LifterLMS 3.0 will be launching very soon.
First, I’d like to thank you and the entire LifterLMS community for all the feedback and feature voting which helped us shape the upgrades included in LifterLMS 3.0.
We are treating the release of LifterLMS 3.0 like a giant party!
We will be offering some webinars and live streaming to discuss some of the benefits and new features of LifterLMS 3.0. Also to celebrate the launch, LifterLMS Pro members will be receiving a 25% discount code that they can use on any LifterLMS add-on.
So What Exactly Is New in LifterLMS 3.0?
Be sure to read the entire post so you’re up to speed on what’s coming, including the pricing changes.
1) Unified one-screen checkout
The much anticipated simplified checkout flow is here. When a user clicks the button to enroll in a course, the registration (or login) is on the same screen as the checkout page. If you are accepting credit cards via the LifterLMS Stripe Extension, then the credit card input fields will be there as well.  If you are using Stripe and PayPal as checkout options, then the user can select which checkout option they prefer. PayPal checkout is of course an extra step, as the user needs to bounce over to PayPal to checkout, then bounce back to your site to start the course.
2) Powerful access plans so you can create just about any pricing model for your courses and memberships
LifterLMS 3.0 has an incredibly versatile pricing and membership engine. Our terminology is changing from pricing to “Access Plans.” Access plans can be free or paid. Here are all the variable you have to work with:
- Plan Title
- Plan SKU
- Enroll Text
- Featured
- Is Free
- Price
- Frequency
- Plan Period
- Plan Length
- Access Expiration
- Plan Availability
- Memberships
- Trial Offer
- Trial Price
- Trial Length
- Sale Pricing
- Sale Price
- Sale Start Date
- Sale End Date
You can see how just about any pricing and access requirement can be met with the all new course access plans builder. Courses can have multiple access plans associated with them as well. As an example pricing model for a course,  you might have a one-time payment option, a payment plan option, and then a free option if you’re already a member in a particular membership product.
3) More powerful automated course and membership access start and end functionality
In LifterLMS 3.0 you have more control over when a course or membership can be purchased, allow users inside, and automatically remove users on circumstances you define. Here are a couple example scenarios:
- Sell a course that’s “coming soon,” but don’t allow users inside yet.
- Automatically remove a new student from a course after 90 days from purchase or on a specific date
4) An upgraded LifterLMS Stripe plugin that allows your website to be aware of when a recurring payment fails or card is declined so a user can be removed automatically from a course or membership
The new LifterLMS Stripe integration that will roll out at the same time as LifterLMS 3.0 is way more advanced than it used to be. In conjunction with the new access plans feature for courses, Stripe let’s your website know when a recurring payment fails or card is declined so a user can be removed automatically from a course or membership.
In the old version of LifterLMS a recurring payment would be set up at checkout with Stripe, but that was the end of the 2 systems interacting together. Now the integration is much more intelligent and useful.
5) PayPal will be moved out into it’s own add-on with more advanced functionality
We’ve re-developed the LifterLMS ecommerce engine and moved PayPal integration out to it’s own plugin. Just like with Stripe, the new LifterLMS PayPal integration is more powerful. It allows your website to be aware of when a recurring payment fails or card is declined in the PayPal system so a user can be removed automatically from a course or membership.
If you are using an older version of LifterLMS and want to keep the native PayPal integration in it’s legacy form, simply do not update your version of LifterLMS once LifterLMS 3.0 becomes available. Also note benefit #19 on this post where you can get the whole universe of plugins, themes, and premium support packages for LifterLMS in a new bundle option.
It was a tough decision to move PayPal out of the core free version of LifterLMS. Read this post to learn more about the pricing model changes.
6) A new manual order type is included in the free LifterLMS core plugin
A manual order is an option you can offer on your website where people purchase courses and memberships, but their order is set to pending while the website owner awaits the arrival of cash, check, bank transfer, or whatever other method you have of receiving payment outside of the website. Once you get paid, you can change the order status to completed, and the user will be let into their courses.
7) WooCommerce will be moved out into it’s own add-on with more advanced functionality
The new and improved WooCommerce integration will have the ability to match LifterLMS Access Plans to Woo products. There will also be support for for the popular WooCommerce Subscriptions extension.
For the cleanest user experience, we recommend using the LifterLMS checkout system, but of course understand that you might want to tap into the WooCommerce ecosystem of extensions.
If you are using an older version of LifterLMS and want to keep the native WooCommerce integration in it’s legacy form, simply do not update your version of LifterLMS once LifterLMS 3.0 becomes available. Also note benefit #19 on this post where you can get the whole universe of plugins, themes, and premium support packages for LifterLMS in a new bundle option.
It was a tough decision to move optional WooCommerce integration out of the core free version of LifterLMS. Read this post to learn more about the pricing model changes.
8) An all new upgraded design of the base LifterLMS components
Design trends change over time. And the course tile base designs that launched with LifterLMS years ago have been upgraded to a more modern flat design.
As LifterLMS works with any well coded WordPress theme, the LifterLMS design elements are very subtle. You will notice some slight changes. If you want more advanced control (without needing to write code) over the the design elements of LifterLMS components, check out the LifterLMS LaunchPad theme.
