An extended enterprise LMS has a much harder job than the one you use for internal staff. After all, its learners don’t work for you.
Your resellers, franchisees, installers, and customers have their own managers, their own targets, and absolutely no obligation to log in. You can’t mandate their training, so they have to want to come back.
Naturally, that changes what good looks like. Each partner needs its own branded space, run by its own admins. Training might be something you sell rather than something you give away for free. And you’ll need an easy way to see who’s keeping up, organisation by organisation.
We’ve compared 12 platforms built to train people outside your organisation, including our own. They aren’t ranked. Instead, each one carries a label for who it suits, because the right choice depends on who you’re training and which trade-offs you can live with.
What an Extended Enterprise LMS Actually Has to Do
An extended enterprise learning management system (LMS) trains people on someone else’s payroll. That rules out platforms that assume every learner is in your HR system. To make this list, each platform had to pass three tests:
- Does Each Organisation Get Its Own Space? Every partner, reseller, or customer account needs its own branded academy, with its own content and users, run from one platform.
- Can Outsiders Get In Without Friction? People must be able to sign up, or sign in through single sign-on, without an employee record or a call to your IT team.
- Does It Keep the Record? Admins can assign training, issue certificates, and see completions for each organisation, so you know who is qualified to sell or support your products.
Those are the basics. These questions decide which platform suits you.
- Will They Come Back? Partners choose where to spend their time. Short lessons, valuable content, competition, and rewards worth having give them a reason to return.
- Can Partners Manage Their People? Delegated admin lets each partner enrol staff and track progress, so your team isn’t fielding every request.
- Can You Charge for It? Built-in ecommerce lets you sell courses and certifications, which can turn customer education into a revenue stream.
- Does It Fit Your Tech Stack? Single sign-on and integrations with your CRM or partner portal tie training to the accounts you already track.
- Can You Compare Partners? Reporting by organisation, region, and product line shows you where knowledge is strong and where sales are at risk.
- Will It Work Across Borders? Partner networks rarely stop at one country, so the interface and content need to work in several languages.
Plenty of platforms can put a course in front of outsiders. The 12 below can also tell you which organisations know your product.
The 12 Extended Enterprise LMS Platforms Compared
The table below shows who each platform suits, how it keeps your partners separate, where it’s hosted, and roughly what it costs at scale. We make the Impact Suite, so Growth Engineering is listed first. The other 11 follow in alphabetical order.
At a Glance
| Platform | Best for | Partner set-up | Hosting | Price |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Growth Engineering | Partner training people choose to come back to | Branded academy and app per partner | AWS: UK, US, APAC | ££ |
| Absorb LMS | Selling training through flexible ecommerce | Multi-tenant portals by department | AWS: US, Canada, EU, Australia | ££ |
| Adobe Learning Manager | Marketing-led academies in the Adobe ecosystem | Separate academies and sign-up profiles | AWS: US, EU, India | ££ |
| Confirm (formerly Learning Pool) | Software companies running customer academies | Branded academy by audience | AWS: US, EU | ££ |
| Cornerstone | Large enterprises selling training to client firms | Microsites and client accounts | AWS: US, UK, EU | £££ |
| Docebo | Enterprises training customers, partners, and staff together | Branded domain per audience | AWS: US, Canada, EU, UK, APAC | ££ |
| Intellum | Tech companies educating very large customer bases | Organisations with their own subdomains | AWS: US, EU | £££ |
| LearnUpon | Mid-sized teams launching partner portals quickly | White-label sub-portals | AWS: US, EU, Australia | ££ |
| Litmos | Channel programmes run from Salesforce | Multi-tier partner portals | AWS: US, EU, Australia | ££ |
| Skilljar by Gainsight | Customer education teams in B2B software | Academy sites with partner managers | AWS: US | ££ |
| TalentLMS | Smaller partner networks on a tight budget | Branches with their own URL and SSO | AWS: US | £ |
| Thought Industries | Companies that sell training as a product | Panorama client portals | AWS: US | £££ |
£ under £30k · ££ £30k to £75k · £££ £75k+
Bands give a rough annual licence cost for around 5,000 active external learners, before implementation, add-ons, and content. Treat them as a budgeting guide rather than a quote, and see our LMS pricing guide for what drives the final figure.
The 12 Extended Enterprise LMS Platforms in Detail
Every profile below follows the same pattern: the key facts, what the platform does well for customer and partner training, and one limitation worth knowing before you sign.
