Kajabi vs. Mighty Networks vs. upcoach: Detailed comparison

Kajabi and Mighty Networks are both advanced platforms for course creators, coaches, and membership sites.

However, they have distinct differences that make one better than the other for various use cases.

In this post, we’ll compare these platforms from a high-level overview and then analyze them in more detail.

Kajabi vs. Mighty Networks: High Level Overview 

Kajabi – Focused on Course Creation and Automation

Kajabi is a popular online course platform that provides creators with robust customization, automation, and marketing/sales features.

While other course platforms claim to offer many of the same features, Kajabi’s features tend to be much more advanced. 

Its marketing automation features are particularly strong and perhaps unrivaled by any other course creation platform. 

So if you’re looking for a robust course creation platform with extensive customization and marketing features, Kajabi is a great option. 

Ideal for: Advanced and tech-savvy coaches looking for sophisticated marketing automation to increase sales.

Pros:

• Advanced course creation and customization options
• Advanced marketing and selling options
• Innovative funnel builder
• Great customer support (according to online user reviews)

Cons:

• It might be too much (and too expensive) if you’re not an advanced creator
• Its community features are relatively basic, and it isn’t easy to track client progress

Mighty Networks – Focused on Community and Networking

Mighty Networks offers many of the same basic capabilities as Kajabi, but rather than focusing on course creation, its main focus is on community building. 

The platform allows creators to manage their community, create online courses and video content, and build memberships in one place. However, you’ll notice that the community features are much more robust than Kajabi’s, and the main interface is structured around the community rather than a self-paced course.

In fact, you can create events, live streams, sort threads by topic, and more.

Ideal for: Membership sites and anyone building a community. 

Pros:

• Unbeatable community features with events, live streams, and discussion forums
• Offer exclusive paid events and discussions
• Add courses as upsells to your community

Cons:

• Lacks client engagement features like to-dos, habit tracking, etc.
• Simplistic marketing features

upcoach – Focused on Getting Clients to Take Action and Achieve Goals

The best way to grow any community, coaching program, or course is to help clients achieve their goals. If you can nail that, they’ll probably tell their friends about it, and it will grow through word of mouth.

We believe that there are three keys to getting clients to achieve their goals:

• Learn the information (coaching calls, training videos, etc.)
• Action items to execute the information (to-dos, habit tracking, worksheets, etc.)
• A community for accountability and support

While Kajabi is excellent at transferring information (the course creation side) and Mighty Networks is excellent at building community, we couldn’t find a platform that focused on ensuring your clients actually take action on the material learned.

So we built a platform that incorporates all three of these key points – it’s called upcoach.

As you’ll see below, upcoach is structured with all the features in each of the three categories above to drive the best client results. 

So you’ll get the course creation and community features that Mighty Networks and Kajabi offer, as well as action-oriented features like to-do lists, native worksheets, and an integrated habit tracker. 

This makes it easy to track the entire client journey and reach out if they start to fall behind.

Ideal For: Coaches and course creators that want to deliver transformational client results.

Pros:

• All-in-one platform with features to support all three aspects of the transformation process 
• Cutting-edge accountability and client engagement features
• Admin automation features (billing, coaching call scheduling, internal chat, etc.)

Cons

• Few marketing automation features because it’s designed to drive referrals and word-of-mouth marketing by delivering transformational results
• Most features won’t be useful to hands-off course creators

Kajabi vs. Mighty Networks: Community Features

Below we’ll analyze how each platform approaches community engagement and specific features.

Kajabi

Given that its main focus is on online course creation, Kajabi’s community features are relatively simplistic.

The community is structured as a general forum similar to a Facebook group.

There are two views within the community – Feeds and Topics.

Topics are organized discussions, while the Feed is a continuous stream of chronologically organized content.

Unfortunately, there isn’t an intuitive way to create accountability groups.

Mighty Networks

Community is Mighty Networks’ area of expertise. 

Starting with its forum-based features, you can create topics, events, and tailored groups. You can also determine “access levels” and allow members to publish posts, pictures, and videos and share them with others.

Everyone in the community can follow threads, message other members, and network with those who live in the same area.

You can also create events, host live streams, and offer other more interactive community activities.

All of these functions are available on both desktop and the mobile app.

upcoach

upcoach’s best community feature is its accountability groups. 

You can easily create accountability groups with 5-7 members (or any number that seems right to you), and those members can hold each other accountable to tasks (to-dos, worksheets, habits, etc.) assigned the previous week.

They can schedule weekly accountability meetings and also chat in a private forum throughout the week.

This positive peer pressure encourages people to take action on the course content, ultimately leading to better client results.

upcoach also offers a general member forum where anyone in your program can ask questions and discuss challenges with other members.

