Sophia vs. Study.com vs. Straighterline?

[TorchySF]

Which is better Study.com or sophia or straighter line and why?

Feels like study.com has more courses and different ways to learn -- video, reading, quiozzes, and others are more just reading?

Am I right?  I am totally new to this.

[rachel83az]

I've split your question off into a new thread because it was off topic in the old one. "Better" or "Best" is subjective. It depends on what you're looking for.

Sophia - Cheapest by far. $99/mo. and all the courses you're able to complete during this time. For most mature students, most courses can be completed in a matter of days.

Study.com - $199/mo. for 2 exams per month, up to 3 additional exams available for $70/each. This is where students in this forum get most of their UL credit.

Straighterline - Subscription fee + course purchase fee. They are fairly widely accepted, but only have a few courses that aren't offered at SDC or Sophia. Some students really enjoy their courses, however, and don't mind the additional cost.

[TorchySF]

do any teach better than others?

[rachel83az]

They all teach in slightly different ways. One is not necessarily "better" than the others. It all comes down to personal preference.

[ss20ts]

I would say it depends on where you're transferring to. Sophia is all one needs for UMPi which is great because it's the cheapest of the 3 and in my experience the easiest. Sophia has the option to read the text or watch videos. Some classes will have 4 different people who created videos and they explain things in a different way which is quite helpful in subjects such as math.

[dfrecore]

I hated SL, the quizzes were very textbook-specific and hard to find the answers to (and I read the textbook!). Just an all-around bad experience, never finished a course there.

Did only 1 course on Sophia back when it was $329/course, I love their dashboard; very user-friendly. Back then, there were no touchstones (papers) to write even for my UL course (project management was UL at the time). So it was great.

Study.com gives you the option to watch videos OR read the text, and you can have 2 screens open to take the quizzes which is helpful. I think at this point, they are quicker grading papers than Sophia. They also have SO many more courses than everyone else.

[withrown]

I like SL the best because you could just get 100 percent on the section tests and bomb the final and not care. Sophia was pretty good and really tried to teach you the material and like the previous poster said they used to have an upper-level credit course that was completable in a couple of hours. I tried study.com but the number of quizzes combined with the assignments get a big no from me.

A caveat - I was just trying to get through courses as quickly as possible. So being able to skim a couple chapters and take a test (via Straighterline) was the best for me.

[LevelUP]

Study.com only lets you do 5 courses per month. People complain about the volume of quizzes they have, but all those quizzes do help you to learn the material, especially when teaching a tough subject.

Sophia would be the quickest and cheapest if you had 40 hours and you were able to move through courses quickly.

SL uses traditional books however it's impossible to read the book and memorize what is needed for the text, so you end up searching for answers. SL doesn't have a video learning system like Sophia or Study.com.

[jsh1138]

Study.com is going to be your best bet in most situations because 1) they have an app, and 2) duplicate material you've done in one course is filled in for all other courses, and 3) they let you pre-test for courses you think you know alot about and it fills in the material you get right on the course you're pre-testing for as well as all other related courses.

Also Study.com has the most course offerings and has more upper level credits than all the other competitors combined.

Straighterline is for people who want to test online but pretend they're in a classroom reading the textbook. Sophia since the change is interesting but I don't think as useful as Study.com for most people, although obviously if you want Sophia courses they're much cheaper than Study.com so there's that.

The app is almost by itself enough reason to go with Study.com though. If you're in line at the grocery store or bank or if you're on the toilet or if you're waiting at the bus stop or whatever, you can be knocking out quizzes the whole time and it's just really hard to beat that.

[bjcheung77]

Everyone has their own learning style and time commitment... It really depends on the student and how they do things. For me, I took the most courses from StraighterLine as that learning system was most commonly available at the time for cheaper. Sophia.org/Study.com was slightly more expensive at the time and so, my bulk of alternative credits came from SL.

When Study.com came out with discounts/referrals and Sophia.org dropped their pricing from $329/course to $99/month all you can take, my recommendation now has changed to Sophia.org for lower-level credit and Study.com for upper-level credit, skipping StraighterLine altogether. Unless you have some courses that are not available at Sophia.org, then take it at Study.com