User Roles
LearnDash Dashboard shows each user a personalized view based on their role. Everyone sees only the tools and information relevant to them — nothing more, nothing less.
There are four roles: Administrator, Instructor, Group Leader, and Student.
Administrator
Administrators have full access to everything on the dashboard, plus all plugin settings in the WordPress admin.
What an admin can do:
- View and manage every course, lesson, topic, quiz, and question on the site — regardless of who created it
- See all students across all instructors and groups
- Run site-wide reports on essays, assignments, quizzes, and course completion
- View insights and visual charts for the entire site
- Bulk enroll or unenroll any students from any course or group
- Reset student progress on any course
- Export student data
- Manage all groups and group members
- Review and approve instructor applications
- See all instructor earnings and manage payout requests
- Send emails and messages to anyone on the site
- Access all plugin settings, commission reports, email logs, and invitation logs
Instructor
Instructors are educators who create and sell courses on your site. They get a full course management workspace without needing admin access.
To become an instructor, a user applies through the instructor registration form. You approve or reject the application from your admin settings.
What an instructor can do:
- Create, edit, and delete their own courses, lessons, topics, quizzes, questions, certificates, and announcements
- Duplicate (clone) one of their courses to use as a starting point for a new one
- View a list of students enrolled in their courses
- Track individual student progress and quiz results
- Send emails to their students
- Exchange private messages with their students
- View their earnings from course sales
- Request a payout of their earnings
- Create and manage Zoom meetings (if Zoom is enabled on your site)
- Generate enrollment codes for their courses
What an instructor cannot do:
- See other instructors’ courses, students, or earnings
- Access WordPress admin settings
- Manage groups (unless an admin grants additional access)
Sharing a course: An instructor can share a course with another instructor. Shared courses appear in the co-instructor’s dashboard with a “Shared” badge.
Group Leader
Group Leaders manage specific student groups assigned to them by an admin. They focus on group oversight rather than course creation.
What a group leader can do:
- View and manage the groups assigned to them
- Add or remove students from their groups
- View reports on group member progress and course completion
- Generate enrollment codes to invite new members to their group
- Send emails or private messages to students in their groups
- View course and lesson content inside their assigned groups
What a group leader cannot do:
- See groups they are not assigned to
- Create or edit course content
- Access instructor earnings or commission data
- Manage site-wide settings
Student
Students are anyone on your site who is enrolled in courses — anyone who is not an admin, instructor, or group leader.
What a student can do:
- View all the courses they’re enrolled in and track their progress
- Resume a course right where they left off
- Review their quiz attempts, scores, and question-by-question results
- Download certificates for courses they’ve completed
- View and submit assignments
- See their activity timeline
- Read announcements from instructors
- Track time spent learning
- Redeem enrollment codes to join a course or group
What a student cannot do:
- Create or edit any course content
- See other students’ progress or data
- Access reports, earnings, or admin settings
Quick Comparison
| Feature | Admin | Instructor | Group Leader | Student |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| View own enrolled courses | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Create and edit courses | Yes | Own only | No | No |
| View student progress | All students | Own students | Own groups | No |
| Run reports | All data | Own data | Own groups | No |
| Bulk enrollment tools | Yes | Own courses | Own groups | No |
| Send emails and messages | Everyone | Own students | Own groups | No |
| Manage earnings and payouts | Yes (all) | Own earnings | No | No |
| Manage groups | Yes | No | Assigned only | No |
| Create Zoom meetings | Yes | Yes | No | No |
| Plugin settings | Yes | No | No | No |
Controlling What Each Role Sees
You decide which sections appear in the sidebar for each role. Go to LearnDash Dashboard > Menu Options and check or uncheck sections for each role. Changes take effect immediately.