Often called an LMS for short, a learning management system is a software application that provides the framework that handles all aspects of the learning process – it’s where you house, deliver, and track your training content. While most often called an LMS, other names that might be used is training management system, learning activity management system or even learning experience platform (LXP).

A learning content management system (LCMS) sometimes gets confused with an LMS as well. An LCMS is software that is used to author and manage learning content. The two systems are complimentary to one another but not the same.

An LMS is designed to make life easier for those in charge of training and development—e.g., identifying and assessing individual and organizational learning goals, tracking progress toward meeting those goals and collecting and presenting data for supervising the learning process.

In addition to delivering content, an LMS can also handle things such as onboarding, compliance and skills gap analysis.