7) Upgraded coupon system
The LifterLMS 3.0 coupon system has been overhauled to give you better reporting on use and more control over coupon options.
9) New user profile field management options
There are 3 places in a LifterLMS powered platform where users interact with their user account details:
- Registration
- Checkout
- My Account (Student Dashboard)
In LifterLMS 3.0, you can now make certain fields like first name, last name, address, and phone number required, optional, or hidden. Email is always required, as it is necessary to create a user in the system.
So why does this matter?
Let’s assume you only want to capture email on checkout to create the least amount of steps and friction points as possible. But if a user has already purchased and is on their account page, perhaps you want to take the opportunity to collect more information.
This feature also lays the groundwork for a custom registration field system down the road.
10) New open registration options
Open registration is now optional. Open registration, when enabled, means that a user can create an account even without purchasing something.
Perhaps you would prefer to avoid open registration because you want to decrease spam sign-ups or for your situation, you will be adding students manually.
Or perhaps you want open registration turned on so you can get sign ups and then do specific marketing campaigns with users on your system who have not yet purchased a course or membership. You can do these types of advanced email marketing with the LifterLMS MailChimp or ConvertKit extensions.
11) Voucher system upgrades
You can now hide or make the voucher system required. The LifterLMS voucher system allows you to sell courses and memberships offline or through another system. Your end users can then redeem through an activation code or codes, which the website admin can track.
Perhaps you want to disable the voucher system because you don’t plan on using it. No problem. You can turn it off.
Perhaps you don’t sell your courses at all. You just want an easy way to activate a classroom of students into your online course. Simply make vouchers required on registration and hand out voucher codes to your users.
12) New pricing table on course page
Because you can create multiple pricing options with the new LifterLMS access plans feature, you need a way to display pricing in a clean and intelligent way.
LifterLMS pricing tables are created based on the details you create in your access plans for a course.
You can still of course just have a single one-time price on a course, but we’ve got you covered if your pricing model and strategy is more complex.
13) New and improved student management and order interfaces
LifterLMS 3.0 has an upgraded order interface so you can view data and manage orders more effectively. You can easily view pricing, status, next payment date, and more.
From the student management interface, you can also get a quick view of where individual students are at in a particular course and even change enrollment status in one click.
14) New refund system for Stripe, PayPal, and manual refunds
In the old LifterLMS system, once an order was set up, it was passed to PayPal or Stripe. So if you needed to issue a refund, you had to go outside of your website to do that inside PayPal or Stripe.
Now in LifterLMS 3.0 you can refund orders much easier from inside your website.
 15) Support for right side currency display and zero decimal currency support
It’s a core value here at LifterLMS to serve the entire world. You might have noticed that with our commitment to multilanguage support through translations.
Not all currencies behave the same. That’s why we’ve added right side currency support and zero decimal currency support. Examples of zero decimal currencies are the Japanese Yen or the Chilean Peso.
16) Updates to the My Account page
In previous versions of LifterLMS, if you have a large catalog of courses on a student dashboard, the page could become slow to load or have performance issues. In LifterLMS 3.0 that is no longer an issue with the new pagination system.
Also if you include memberships on your dashboard, those now link over to the membership pages.
17) New interface and performance upgrades to the analytics
LifterLMS analytics have been upgraded to be faster, more performant, and more scaleable.
Thank you to those of you who helped us identify the opportunity here for large user base sites. The queries have been rewritten and we’ve added asynchronous loading to allow for maximum data processing performance.
18) Setup wizard
LifterLMS 3.0 also includes a set-up guide that helps walk new users through setting up their site in an easy to digest step-by-step manner.
You can also re-run the set-up guide at any time to make sure you have everything set up properly.
There’s also a step where you can opt in into nonsensitive information anonymous tracking. This helps us gather data on how people are using LifterLMS so we can improve on the features and focus on the pieces of the software that matters most to our users. Data driven decisions are a beautiful thing, and I encourage everyone to participate.
Nonsensitive data does not include pricing information or anything specific about your users. We DO NOT gather that data. That’s your business!
Also for participating, we’ll send you a coupon. You’ll see more information about how that works in the setup wizard.
19) New pricing option for LifterLMS products
We will be offering a new product bundle where you can get all the third party integrations and design tools made by us at LifterLMS for $299 (This is over $800 of total retail price). Many of our users have been requesting this option. Some people were worried about future costs if they would have to buy more and more $99 products down the road as their site integration and design needs got more advanced. With LifterLMS 3.0 you can save big and move forward confidently with a clear, known cost structure by investing in the entire third party integration and design tools product suite bundle for one price!
If you are an existing LifterLMS user with an active license or more and would like to upgrade to the bundle, we will gladly prorate the cost for you. Contact us here to request proration and upgrade.
You can of course invest in LifterLMS products a la carte, but I believe the Universe product bundle will be a no-brainer investment for the serious online course creator, membership site owner, or LMS professional.
Got Questions about LifterLMS 3.0?
If you have any questions about LifterLMS 3.0, please feel free to send an email or join the discussion in the LifterLMS VIP Facebook Group!
Keep an eye on your email inbox as we send you more information about the coming LifterLMS 3.0 release.
We can’t wait to see what you build with LifterLMS 3.0!
