LessonUp

LessonUp is a lesson-building and teaching platform for educators working in classrooms or online. It suits teachers who want to combine prepared content with live participation and student-learning insights. Its clearest advantage is bringing those tasks together; the main trade-off is that lesson and AI quotas vary by plan.

Overview

Teachers can create lessons, draw on a library of material from educators and content partners, or import PowerPoint presentations and add interactive elements. That gives LessonUp a broader role than a presentation tool: lesson preparation and student responses sit in the same workflow. Individual teachers can start with a free account, while school plans add administrative and collaboration features for teams.

Founded in 2015 and headquartered in The Hague, LessonUp says it complies with GDPR, stores personal data on European servers and uses technical and organisational safeguards, including 256-bit SSL for website connections. For student learning data and results, the school or teacher is the controller; LessonUp processes that data under their instructions.

Key features

Interactive lessons and feedback

Teachers can use multiple-choice questions, polls, drag-and-drop activities, word clouds, hotspots, spinners, fill-in-the-blanks and sorting. Live quizzes and audience reactions add further ways to invite responses during a lesson. Reports and insights help teachers review student learning, and the free account saves lesson results. This combination is useful when participation and a record of responses matter alongside delivery; teachers seeking only a basic presentation tool may not need the wider set.

Flexible lesson creation

PowerPoint imports can be edited with quizzes, polls, mind maps and open questions, while the lesson library offers material from other educators and content partners. AI can help produce lessons, quizzes, rubrics, assignments, images, summaries, glossaries and translations. The range can support preparation as well as live teaching, but the monthly AI allowance is a meaningful constraint: Start includes 20 uses, Pro 50, and school tiers range from 75 uses per teacher to unlimited usage.

Connections and school support

Integrations include Canvas, Google Classroom, Microsoft Teams for Education and itslearning; school plans also include SURFconext single sign-on. School subscriptions include a dedicated contact, onboarding online or in person, and tailored webinars and continuing professional development sessions. Those additions make the school tiers more relevant to coordinated adoption than to a teacher buying alone.

Pricing

The free plan costs nothing and includes some interactive features, with lesson results saved. It is a sensible way to begin, but paid plans are needed for the specified lesson and AI quotas and broader feature bundles.

• Start: $7 a month, per teacher, on a yearly subscription, including VAT. It allows 10 lessons and 20 AI uses per month, with interactive questions, the lesson library, PowerPoint import and editing, reports and insights. It fits teachers with a modest lesson volume; the 10-lesson ceiling is the clear limitation.
• Pro: $7.99 a month, per teacher, on a yearly subscription, including VAT. It adds unlimited lessons and 50 AI uses per month alongside the same listed core features. It is the stronger individual option for teachers who build frequently, though AI use remains capped.
• School Basic: $7.50 a month per teacher on a yearly subscription, including VAT, with custom pricing by quote and a minimum of 10 teachers. It includes 75 AI uses per teacher per month, school administration, collaboration, SURFconext SSO, and Canvas and itslearning integrations. It is aimed at schools needing shared administration and integrations rather than an individual account.
• School Complete: $9.58 a month per teacher on a yearly subscription, including VAT, with custom pricing by quote and a 10-teacher minimum. It raises the AI allowance to 150 uses per teacher monthly, retaining the listed school features.
• School Plus: $12.92 a month per teacher on a yearly subscription, including VAT, with custom pricing by quote and a 10-teacher minimum. It provides unlimited AI usage plus school administration, collaboration, SURFconext SSO, and Canvas and itslearning integrations. It is the school choice when AI quotas would otherwise constrain use.

A 30-day trial is offered. All paid prices above are per teacher and based on yearly subscriptions, so the monthly figure should not be confused with a month-to-month term.

Platforms

LessonUp is available on the web, Android and iOS. Its terms name the web application and mobile apps Sidekick for LessonUp, LessonUp and Step-by-Step.

Who it's for

LessonUp is best suited to teachers who want lesson preparation, interactive classroom activities and learning reports in one place, and to schools that need administration, collaboration, integrations or onboarding support. Teachers with occasional needs can begin free; those making lessons regularly should weigh Start's 10-lesson cap against Pro's unlimited lesson allowance. Schools must account for the 10-teacher minimum on the listed school plans.

Pros and cons

• Pro: Lesson creation, a shared library, PowerPoint editing, interactive activities and reports form a connected teaching workflow.
• Pro: The free account saves lesson results, giving teachers a useful starting point without a paid subscription.
• Pro: School tiers bundle administration, collaboration, named integrations and onboarding support for team adoption.
• Con: Start is limited to 10 lessons monthly, while even Pro caps AI use at 50 per month.
• Con: School plans require at least 10 teachers and a quote, making them unsuitable for a single teacher seeking those administrative features.
• Con: Paid plans are priced per teacher on yearly subscriptions, which is a commitment beyond the displayed monthly rate.

Alternatives

For a different emphasis, consider Poll Everywhere, Lumio, Kahoot!, AhaSlides, Annotate.net, Formative, Mentimeter and ClassPoint.

Poll Everywhere is worth considering for audience polling across Android, iOS, macOS, web and Windows; its free Intro plan caps audiences at 40, or 700 for 30 days. Lumio suits an individual educator prioritising lesson storage, with a free 100MB plan and a Standard plan at $59 a year for unlimited storage. Kahoot! is a fit for a straightforward live quiz: its free Go plan supports up to 40 participants with classic live play and quiz or true/false questions.

AhaSlides offers a free plan for up to 50 participants, with five quiz questions, three poll questions and unlimited presentations per month. Annotate.net has a free Student Starter Account with 100MB storage and one regular enrollment course for up to 50 students. Formative's free Teacher plan includes unlimited activity creation and basic auto-grading, making it a relevant option for teachers focused on those capabilities. Mentimeter's free plan allows 50 participants per month and 23 slide types. ClassPoint's Basic plan has a 25-participant maximum, 20 free AI quiz credits and five questions per PowerPoint presentation.

For browsing by category, see Interactive Classroom Software, Interactive Lesson Makers and Interactive Presentation Software.

Verdict

LessonUp is a strong choice for teachers who want lesson creation, live interaction and student-learning insight in one service, with school tiers for coordinated use. Its free account makes it approachable, but teachers should choose by monthly lesson and AI needs, and schools should be ready for quoted pricing and a 10-teacher minimum. Look elsewhere if you need only simple live quizzes or polling rather than a broader lesson workflow.