Latest Moodle News

Hi Moodlers,

As we move further into Moodle’s financial year (aligned with the Australian financial calendar), we want to share an update on our progress to date and some important changes we’re making at Moodle HQ to ensure the long-term sustainability and success of Moodle.

This year has seen fantastic progress. We’ve invested in new talent and aligned our teams globally, begun development of our new Design System, implemented changes that will drive our Technical Transformation, released Moodle LMS and Moodle Workplace versions 5.1, moved closer to launching our new Moodle Marketplace, established our Community Contributions team, and connected with many of you at our last MoodleMoot Global event!

It’s been a busy year — and on reflection, perhaps a bit too busy.

Moodle HQ remains a relatively small organisation, including around 100 people dedicated to designing, building, and maintaining the Moodle Products ecosystem. Our ultimate goal is the long-term sustainability of Moodle — we want it to thrive for the next 100 years, continuing to power limitless learning opportunities and support the educators who bring that learning to life.

Doing too many things at once doesn’t help us achieve that goal. So, we’ve made the decision to narrow our focus to ensure our energy and investment are channelled where they’ll make the greatest impact.

We’ll be concentrating on key areas of opportunity — investing where we can best support our community, customers, and learners around the world. 

Much of what we’re working on will continue, including all the initiatives we’ve already progressed this year. However, there are also a few areas we’ll be stepping back from:

• MoodleNet: We’ll cease HQ-driven development of MoodleNet. The platform code will remain available on GitHub and can be adopted, used, or enhanced by anyone interested in continuing that work. We encourage the community to self-organise and explore those opportunities. Access to moodle.net will be removed from public view on 24th April 2026, in line with the Moodle LMS 5.2 release date.
  

• Fund Moodle: We’ll decommission the Fund Moodle site as our approach to community contributions evolves from financial transactions toward joint projects and collaborative initiatives. Access to fund.moodle.org will be removed from public view on 18 November 2025. More information about how you can engage with our Community Contributions team and continue to contribute to Moodle in various ways will be shared shortly, so please stay tuned.
  

• New Product Development: Our immediate priority remains developing new capabilities in Moodle LMS and Moodle Workplace, while preparing for the launch of our new Moodle Marketplace. Other exciting initiatives, such as our Moodle for Higher Education product, will progress in time.

As part of these changes, we’re also saying goodbye to a few valued Moodle HQ team members — some of whom are familiar faces to many in our community. This is never easy, and we will miss their talent and contributions dearly.

Through all of this, our commitment to our mission — and to you, our community — remains unwavering. These adjustments are about ensuring Moodle continues to grow sustainably and with confidence in the years ahead.

Thank you for your ongoing trust, contributions, and belief in Moodle’s vision. Together, we’ll keep building a stronger, more connected learning ecosystem for educators and learners everywhere.

Take care,
Marie Achour
Chief Product Officer, Moodle HQ
On behalf of the Moodle HQ Leadership Team

Moodle 5.1 brings with it some exciting new changes to the software directory structure helping to position Moodle for the future.

During this webinar, presented by Adam Jenkins from Shizuoka Institute of Science and Technology, you will learn about the new changes to the Moodle software directory structure and the implications for site administrators, in particular, web server configuration changes needed to support Moodle 5.1 and future releases. This webinar is for advanced Moodle users and administrators.

This webinar is part of the course 'Moodle Academy Webinars'. You have to be enrolled in this free course to register and join the webinar.

-> Register at Moodle Academy.

During this webinar, presented by Thom Rawson and Helen Foster from Moodle HQ, you will learn about the new features in Moodle 5.1 for administrators and teachers.

This webinar is part of the course 'What's New in Moodle 5.1'. You have to be enrolled in this free course to register and join the webinar.

→ Register at Moodle Academy.

Plugin Translator by Brickfield is designed to harness the power of Artificial Intelligence (AI) to assist plugin translators when they are preparing language strings for Moodle plugins and Moodle Core! Simple!

