Widget Areas for LearnDash vs Xtreme Courses

Widget Areas for LearnDash simply gives you more places to add custom content in LearnDash. By utilizing built-in LearnDash action hooks, we assign widget areas (also known as “sidebars”) to various locations throughout your LearnDash pages. Available LearnDash Widget Areas Focus Mode: Sidebar: Above Navigation Focus Mode: Sidebar: Below Navigation Focus Mode: Content: Start Focus Mode: Below Content Course Page: Content: Start Course Page: Content: End Group Page: Content: Start Group Page: Content: End Requires the “LearnDash 3.0” Active Template. Tested with LearnDash 4.23. How to Use Upon activating the plugin, new widget areas will appear on the Appearance > Widgets screen in your WordPress admin area. You can also access them via the Customizer (Appearance > Customize > Widgets). Simply add the blocks/widgets you’d like to insert into the corresponding widget areas. Be sure to click the “Save” button at the bottom. Navigate to a page that contains that widget area, refresh, and your new widgets will be there. Types of Content to Add WordPress comes with a set of default widgets, several of which might be useful. If you’re using the new block editor, all blocks will also be available to you. Add a simple Paragraph block with some basic text Add an Image or Video/Embed block for more visual content Add a Navigation Menu widget to insert a custom menu you’ve created Add your own Custom HTML widget to embed an or write your own code TIP: You can use the LearnDash Student and LearnDash Visitor blocks to display a block’s contents only to enrolled students or unenrolled visitors. LearnDash Widgets LearnDash comes prepackaged with a few widgets, but there’s probably only one that makes sense in these widget areas. Add a Course Progress Bar to the top or bottom of your Focus Mode sidebar Feel free to experiment with the other LearnDash widgets. Elementor Templates If you’re using Elementor Pro, you can create a custom section and embed it anywhere on your site, including in your new LearnDash widget areas. There are two ways to do this: When you go to insert a block/widget, select the Elementor Library widget. Choose a template from the dropdown menu. Click “Save.” Navigate to Templates > Saved Templates. Copy the shortcode next to the template you want to insert. Now you’ll insert a Shortcode block into the widget area, and paste the shortcode. For more information, see the article in Elementor’s knowledge base. Widget Area CSS Class Names If you need to target the widget areas to apply custom styles using CSS, you can use the following class names. All widget areas have the .ldx-widget-area class. Focus Mode: Sidebar: Above Navigation – .ldx-widget-area.fm-nav-before Focus Mode: Sidebar: After Navigation – .ldx-widget-area.fm-nav-after Focus Mode: Content: Start – .ldx-widget-area.fm-content-start Focus Mode: Below Content – .ldx-widget-area.fm-content-bottom Course Page: Content: Start – .ldx-widget-area.course-content-start Course Page: Content: End – .ldx-widget-area.course-content-end Group Page: Content: Start – .ldx-widget-area.group-content-start Group Page: Content: End – .ldx-widget-area.group-content-end Example Usage: .ldx-widget-area.fm-nav-before { margin: 1em; } This would add 1em of spacing around the widget area that appears above the navigation in the Focus Mode sidebar. In addition, all widgets placed inside of a widget area have a class of .ldx-widget. Show/Hide Widgets on Certain Devices While not a direct feature of this plugin, you can show/hide widgets on different devices using another free plugin. Install & activate the Widget Options plugin Navigate to the widget that you’d like to adjust the visibility on Scroll to the bottom and click on the tab with the mobile phone Choose to either show or hide on the checked devices Check the appropriate devices Click “Save” Show/Hide Widgets on Specific Course/Lesson/Topic Pages Another feature of the free Widget Options plugin (mentioned above) is to only show widgets on specific course, lesson, topic or quiz pages. Install & activate the Widget Options plugin Navigate to the widget that you’d like to adjust the visibility on Scroll to the bottom and click on the settings cog icon Click on the Logic tab In the text box, you can use the is_single() conditional tag to only display that widget on a specific page Use the ID of the course, lesson, topic or quiz 👉 How to find the ID of LearnDash content Example: This would only display the widget on the page with an ID of 7: is_single( '7' ) If you wanted to display a widget on multiple pages (with IDs of 1, 2 and 3), your code would look like this: is_single( array( 1, 2, 3 ) ) There are many more WordPress conditional tags you can use. From within WordPress Visit “Plugins > Add New” Search for “Widget Areas for LearnDash” Click the “Install” button Click the “Activate” button Navigate to “Appearance > Widgets” or open the Customizer to start adding blocks/widgets to your new widget areas