1. Growth Engineering
Best for: partner training people choose to come back to
- HQ: London, UK
- Ownership: Independent, owned by its founder
- Hosting: AWS: UK, US, APAC
- Price: ££
Growth Engineering built the Impact Suite for learners nobody can order to log in. Every retailer, reseller, or franchise gets its own branded academy, with its own content and users, all run from one platform.
The Learning App puts your brand in the Apple, Google Play, and Huawei stores, right next to the other apps on a partner’s phone. Then the engagement tools give outsiders a reason to return:
- Knowledge Contests turn product detail into head-to-head games.
- The Reward Centre lets learners spend their points on vouchers, gifts, or perks.
- Clubs connect staff across stores and countries, with posts translated instantly.
Partner managers and franchise owners can track their own teams, certificates can expire when products change, and the eCommerce integration lets you sell courses to customers.
The limitation: we build the platform, not the courses. Your team supplies the content, or creates it in our Authoring Tool. We can also recommend content partners for ready-made libraries. For partner training, this limitation matters less than it sounds. After all, training on your products has to come from you anyway.
2. Absorb LMS
Best for: selling training through flexible ecommerce
- HQ: Calgary, Canada
- Ownership: Private, PE-backed
- Hosting: AWS: US, Canada, EU, Australia
- Price: ££
Absorb is a long-established corporate LMS with a strong extended enterprise offer. Its portal multi-tenancy offering lets one portal serve several brands or partner groups, with department admins managing their own corner of it.
Commerce is the standout. Absorb supports around 30 payment gateways, including Stripe Connect, Braintree, and Cybersource, so you can sell courses in the markets and currencies your customers use. The learner interface and courses also work in more than 30 languages.
If your partner portal or customer community already runs on Salesforce, Absorb’s Salesforce Connector puts training inside it. That way your partners and customers can enrol and complete courses without leaving a portal they already use.
The limitation: tenants share more than you might expect. Absorb’s documentation says that the LMS name, email settings, translations, and templates are global across every tenant. Customisation is also a commonly listed issue across third-party review sites.
3. Adobe Learning Manager
Best for: marketing-led academies in the Adobe ecosystem
- HQ: San Jose, USA
- Ownership: Public (NASDAQ: ADBE)
- Hosting: AWS: US, EU, India
- Price: ££
Adobe describes Learning Manager as “external by design”, and its customer and partner tools back that up. Admins can run several branded academies and let visitors browse the course catalogue before they sign in.
Its external registration profiles are well thought out. Each partner can have its own sign-up link with a seat limit, an expiry date, approved email domains, and automatic removal of inactive users. Reports can then compare user groups, such as individual partners, side by side.
One of its biggest draws is the wider Adobe stack. Learning Manager connects to Adobe Experience Manager and Marketo Engage, so marketing teams can treat learning as part of the wider customer journey. The platform itself supports 16 interface languages and 41 for content.
The limitation: there’s no built-in way to take payment. Selling courses relies on the Adobe Commerce connector, which is only available when Learning Manager is bought alongside Adobe Experience Manager.
4. Confirm (formerly Learning Pool)
Best for: software companies running customer academies
- HQ: Derry, UK
- Ownership: Private, PE-backed
- Hosting: AWS: US, EU
- Price: ££
Learning Pool rebranded as Confirm in August 2026, ten months after buying WorkRamp. WorkRamp’s customer learning product now lives on as Confirm Academy, and it still feels built for software companies educating their users.
The Academy connects to Salesforce, HubSpot, Zendesk, Intercom, and Segment, and it supports single sign-on through Okta, Auth0, Azure, and Impartner, a common partner relationship platform. The Salesforce sync pushes registrations, certifications, and learning paths into your CRM.
Launching is straightforward. Admins can invite up to 5,000 contacts from a single CSV, sell courses through a Stripe checkout, and build reports that go straight to external contacts on a schedule, so partner managers see their own team’s progress without logging in.
The limitation: localisation is still catching up. The interface comes in 13 languages, but translating the academy portal itself only supports Canadian French so far, and only for early adopters.
5. Cornerstone
Best for: large enterprises selling training to client firms
- HQ: Santa Monica, USA
- Ownership: Private, PE-backed
- Hosting: AWS: US, UK, EU
- Price: £££
Cornerstone is one of the biggest names in corporate learning, and its extended enterprise tools are built for organisations that treat training as a business. You can launch an unlimited number of branded microsites, one for each audience or market.
