreciate that I can respond to knowledge check questions with visual feedback, audio feedback, or forced review of relevant slide.
I really, really appreciate that Captivate is very flexible and gives me control over so many aspects. I can be as creative as I want which helps me build more appealing lessons.

Cons

I appreciate that Adobe includes users in the feedback loop for new versions. But I would like for more explanation on new features, how to use, where feature parameters have been moved to, what features have been renamed to, etc.
Currently bulleted lists are animated as a block. If I want bullet points to animate synchronized with narration, then I have to create separate text blocks for each bullet. The end result is that copying my text from my notes is no more faster than typing. The workflow is either copy one short phrase and paste into a new text block vs typing the phrase. And then do the same thing for each bullet. (Sigh...)
I've had several situations where I'd like to have something travel on a path. For example, if I have a line graph, it would be nice to draw the line's path, but have it grow over a few seconds, or even haltingly. I once used an AA to show this, but it took quite a while to write it out (especially because writing it out is selecting each action from a drop down list). I had several states of the line graph and in each state I had the line grow another unit with a yellow highlight, proceeding down the line's path. So the AA sequence was delay by 1 second, change state to 2, delay by 1 second, change state to 3, delay... and on and on. The AA was a dozen or so lines long.
I saw a webinar a while back about lottie files. It seems that they could make a lesson more dynamic. Could Adobe add the ability to incorporate lotties into a lesson?

Likelihood to Recommend

Captivate is well suited for instruction designers who want to build attractive, personalized, interactive, energetic lessons. It's also a good choice for someone who wants to build something innovative because Captivate gives the developer so much control over so many aspects.

But if someone wanted something built quickly, generically and didn't care about holding the viewer's attention, then Captivate might be an expensive tool. That person might be more satisfied with a cheaper and easier to learn authoring tool.

Verified User

Consultant in Professional Services (E-Learning company, 1-10 employees)

Vetted Review

6 years of experience

Awesome elearning

Rating: 9 out of 10

Incentivized

October 7, 2022

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

Captivate is powerful and builds great eLearning. It has a bit of a learning curve, but your end products will be well worth it. Our learners love the interactivity that Captivate provides and our designers love the flexibility that they have when building out products. It's a great product and it's really flexible.

Pros

Incorporates JavaScript.
Serves as a great platform for building learning games.
Creates brilliant eLearning.

Cons

It's responsive but not quite responsive.
There's a lot to remember about how to make it do things.
The learning curve can be steep.

Likelihood to Recommend

Captivate is perfect for building corporate training. It's good for difficult concepts and gamification. My clients love it.

Verified User

Professional in Sales (E-Learning company, 1-10 employees)

Vetted Review

5 years of experience

Adobe Captivate - A Powerful Multimedia Tool

Rating: 8 out of 10

Incentivized

October 7, 2022

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

We use Adobe Captivate to create interactive video presentations. You can easily add video assets, build interactivity, and add assessment questions all in one application. Typical delivery includes publishing to a SCORM package and uploading to an LMS. Adobe Captivate allows us to expedite the content creation process by leveraging templates and saved actions to build out our eLearning solutions.

Pros

Easily add video to Captivate projects.
Program interactions without prior coding skills.
Target mobile devices with responsive layouts.

Cons

Responsive design programing could be expedited with premade widgets.
More finished templates and interactions.
Improved interface in line with other Adobe tools.

Likelihood to Recommend

Adobe Captivate shines when creating true multimedia experiences - audio, video, and interactions. The timeline allows you to easily place content on each slide and visualize how the user will interact with each element over time. If you are trying to do simple quizzes or polling, Adobe Captivate may be the wrong tool when create this type of content.

Verified User

Executive in Corporate (E-Learning company, 1-10 employees)

Vetted Review

10 years of experience

Overview of Good Development Tool

Rating: 10 out of 10

Incentivized

October 6, 2022

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

I use it find learning solutions. I also teach workshops on it and like to add external web objects. I'm known for importing web and Animate files (OAM). I then use JavaScript to get the two objects to talk to each other.

Pros

Mobile development.
Exporting to HTML5.
Advanced Actions.

Cons

The built int JavaScript editor.

Likelihood to Recommend

It's well suited for rapid development of eLearning. It's good that it works with an LMS well and can produce some nice looking content.

It does need some newer templates and the JavaScript window SUCKS. I tend to write the code else where and then paste it into the JS window.

Phil Cowcill

Senior eLearning Developer in Engineering at PJ Rules (E-Learning, 1-10 employees)

Vetted Review

20 years of experience

Captivate - a solid performer in need of a refresh

Rating: 6 out of 10

Incentivized

October 6, 2022

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

We use Adobe Captivate to design self paced eLearning for our staff and administrators. These courses are used to supplement our in person professional development. We also use Captivate to develop courses that are required in our industry. This helps to ensure compliance with our state laws and local school board regulations. Captivate has been our go to eLearning software for many years.

Pros

Uses industry recognized standards for building eLearning. (SCORM files)
Is part of the Adobe suite of products and has resources and assets from Adobe.
Is continuing to evolve with the ever changing world of eLearning development

Cons

Captivate is slightly behind the curve in its development cycle.
Captivate would benefit from a collaborative workspace.
Captivate would benefit from cloud saving features.

Likelihood to Recommend

While Captivate is a very powerful product, it does suffer from a design that is dated and hard to navigate. Once learned the product is powerful and very functional. However the learning curve, as with most Adobe products, is very steep. As such new users can find it hard to use the product initially. Captivate would see dramatically increased market share if it overhauled its UI.