Xtreme Courses is a complete learning management system (LMS) plugin for WordPress. Build structured online courses in a React drag-and-drop builder, sell them through WooCommerce, schedule drip content, run auto-graded quizzes, issue verifiable PDF certificates, and keep students engaged with XP, badges, and leaderboards — all from your own WordPress site. No upsells. No locked features. There is no “Pro” version of Xtreme Courses — every feature listed on this page ships in the free download and is fully functional out of the box. No upgrade nags, no feature gates, no artificial limits on courses, students, or enrollments. Plugin homepage · Documentation · Support Why Xtreme Courses? If you’ve evaluated the established LMS plugins (LearnDash, LifterLMS, Tutor LMS, LearnPress, Sensei) you already know the pattern: the features you actually need to run a paid course business — certificates, drip scheduling, quizzes, e-commerce checkout, reporting — are spread across paid tiers and per-feature add-ons. Xtreme Courses is built differently: The whole stack is free. Course builder, WooCommerce selling, drip content, quiz engine, PDF certificates, gamification, live lessons, reviews, analytics — nothing is held back for a paid tier. Commerce-ready from day one. Native WooCommerce integration: one-time purchases, free enrollments, subscription-gated content, bundles, bulk enrollment coupons, and gift enrollment. Modern WordPress stack. PHP 8.2+ with strict types, a React drag-and-drop course builder, custom REST API, Action Scheduler background jobs, and full uninstall cleanup. Self-hosted and private by default. No telemetry, no external service calls unless you explicitly configure live Zoom lessons (disclosed below). Your course content and student data stay on your server. WordPress.org-compliant. Fully GPL, no obfuscated code, every external-service touchpoint disclosed on this page. A free alternative to LearnDash, LifterLMS, Tutor LMS, LearnPress, and Sensei for course creators who want the complete LMS feature set without per-feature pricing. Core Features (Free): React Drag-and-Drop Course Builder — Build structured courses with sections, lessons (video, text, PDF, audio), and quizzes using a visual drag-and-drop interface. WooCommerce Integration — Sell courses as one-time purchases, free enrollments, or subscription-gated content. Supports bulk enrollment coupons and gift enrollment. Drip Content Scheduling — Release lessons on a fixed date, X days after enrollment, or after completing the previous lesson. Visual Gantt-style drip timeline. Quiz Engine — Multiple choice, true/false, and fill-in-the-blank questions with timed mode, pass thresholds, retake limits, and auto-grading. PDF Certificate Generator — Auto-generate personalized certificates on course completion with a public verification URL. Student Dashboard — Tabbed dashboard showing enrolled courses, progress rings, certificates, achievements, and order history. Instructor Role & Dashboard — Dedicated xc_instructor role with scoped access to own courses, student roster, and earnings. Gamification — XP points, badges with trigger conditions, and a leaderboard Gutenberg block/shortcode. Live Lessons — Zoom SDK embed and Google Meet pre-join cards with calendar reminder emails (.ics attachment). Analytics Dashboard — Chart.js-powered admin panel with enrollment trends, lesson funnel, quiz performance, revenue, active students, and certificate issuance rate. Course Reviews & Ratings — Star ratings and written reviews with moderation, instructor replies, and aggregate display. Course Bundles & Prerequisites — Bundle multiple courses into a single WooCommerce product and enforce prerequisite completion. Mobile Lesson Player — Distraction-free, full-viewport lesson player with progress persistence. Technical Highlights: PHP 8.2+ with strict types Custom REST API namespace /xtreme-courses/v1/ Custom database tables with proper indexes Action Scheduler for all background jobs Transient-based caching for leaderboard and progress queries Full nonce verification on all AJAX/REST write endpoints Input sanitization and output escaping throughout Complete uninstall routine (tables, options, uploaded files) Bundled libraries This plugin bundles Chart.js v4.5.1 (MIT, Copyright 2014-2025 Chart.js Contributors) for the Analytics admin panel. The script is served from the plugin folder at assets/js/vendor/chart.umd.min.js — no third-party CDN is contacted. External services This plugin can connect to one third-party service. It is opt-in — it is only contacted when an admin or instructor explicitly creates a live lesson and a student attends it. The default install of the plugin does not contact any external service. Zoom Meeting SDK (optional, used for live lessons) If an admin or instructor creates a live lesson and pastes a Zoom meeting URL into the lesson, then when a student opens that lesson the plugin will: Render an embedded Zoom client by enqueueing the Zoom Meeting SDK JavaScript directly from https://source.zoom.us/zoom-meeting-3.1.2.min.js on that lesson page only. The Zoom SDK then connects to Zoom’s own infrastructure to join the meeting. The plugin itself does not send any data to Zoom from your server — all communication happens between the student’s browser and Zoom. If you do not use the live-lesson feature (no live lesson with a Zoom URL is ever created), the Zoom SDK is never loaded and Zoom is never contacted. Service provider: Zoom Communications, Inc. Terms of Service · Privacy Statement License Xtreme Courses is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation, either version 2 of the License, or (at your option) any later version. Xtreme Courses is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU General Public License for more details. You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License along with Xtreme Courses. If not, see https://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-2.0.html.