Its commercial tools go beyond selling single courses. Client Accounts let you sell training subscriptions to whole companies, and Training Units act as a prepaid currency that clients can spend or hand out to their people through key codes.
Self-registration groups bring outsiders in without manual set-up, including guest access for anonymous learners. The platform offers 45 language packs, so it can follow a partner network into most markets.
The limitation: much of it needs Cornerstone’s help to switch on. Its own documentation says Training Units are disabled by default and need Global Customer Support to enable them. Plan for a longer set-up than with lighter platforms.
6. Docebo
Best for: enterprises training customers, partners, and staff together
- HQ: Toronto, Canada
- Ownership: Public (NASDAQ: DCBO)
- Hosting: AWS: US, Canada, EU, UK, APAC
- Price: ££
Docebo runs internal and external training on one platform, which suits companies that want a single system for staff, partners, and customers. Its Extended Enterprise app gives each client its own branding, language, catalogue, self-registration, single sign-on, and custom domain.
Delegated administration is well developed. Power Users get control over specific groups of learners, so a partner’s own manager can enrol staff and follow their progress. Courses can be sold through Stripe or Adyen, including Stripe Tax for handling sales tax automatically.
The ecosystem is broad. Docebo for Salesforce connects training to your CRM, gamification adds points and leaderboards, and a branded mobile app is available for partners who learn on their phones.
The limitation: it takes time to learn. Docebo’s breadth comes from optional apps that admins enable and configure one by one. Many independent review sites note that the platform has a steep learning curve.
7. Intellum
Best for: tech companies educating very large customer bases
- HQ: Atlanta, USA
- Ownership: Private, founder-led
- Hosting: AWS: US, EU
- Price: £££
Intellum built its platform around customer and partner education, and it works at a very large scale. Meta reached two million external users in 34 months, and Google, Gusto, and Impact.com are also customers.
Each audience sits within its own Organization, with a branded subdomain and its own permissions. Stripe handles paid courses and certifications, and single sign-on works through SAML, OAuth, and the usual suspects.
Content creation is well covered too. Intellum’s Evolve authoring tool added multilingual management in September 2025, the platform supports more than 50 languages, and its AI Creator Agent helps teams draft courses faster.
The limitation: reporting is the weak spot. Deeper analysis now runs through the Intellum Data Connector, which exports your data to separate BI tools. Check the built-in reports against what your partner managers will actually need.
8. LearnUpon
Best for: mid-sized teams launching partner portals quickly
- HQ: Dublin, Ireland
- Ownership: Private, PE-backed
- Hosting: AWS: US, EU, Australia
- Price: ££
LearnUpon’s portals make it a natural fit for partner training. Each sub-portal can have its own branding and admins, you can license courses to individual portals, and a multi-portal report shows progress across all of them.
Ecommerce is available to every customer. Courses can be sold through Stripe, PayPal, or Shopify, with coupons, bundles, and bulk purchases for companies buying seats for their teams. Its Salesforce app tracks enrolments and completions against both Salesforce users and contacts.
The product keeps moving forward. Learning Journeys arrived in 2025, and Create+, an AI authoring tool, launched in March 2026. HubSpot integration, single sign-on, and gamification features are available on request.
The limitation: customisation options depend on your overall package. White-labelling, extra languages, the Salesforce integration, and API access are plan-specific features.
9. Litmos
Best for: channel programmes run from Salesforce
- HQ: San Francisco, USA
- Ownership: Private, PE-backed
- Hosting: AWS: US, EU, Australia
- Price: ££
Litmos has served partner and customer training for years, and SAP owned it until Francisco Partners bought it in 2022. Its partner enablement features include multi-tier partner portals for distributor and reseller networks, plus automated certification paths.
Salesforce is where it fits best. Litmos has an app on the Salesforce AppExchange, which suits channel teams that already manage partners, deals, and accounts in the CRM.
Commerce is flexible. You can sell courses through Shopify, PayPal, or Stripe. The platform supports more than 37 languages for international partner networks. Gamification features and a mobile app round out the learner experience.
The limitation: separate spaces for each partner cost more. Litmos lists additional tenants as a paid add-on on every plan, which will add up quickly if you need a branded portal for each partner.