The Bottom Line

Kajabi’s community features are relatively simplistic and follow a general forum-style structure.

On the other hand, Mighty Networks’s speciality is community. In addition to forums, you can also schedule live events, host live streams, and more. It’s almost like creating a private social network.

upcoach offers small accountability groups designed to encourage members to take action on assignments through positive peer pressure. As a result, they are more likely to achieve the results they signed up to achieve, which increases referrals, customer lifetime value, and allows you to charge more. It also offers a general community forum. 

Kajabi vs. Mighty Networks – Course Creation & Customization

Kajabi

Few platforms can rival Kajabi’s advanced course creation customization features.

It offers a variety of pre-designed layouts, templates, and customizable pre-set sections to choose from that will help streamline the course creation experience. Every section is fully customizable, and so are the blocks within them.

Overall, there’s a lot you can do to control client experience, and while the creation process is fairly simple, it’s much more suited for seasoned and experienced coaches.

If you select a higher-tier plan, you can directly edit the HTML and CSS for more sophisticated customization.

Mighty Networks

Mighty Networks includes premade templates to make the course creation process easier, but it has nowhere near Kajabi’s flexibility. Instead, it’s mainly a dashboard that allows you to store training videos. 

So if you want more advanced course creation options, Mighty Networks might not be the best option. 

upcoach

Creating courses in upcoach is done through the Program Builder feature.

It offers premade templates you can customize with drag-and-drop functionality, so even beginners with zero technical knowledge can create a beautiful custom course with their own branding. 

Another great thing about the Program Builder is that you can reuse blocks and programs you’ve already designed.

For instance, if you want to build a new course, all of the programs and blocks you used in the previous one will be available in the Program Builder. So you can save time by using an existing program as a template.  

Inside each lesson, you can upload videos and lock future lessons (if you choose). You can also add habits, to-dos, and worksheets to the bottom of each lesson to ensure clients take action on the information learned.

To track client progress, clients can mark lessons as complete. It’s also easy to track client progress with the corresponding tasks (e.g., to-dos, habits, worksheets) as all of these tasks live inside the platform, and clients can check them off as they progress.

The Bottom Line

Mighty Networks doesn’t target course creators, so its course creation features are the most simplistic.  

Kajabi is best suited for advanced coaches due to HTML and CSS code customization features and diverse pre-made templates.

However, because it lacks action task features, you’ll most likely need to integrate your Kajabi course with external platforms to provide clients with action items for each lesson. 

This is why upcoach is such a strong alternative.

Not only do you have advanced course creation and customization tools at your fingertips, but you can also add features like habit tracking, to-do lists, and worksheets to each lesson to ensure clients take action on the information. 

Kajabi vs. Mighty Networks – Client Engagement and Accountability

You can teach clients the information they need to succeed, and they can discuss it with other members of your community, but it will ultimately be useless if they don’t take action and apply that knowledge. 

So if you want to deliver transformational results, drive more referrals, and have happier clients, this is arguably the most important feature category to consider. 

Kajabi

Kajabi only includes one form of client engagement – lesson assessments and quizzes.

You can program Kajabi to only unlock the next lesson after clients complete or receive a passing score on the quiz (each quiz is graded automatically).

Some of the lesson assessment options include:

• Open-ended questions
• Multiple-choice questions
• Fill-in-the-blank questions
• Image-based questions

While lesson assessments are useful in gauging comprehension of the material, they don’t guarantee that clients will apply that knowledge and grow. 

So if you really want to produce transformational results, you’ll still have to use third-party tools like to-do lists, habit trackers, and worksheets.

Mighty Networks

Mighty Networks is designed for discussions and community collaboration rather than individual member progress. Therefore, it doesn’t offer quizzes or progress checklists.

So if you want more active engagement features, you’ll probably have to integrate with other tools. 

upcoach

Engagement and action tasks are upcoach’s specialty, and it’s a key reason why upcoach is a truly all-in-one coaching platform. 

Instead of just pop-quizzing clients and assessing their knowledge, you can assign action items and track client progress.

Here are a few of the features that make it easy to improve your clients’ success.

Habit Tracking

Habits are the building blocks for permanent change, so if you really want to change lives, habit tracking should be a core element of your coaching program.

upcoach offers a habit tracker that lives natively inside the dashboard. Clients can add their own habits to the habit tracker, or you can program the upcoach platform to automatically add habits to their tracker after they complete a lesson. 

Habit trackers are also publicly visible to all other members, so it adds some positive peer pressure for people to keep up with their habits and ensure they don’t fall behind. This also makes it easy for members to review habit progress during accountability groups.

Smart Docs

Creating worksheets in Google Docs or another tool and then sending them clients via email or attaching them to a course platform is a pain. 

Fortunately, upcoach solves this with Smart Docs.

