2 Ways to Manually Enroll Users into a LearnDash Course

Hi Von,

I can’t speak to using that function. I know that function exists, but I have never used it.

I just tested adding a user (subscriber role) to a closed course using the first method outlined above (going to the user’s page, selecting the course, adding it to their list of enrolled courses, and clicking the “update” button).

It worked perfectly. They were enrolled. They had access to the course. The “take this course” button was gone. And I could click through to the first lesson.

Hey Justus,

I have not done anything like this, but it sounds like something I would try to use a quiz builder and/or form plugin to achieve. Here are two options you can look into:

• ThriveThemes Quiz Builder
• Gravity Forms Quiz Add-On

I believe both would allow you to assign scores/values to each answer, and then based on a certain score at the end, you could recommend certain courses.

I don’t know of a way to do this in bulk. The only way I know of is to go into each user’s profile and manually mark each one as complete.

Hi Jonathan — Good question. This is a fairly common technique, and there are two different plugins I can recommend. People usually use one or the other:

• WPFusion
• Uncanny Automator

Both plugins are really well built and have awesome support. I know the owners of both companies. They’ll also help you sort out if their plugin is the best fit for your exact scenario.

The above links are affiliate links. They cost you nothing and help support me so I can continue to provide free articles and respond to comments. It would be appreciated if you use them if you decide to purchase either product, but totally your call.

Hi Chris. I haven’t done this before but it might be possible using the User Role Editor plugin, and modify a Group Leader’s permission to include a permission that allows for adding users. I’m not positive that permission exists but you can do a quick search for “wordpress roles and permissions” to find a list.

Hi Chris – Yes, I think you can do this with LearnDash… mostly/sort of.

You can create “Groups” in LearnDash, and those would be your levels. You then add __ courses to each group (there is no limit to how many courses in a group). Then you’d sign people up manually from the WordPress admin, and add them to the appropriate group, which gives them access to all courses in that group.

The only tricky part might be completely hiding groups/courses from those that shouldn’t see them. You can definitely restrict access to the courses, just hiding them completely on the frontend might be a little tricky.

But I think you can hide group stuff fairly well. Check these docs.

Hi Neal – No, I’m not sure why that is happening, but it’s probably related to why LearnDash says that 1) it’s not recommended to use that list, 2) all enrolled users may not appear in that list, and 3) proceed with caution.

I’ve heard developers from LearnDash recommend NOT using that field, but I don’t remember any clear explanation as to WHY. Unfortunately, it’s still the only way I know of to bulk enroll/unenroll users, so that’s why I cover it in this article. But as it seems, it’s not very reliable.

I’m assuming you’re using WooCommerce. If that’s not the case, ignore this response and let me know what you’re using to sell products.

If a user purchases a product, pays online, and the status is automatically changed to completed, you received the money. You shouldn’t have to verify anything. 99.9999999% of the time, the money will already have been paid. That’s how online transactions work with WooCommerce & almost all payment processors I know of. I don’t understand why you’d want or need to verify anything.

If you want to bypass the functionality that the LearnDash-WooCommerce integration plugin provides, automatically marking the transaction as “completed,” I think LearnDash has a hook you can use for that. It will force the transaction to say as “processing” until you manually set it to completed. And in this case, they will only be enrolled once you manually set it to “completed.” But I don’t have that code, nor do I see it listed in the developer docs, so you’ll have to ask LearnDash support for it.

When you manually add a user in WordPress, there’s a checkbox that lets you notify the user. It says “Send the new user an email about their account.”

It depends on how you have everything else set up. The emails happen separately from the enrollment, and you can handle them in a multitude of ways.

By default, WordPress usually sends new users an email with their username, and it lets them know they can reset their password. But if you’re using Uncanny Automator to enroll people, their might not be any “you are enrolled” email that goes out. You would need to set that up via whatever form or plugin you’re using to collect the user’s info. Or you could connect Uncanny Automator to a third-party email service and use that to send a “you are enrolled” email.

Hi Sarah – LearnDash changed how this works in newer versions of their plugin. I just updated the article with the new process.

You still go to the Settings tab on the Edit Course screen, but now you scroll down to the “Course Users” section. From there, you can select multiple users and add them to the course in bulk. I also added a tutorial video to the article.