This will save time for many organisations and plugin developers, in tasks such as:

• Developing and managing multiple translations across a range of Moodle plugins.
• Site administrators needing some additional translations for their active plugins.
• Moodle Partners translating their local plugins for their clients.
• Moodle Partners completing the core translation in areas with low core translation percentage.

This webinar, presented by Gavin Henrick, will demonstrate how it works and how you can use the freely available plugin to complete needed localisation of Moodle Core or Community Plugins.

This webinar is part of the course 'Moodle Academy webinars'. You have to be enrolled in this free course to register and join the webinar.

→ Register at Moodle Academy.

Hi Everyone,

We’re pleased to announce the release of Moodle LMS 5.1, packed with updates that simplify course building, give teachers more control over AI at the course level, and reduce admin complexity. This release builds on the momentum of 5.0, with improvements designed to save time, reduce clutter, and make Moodle LMS easier to use every day.

Behind every new feature, improvement and fix are the efforts of our amazing Moodle community, our partners, and the Moodle LMS team. We deeply appreciate everyone who helped bring Moodle LMS 5.1 to life.

Here’s what’s new in Moodle LMS 5.1:

🧭 An expanded Activities overview page
The Activities overview page now works across all major activity types, showing teachers what needs grading or follow-up and giving learners a clear view of upcoming tasks and completed work.
Why this matters: One organised view of all course activities helps teachers take action and learners stay on track.

🛠️ A redesigned Activity chooser
The Activity chooser has had a makeover! Activities are now grouped on separate tabs by teaching purpose - assessment, collaboration, communication, resources, and interactive content - with related tools suggested for each
Why this matters: Teachers can build with their learning goals in mind, choosing tools based on purpose - and admins can customise the Activity chooser to fit their institution’s unique course-building needs.

🧠 More options and control over AI
Teachers can now easily switch AI on or off at the course level and configure AI settings per activity - no more wading through permissions pages! Meanwhile, with new support for DeepSeek, admins can choose from a broader range of AI providers.
Why this matters: Educators gain real flexibility to decide where AI tools add value in their courses, while institutions retain control over which providers best fit their policies and needs.

In addition to these new features, Moodle LMS 5.1 includes a range of improvements that make everyday teaching and site administration easier:

• Better course creation tools: Richer media handling in TinyMCE and clearer course settings.
• Course enrolment & management: Options to set enrolment start dates, choose groups, and track assignment feedback downloads.
• Platform simplification: Retirement of older blocks and settings for a cleaner interface.
• Security: CAPTCHA added to password recovery page.

Moodle LMS 5.1 also includes many more updates across course creation, enrolment, and administration - each designed to save time and simplify daily workflows. You can explore the New features documentation for a full overview.

A special note around upgrading your instances for this release: As part of our continuing efforts to modernize and update the architecture of Moodle LMS, we’ve made a change to the code structure that will require you to reconfigure your web servers as part of the upgrade process. Please read this linked documentation prior to upgrading. 

Thank you for being a valued members of our Moodle community!

Warm regards,
Matt Porritt
Product Director, Platform Solutions

We're pleased to announce the start of regular meetings, run by Moodle community members for Moodle community members. These meetings will take place monthly in the BigBlueButton meeting room which is in the Moodle in English community space.

The first meeting will be on Tuesday 23 September at 13:00 UTC. To learn more about the meeting content, about this new initiative and about how other languages can be supported, read the post New meeting format Moodle Community Meetings.

We hope to see you there!

Learn how to develop clear, Intended Learning Outcomes for your courses and programs in this webinar led by Karen Shackleford-Cesare, from University College London (UCL).

Intended Learning Outcomes are short, clear statements that help students understand what they can expect to achieve at various stages throughout their learning journey. They enable course designers to ensure summative assessments test the desired learning has been achieved. Creating effective Intended Learning Outcomes is an important prerequisite in the design of learning activities and assessments, including within the ABC Learning Design process, which is used to develop short courses for Moodle Academy, as well as many other educational programs worldwide.

