Nearpod Alternatives: Interactive Learning Apps Comparison

Is Nearpod worth the hype? It depends on what you’re using it for in the classroom. Nearpod is a powerful tool with many features. But it comes with a high price tag that your district or school might not fund. You may be happier with an alternative to Nearpod if you can find the tech that checks all your must-have boxes.

We’ll walk you through formative assessment and presentation tools that compare to Nearpod so you can make your own judgment when choosing an interactive learning app.

	TeacherMade	Nearpod	Kami	Peardeck
Overview of product	Convert PDFs and slides into interactive and auto-grades assignments	A digital product that incorporates multimedia	Online document notification and markup tool	A digital product that makes online presentations more interactive
Teachers can…	Upload existing PDFs and slides and convert into online interactive activities Save time by using auto-grade features and utilize data to inform instruction Provide feedback to students	Create lessons incorporating quizzes, polls, videos, drawings, web content, etc. Create lessons that are student-paced or teacher-paced Access the library of materials	Use existing documents Provide student feedback Add in video or screenshots	Create lessons that are student-paced or teacher-paced Share student responses Add audio to slides
Students can…	Experience 15+ question types that simulate new online standardized tests Use your classroom material digitally	Access Nearpod on any device Annotate slides and explain their thinking Take a quiz directly on their device	Digitally annotate text Use speech-to-text for annotations	Follow along on a presentation and interact with slides Annotate slides to explain their thinking
Integrations	Google Classeoom, Schoology, Microsoft Teams, Classlink	Google Classroom, Schoology, Canvas, Microsoft Teams, Blackboard	Google Classroom, Schoology, Canvas, Blackboard, PowerSchool, Edmodo	Google Classroom, Schoology, Canvas, Microsoft Teams

What Is Nearpod?

At its core, Nearpod is an online digital presentation tool. Teachers can create slide presentations and add interactive activities to these presentations. Nearpod also makes it easy for teachers to add multimedia to their lessons.

What Are Nearpod’s Key Features?

Create interactive presentations that are asynchronous and synchronous
Utilize a comprehensive collection of learning materials
Upload existing PowerPoint presentations to modify with features
Make Youtube and other multimedia interactive
Add assessment features to presentations with some auto-grade functionality
Option to incorporate VR headsets into lessons
Students and teachers can draw directly onto slides
Collaboration boards help students interact digitally
Read aloud and other accessibility tools like audio response

Pros And Cons Of Nearpod

As an assignment delivery app, Nearpod is one of the best tools you can choose from because there are so many features you can utilize to bring more multimedia to your presentations.

Nearpod’s biggest downside comes with a cost. If you plan on using Nearpod regularly, then you will quickly run out of storage space with the free version. You can only store around 100 MB of presentations on a free account. This is problematic for teachers who often reuse their presentations from year-to-year. The paid versions of Nearpod are pricey ($159 and $397 per year).

Spending that much means you’re not getting a robust assessment and assignment creation tools. We’ll address those needs below.

Nearpod Bottomline

Nearpod is for the teacher that wants to streamline their online presentation tools. This is an excellent option if you want to create interactive presentations that bring in multimedia. It’s not a great tool for the teacher who has curated resources through the years. You’ll likely have to start over from scratch and create new materials.

What is Peardeck?

Peardeck is another digital presentation tool. Unlike Nearpod, integrating into Google Slides isn’t a premium feature. Peardeck is built around the premise of adding formative assessment tools to your typical online presentation.

What are the key features of Peardeck?

Has the functionality to be used synchronously or asynchronously, and teachers can toggle between the options mid-lesson
Brings in more interactive multimedia to presentations
Has drawing tools
Embed websites
Acts as a Google Slides add-on, so it is very accessible for teachers and students to use
Question types include multiple choice, open response, drawing, and draggable questions
Student responses appear in real-time, so it’s great for gathering student feedback

Pros and Cons of Peardeck

Peardeck doesn’t have as many features as Nearpod, but we’re not sure if that’s a con. From a teacher’s standpoint, integrating new tech into your classroom flow can be challenging. You can get bogged down in a lot of features. It’s even worse if you’re not using those features, but are still paying for them.

With Peardeck, you can incorporate interactive formative assessment into your Google Slides presentation. That may be all that you need from a Nearpod-type program. You’ll likely be happy with Peardeck and pay a lot less for it.

This video does a great job comparing Peardeck and Nearpod:

Peardeck Bottomline

Peardeck is your best bet if you have already built a lot of content in Google Slides and are looking for a way to include more digital formative assessments.

What is Edpuzzle?

Another option you might consider as an alternative to Nearpod is Edpuzzle as an interactive presentation tool. Edpuzzle places formative assessment inside of videos. So if your preferred online presentation tools are videos (and many flipped classrooms use videos), then Edpuzzle can check many boxes.

Nearpod and other online presentation tools lack robust assessment tools. TeacherMade can help.

You may not be satisfied if the sole reason for switching to an online interactive presentation tool like Nearpod is to gather more student feedback while teaching.

If you’re looking for a way to infuse more informative assessment into your everyday classroom, go for the app that is focused on formative assignments and assignment creation. With TeacherMade, you can:

Convert your existing worksheets to digital worksheets. Never recreate an assignment to make it digital. Many apps like Nearpod force the user to recreate their work to fit the constraints of their program.
Have more flexibility with question choices. With TeacherMade, you get to choose from 15+ question types. You never have to settle on limited question choices. Ask the right question at the right moment with your students.
Stop using too many apps and lose your students when transitioning between different tech. Getting 30ish students to stay with you on a computer is tough. TeacherMade keeps everyone together by integrating into your school’s LMS platform. We’re compatible with Google Classroom, Canvas, and Schoology.

Save time with auto-grading. Nearpod and Peardeck both have limited auto-grading options. They don’t allow you to give student feedback, and often you’re just getting an excel sheet of student responses. Let students know where they stand instantly and give personalized feedback. You will also save so much time with scoring that integrates directly into your LMS grade book.