10. Skilljar by Gainsight
Best for: customer education teams in B2B software
- HQ: San Francisco, USA
- Ownership: Private, PE-backed
- Hosting: AWS: US
- Price: ££
Skilljar started in Seattle as a specialist in customer education before Gainsight bought it in April 2025. It now sits alongside Gainsight’s customer success platform, which suits teams that already track customer health there.
You can run separate Academy Sites for customers, partners, and employees, each on its own domain. Learner single sign-on and certifications come as standard, and courses can be sold in multiple currencies on the Professional plan and above.
Partner managers can take on some of the work. External Management lets a partner’s own manager enrol their group and add students. A Salesforce app links learners to contacts, so customer success and channel teams can see who has been trained.
The limitation: per-partner branding is limited. Skilljar caps Academy Sites at one, two, or three depending on your plan, so you can’t give every partner its own branded academy.
11. TalentLMS
Best for: smaller partner networks on a tight budget
- HQ: San Francisco, USA
- Ownership: Private
- Hosting: AWS: US
- Price: £
TalentLMS is a popular business LMS, and its branches make it a practical choice for partner training. Each branch is an independent sub-portal with its own URL, theme, language, sign-up rules, and single sign-on.
Branches can sell courses through PayPal or Stripe. Depending on the plan, you get anything from one branch to an unlimited number. Native iOS and Android apps include offline access, and gamification adds badges, points, levels, rewards, and leaderboards.
Its integrations cover the essentials. The Salesforce Data Connector brings users, accounts, and contacts into TalentLMS and sends progress, certificates, and badges back every hour. HubSpot and single sign-on integrations are available.
The limitation: reporting is basic. Custom reports start on the Grow plan and allow up to five rules each. Branch reports allow four. Reporting is also a recurring complaint across independent review sites.
12. Thought Industries
Best for: companies that sell training as a product
- HQ: Boston, USA
- Ownership: Private, PE-backed
- Hosting: AWS: US
- Price: £££
Thought Industries is built for organisations where training is a product in its own right, such as software vendors and manufacturers. Its Panorama feature gives each client its own branded or co-branded portal, with access provided through single sign-on or redemption codes.
Client managers and admins can then add learners, manage licences, and see reports for their own organisation. For teams that want full control, the Helium framework lets developers build a completely custom learner experience on top of the platform.
Commerce is a strength. The ecommerce engine works with Worldpay, CyberSource, and Stripe, with Avalara for sales tax and coupons for promotions. CRM connections cover Salesforce, HubSpot, and Microsoft Dynamics 365.
The limitation: the most flexible part of the platform needs developers. Building a bespoke learner experience through Helium requires knowledge of React, TypeScript, and GraphQL. You’ll need specialists at hand to make progress.
How to Narrow This List Down
Every platform here can train people outside your organisation. The right one depends on who those people are and what you need the training to do. To start narrowing down your choices, consider the following three questions:
- Who Are You Training? Software companies educating their users should start with the customer education specialists: Skilljar, Intellum, Confirm, and Thought Industries. For resellers and distributors, look at Litmos, LearnUpon, Absorb, and Docebo.
- Will You Sell the Training? If training is a revenue line, look first at Thought Industries, Cornerstone, and Absorb, which are all strong on commercial features. If it supports a sale instead, CRM links matter more, so look closely at Litmos, Confirm, and Adobe Learning Manager.
- How Many Separate Spaces Will You Need? A handful of audiences fit almost any platform here. Once you need a separate branded academy for dozens of partners, check the limits, because some platforms cap sites or charge for each extra tenant.
If your partners have a dozen other brands competing for their attention, and you need them to keep coming back, then the Impact Suite is a great fit. Each partner gets its own branded academy, and Knowledge Contests, rewards, and Clubs give people you don’t employ a reason to return.
Whichever names make your shortlist, put them through the same tests. Our LMS buyer’s guide covers the questions worth asking in a demo, and if you’d like to see the Impact Suite in action, book a demo and bring your partner use case with you.
Final Words
Training people you don’t employ is a different job from training your own team. You can’t set a deadline and simply expect it to be met. You have to earn every login.
Every platform on this list gives each organisation its own space, lets outsiders in easily, and keeps a record you can rely on. Where they differ is how they handle commerce, how they connect with your existing systems, and how well equipped they are to bring people back post-launch.
Choose the one your partners will open without being chased, and your training stops being another message they ignore. Instead, it’ll become part of how they sell, support, and talk about your products.
Your partners have plenty of other training to ignore. Make yours the exception. See a Partner Academy in Action.