→ Register at Moodle Academy.

Hello Moodle community,

We're excited to announce that our Moodle 5.1 QA cycle begins today, September 1st, and will run for five weeks until the release date on October 6th.

About the QA Cycle
The QA cycle is a key part of our development process. This is when our community helps test Moodle's next version to ensure it's of the highest quality, reliability, and usability.

How You Can Help
Here's how you can get involved and make a difference:

• Exploratory Testing: Try out the latest Moodle features on our QA testing site. Experiment, explore, and share your feedback with us.
• Issue Reporting: If you find any issues, big or small, please report them on the Moodle Tracker. Your input is crucial to improving Moodle.

For detailed instructions on the QA testing process, please check out the QA testing guide. If you have any questions, feel free to post in this forum or join our Moodle QA chat on Telegram or Matrix.

Thank you for being such an essential part of our testing process. With your help, we’ll make Moodle 5.1 a fantastic release! 🚀

Learn how to use the Moodle Database Activity creatively! During this webinar, presented by Thom Rawson from Moodle Academy, you will learn a few advanced techniques and methods for using the Moodle Database Activity. Through templating, CSS, HTML, and simple JavaScript, educators will be able to construct interactive Database Activities to enhance learner engagement and help to increase learner autonomy. In addition, a few alternative methods of assessing Database Activities will be discussed.

This webinar is part of the course 'Moodle Academy webinars'. You have to be enrolled in this free course to register and join the webinar.

→ Register at Moodle Academy.

Hi Moodlers,

I’m really looking forward to MoodleMoot Global this 16–18 September in Edinburgh — it’s always such a special time to connect with our community and share what’s coming next.

In my keynote, Shaping the Future of Moodle, I’ll be opening up our product roadmap — new solutions we’re working on, how we’re improving the user experience, and the features we know will make a real difference for learners, educators and organisations.

I’d love for you to be there, so you can share your thoughts with us and help shape where Moodle goes next.

Get your ticket today

Hope to see you in Edinburgh!

Marie Achour

Chief Product Officer, Moodle HQ

P.S. Some big announcements are in store at the end of the event - don’t miss out on being the first to hear exclusive Moodle news! 

Internationalisation of the Curriculum (IoC) has become quite the catchphrase of late in both secondary and tertiary institutions. For teachers of Foreign Languages (FL), this takes place by ensuring students are able to use the FL in real world situations with peers in different countries. This method of teaching a FL, by ensuring your students are linked with peers in other countries during their learning journey, is known as “Virtual Exchange” (VE).

The best companion an educator can have on their VE teaching journey is Moodle. The International Virtual Exchange Project (IVEProject) started in 2004 by Professor Eric Hagley has used Moodle from its outset. Since 2015, when the IVEProject became large-scale, more than 60,000 students from 30 countries have participated.

The numerous reasons Moodle is the chosen platform will be outlined in this webinar, in particular Moodle’s ability to be customised. Custom modules will be showcased and information on how the IVEProject has influenced some parts of Moodle core code will also be outlined. The ways that Moodle and the IVEProject have made IoC achievable for many around the world will also be shown.

This webinar is part of the course 'Moodle Academy webinars'. You have to be enrolled in this free course to register and join the webinar.

→ Register at Moodle Academy.

User tours in Moodle help you guide learners and staff directly on screen, reducing help desk queries and improving confidence. Whether you want to support onboarding, highlight new features, or provide timely guidance for specific tasks, user tours offer a flexible way to enhance the user experience.

In this webinar, Aurélie Soulier will show you how to design and manage effective tours in Moodle, for different audiences and needs.

Learn how to:

• Create clear, engaging tours.
• Customise tours for different users and contexts.
• Make your Moodle site more welcoming and easier to navigate.

Ideal for Moodle administrators, course designers, and anyone who wants to make their site more supportive and user friendly.

This webinar is part of the course 'Moodle Academy webinars'. You have to be enrolled in this free course to register and join the webinar.

→ Register at Moodle Academy.