Smart Docs is upcoach’s native worksheet builder, which allows you to create and assign worksheets directly inside the upcoach platform. 

This makes it easy for you to assess their performance and reach out in case they need help with any specific lesson or run into a wall.

Automated Tasks

You can assign specific tasks (like sending a particular email, hiring a VA, etc.) following each lesson so that clients have clear action tasks. 

You can add tasks manually or program upcoach to automatically add tasks to a person’s list after they mark the corresponding lesson as complete.

Tasks are also publicly visible, so you’ll notice if a client starts falling behind and can offer additional assistance. 

The Bottom Line

Kajabi offers basic quizzes to assess a client’s comprehension, though these assessments aren’t really an accurate assessment of how they’ve applied that knowledge. 

Unfortunately, Mighty Networks doesn’t offer any action tasks. 

upcoach is the clear winner in this regard, with habit trackers, to-do lists, a worksheet builder, and detailed progress details inside the dashboard. 

Kajabi vs. Mighty Networks – Integrations

Kajabi

Kajabi offers the following integrations:

• Email – MailChimp, ActiveCampaign, and ConvertKit
• Analytics – Google Analytics and Facebook Pixel
• Automation – Zapier and ClickFunnels
• Collaboration – Asana, Trello, Google Docs
• Video conferencing – Zoom
• Scheduling – Calendly
• Habit tracking/Accountability – Habitify and Notion

Keep in mind that all of these are one-way integrations, meaning you can only push information to these tools, not the other way around.

Mighty Networks

Mighty Networks is much more limited in integrations, which can be a problem if you want to offer more advanced progress tracking and marketing automation.

You’ll have to use Zapier for most integrations, and it also doesn’t offer single sign-on integrations (SSO). This can be a major drawback if you want to integrate with an existing platform like Thinkific, Podia, or WordPress, as users will have to remember multiple different passwords. 

In addition, Mighty Networks doesn’t offer an API. 

upcoach 

With so many engagement features already included, upcoach provides the “all-in-one” experience that Kajabi and Mighty Networks lack.

Community, course creation, hosting meetings, project management, habit tracking, smart documents… everything you need can be found in one comprehensive dashboard. 

However, upcoach also offers integrations like:

• ConvertKit – Email Marketing
• Google Slides – Presentations
• Google Sheets – Advanced spreadsheet flexibility
• Miro – Mind-mapping
• Zapier – Gateway to other integrations

The Bottom Line

Kajabi offers some native integrations and you can create more with Zapier. Unfortunately, Mighty Networks offers the fewest integration options. upcoach offers basic integration options, though you’ll also require fewer integrations as all the client progress tracking features (e.g., habit tracking, worksheets, etc.) are offered natively in the platform.

Kajabi vs. Mighty Networks vs. upcoach – Pricing

Kajabi

Kajabi isn’t a cheap platform, though it offers some of the most course creation customization available. 

Here’s the exact pricing:

• Basic Plan: $119/month (annual billing)
• Growth Plan: $159/month (annual billing)
• Pro Plan: $319/month (annual billing)

As you can see in the picture, the highest tier differences are the allowed number of active customers, funnels, and products.

While you do gain access to some cool features like Kajabi University and its robust marketing tools, you’ll most likely end up paying a subscription to another platform alongside it, especially if you need client engagement features.

Considering that the price is very high as it is, Kajabi can be over-the-top for some coaches.

Mighty Networks

Opposite to Kajabi, Mighty Networks comes at a much more affordable price.

Here are the plans listed on the website:

• Community Plan: $33/month (annual billing)
• Business Plan: $99/month (annual billing)
• Mighty Pro: Price not listed

Even though Mighty Networks might seem like a bargain, it lacks a lot of tools you’ll need to provide a full coaching or course experience. So consider factoring in other costs as well.

upcoach

upcoach’s price lands somewhere in between Kajabi and Mighty Networks, but with one huge difference – you don’t need to factor in any additional costs once you subscribe.

The plans included are:

• Launch Plan: $29/month (annual billing)
• Grow Plan: $39/month (annual billing)
• Scale Plan: $79/month (annual billing)

It also offers a 30 day money back guarantee, so you can try it out risk free! 

Kajabi vs. Mighty Networks vs. upcoach – The Winner is…?

In the end, it all comes down to what you’re looking for in an online course platform. 

If you want the community to be at the center of attention and are just starting to dip your toes into the online course industry, then Mighty Networks could work for you.

On the other hand, if you have several years of experience and need advanced customization and automation tools, Kajabi is a much better solution.

However, if you want a platform with community, online coaching and course capabilities, along with client action items, upcoach is probably the best option. 

To see for yourself if upcoach is a good fit for your business, sign up for a demo or jump into the platform risk free today!