Armando Arviso

instructional technology technician in Information Technology at modesto city schools (Education Management, 1001-5000 employees)

Vetted Review

2 years of experience

View profile

Captivate great for creating SCORM

Rating: 7 out of 10

Incentivized

October 6, 2022

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

We provide professional development and training for adults for educators, teachers, staff, and school site administration. We provide live in person, webinar, and self-paced trainings. We use Captivate to create our self-paced SCORM modules that we host in Schoology or PowerSchool Professional Learning LMS platforms.

Pros

Convert PowerPoint to SCORM.
Templates to start a design for eLearning.
YouTube how to video community.

Cons

More simple user interface for navigation.
More automated features.
Built in templates and ready to go features to plug and play.
Additional interactive features and elements to engage learners.
Learner Choice elements to easy add to a design.

Likelihood to Recommend

We like Captivate, but there is a lot of time to learn it and for features we would like to do not as automated as we would have liked, you do need to program some features for the logic. We have not seen a new release since 2019 so we started to explore alternatives including Articulate 360 and GoMo and iSpring. We would like better collaboration features for several staff to work together on the same project.

Verified User

Director (Education Management company, 1001-5000 employees)

Vetted Review

4 years of experience

Soon to be Captivated

Rating: 7 out of 10

Incentivized

October 6, 2022

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

I use this product to create e-learning/training for professional development and k-12 audience. It allows more opportunity to customize learning experience with the features it offers.

Pros

Interactive features.
Scenario-based templates.
Advanced Actions.

Cons

Maybe integrated storyboarding?
Audio functionalities.

Likelihood to Recommend

This is best suited for users who are technologically "flexible" and up to date with programs. There are a lot features (some needs improvement) that can make learning more personal and customized. I like that because it is from Adobe, it works well with other products to create characters and animations. This is hard to use and confusing for someone who has not used similar features that Captivate offers. I have seen my colleagues frustrated because they see the product as overwhelming and not user friendly. It is also not suited where a simple training interface is enough.

Verified User

Professional in Professional Services (E-Learning company, 1-10 employees)

Vetted Review

2 years of experience

Captivate is the powerhouse tool you've been waiting for

Rating: 10 out of 10

Incentivized

October 6, 2022

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

We use Captivate to create integrative eLearning to include system simulations. We train users on many topic and systems with many personas. We have used it extensively to help with enterprise level software rollouts to train project teams, testers, support personnel, administrators, and end users.

Pros

Creates interactive, realistic simulations that are easy to maintain and update.
The structure makes it easier to troubleshoot issues in our code and quickly fix them.
It allows us to be creative and add super complex actions to do anything we can imagine.
Provides many out of the box interactions you can quickly tailor to your needs.
Provides a powerful tool to quickly implement even the most complex eLearning.
Interactive videos in Captivate are awesome!
Setting up Closed captioning and accessibility are easy with Captivate.

Cons

Adding some quick common actions such as the oob triggers in Storyline. This is minor but would be nice to have.
Add a way for newbies to quickly create their first project -- perhaps with a guided tour option that creates a simple set of slides.
More modern interface.

Likelihood to Recommend

Captivate is great for simple eLearning courses as well as super complex courses and assessments.
It is great for recording demonstrations and hands on simulations.
Captivate is great for adding interactive elements to include quizzes to videos
Captivate is great for creating accessible eLearning

Verified User

Consultant in Professional Services (E-Learning company, 1-10 employees)

Vetted Review

20 years of experience

Great product but needs an update

Rating: 7 out of 10

Incentivized

October 5, 2022

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

Create eLearning experiences for distribution to teachers and librarians in the state of Missouri. Most topics surround technology or classroom technology.

Pros

Screen recordings.
Interactive videos.
Mixed media delivery.

Cons

Interface design is dated.
Licensing is poor at the enterprise level.
Leans on outdated and deprecated tools that need to be removed from the program.
Doesn't go deep enough into VR.

Likelihood to Recommend

The big advantage to Adobe Captivate is it does everything in one spot instead of having to purchase, learn and maintain multiple tools and software. Its disadvantage is it is dated.

Bob Martin

trainer, elearning design in Information Technology at University of Missouri (Higher Education, 5001-10,000 employees)

Vetted Review

5 years of experience

Loading Reviews List....

Captivate review

Rating: 9 out of 10

Incentivized

October 7, 2022

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

Pros

Multi-state objects, changing states upon triggers helps make otherwise dry content much more dynamic.
I really appreciate that I can respond to knowledge check questions with visual feedback, audio feedback, or forced review of relevant slide.
I really, really appreciate that Captivate is very flexible and gives me control over so many aspects. I can be as creative as I want which helps me build more appealing lessons.

Cons

I appreciate that Adobe includes users in the feedback loop for new versions. But I would like for more explanation on new features, how to use, where feature parameters have been moved to, what features have been renamed to, etc.
Currently bulleted lists are animated as a block. If I want bullet points to animate synchronized with narration, then I have to create separate text blocks for each bullet. The end result is that copying my text from my notes is no more faster than typing. The workflow is either copy one short phrase and paste into a new text block vs typing the phrase. And then do the same thing for each bullet. (Sigh...)
I've had several situations where I'd like to have something travel on a path. For example, if I have a line graph, it would be nice to draw the line's path, but have it grow over a few seconds, or even haltingly. I once used an AA to show this, but it took quite a while to write it out (especially because writing it out is selecting each action from a drop down list). I had several states of the line graph and in each state I had the line grow another unit with a yellow highlight, proceeding down the line's path. So the AA sequence was delay by 1 second, change state to 2, delay by 1 second, change state to 3, delay... and on and on. The AA was a dozen or so lines long.
I saw a webinar a while back about lottie files. It seems that they could make a lesson more dynamic. Could Adobe add the ability to incorporate lotties into a lesson?

Likelihood to Recommend

Verified User

Consultant in Professional Services (E-Learning company, 1-10 employees)

Vetted Review

6 years of experience