OpenCurriculum

OpenCurriculum is a web-based curriculum planning tool for building lessons and units with an editor and a library of ready-to-use teaching materials. It is best suited to educators and institutions that need standards-aligned planning and shared curriculum resources. Its free individual and team plans make it approachable, while the School plan’s 10-user minimum and per-user charge call for a close look at seat needs.

Overview

OpenCurriculum brings planning, standards alignment, resources and collaboration into one curriculum workspace. Educators can organize courses, units and lessons, then use planning views and standards tools to connect day-to-day work with learning goals. The product also extends to school-level templates, outcomes and course catalogs, making it relevant beyond individual lesson creation.

The organization describes itself as a 501(c)(3) nonprofit. It also offers all paid features free to schools serving students affected by conflict, disaster or extreme poverty who would otherwise go unserved.

Key features

Planning and resources

Planner, calendar and semester or academic-term views provide different ways to follow courses, units and lessons. That range can help educators shift between near-term scheduling and broader curriculum planning without changing tools. The resource library contains hundreds of lessons, strategies, activities, formative assessments, discussion questions and worksheets contributed by teachers, researchers and publishers. Ready-made material can give planning a useful starting point, though the value depends on whether those resources suit a school’s needs.

Standards and collaboration

A standards picker supports national and state standards as well as school-created learning targets, useful for aligning plans to either external requirements or local priorities. Sharing permissions, department or PLC Groups, searchable school materials and Libraries for cataloging resources support coordinated work. Google Drive and Google Calendar integrations are also included in the plan comparison.

Insights and school-wide planning

Reporting tracks standards, planning processes, vocabulary, learning objectives and assessments across plans. For schools trying to understand how curriculum is being implemented, that breadth is more useful than a lesson-only view. Custom templates, school-wide learning outcomes, course catalogs and activity templates give leadership tools for expressing a school’s philosophy and learning model through shared planning structures.

Pricing

OpenCurriculum has two free plans and paid options for larger organizations. The free plans differ in users, course caps and storage, so the right starting point depends on whether planning is individual or shared.

• Teacher: free for 1 user, with a 10-course limit and 200 MB file storage. It suits an individual teacher or curriculum designer, but the course cap may constrain broader planning.
• Team: free for up to 10 users, with a 50-course limit and 1.5 GB total file storage. Small departments can collaborate without a subscription, though storage is shared and courses are capped.
• School: $5 a month, billed at $5 / user, per month, with a minimum of 10 users and a maximum of 200 users. It includes unlimited courses and 1 GB of file storage per user. This fits schools and colleges that need room to grow beyond the free course limits, but the 10-seat floor means smaller teams pay for more users than they may need.
• Network: custom pricing based on your needs for more than 200 users, with unlimited courses, 1 GB of file storage per user and discounted bulk pricing. It is aimed at larger school districts or university clusters.

Teacher and Team include general-inquiries support; School includes three-day business email support, and Network includes priority support. Schools in the stated conflict-, disaster- or extreme-poverty-affected circumstances can receive all paid features free if their students would otherwise go unserved.

Platforms

OpenCurriculum is available on the web. The product supports PDF curriculum exports and lists LMS integrations, which can help schools connect planning to existing teaching workflows.

Who it's for

Individual educators can begin with Teacher, while small schools or departments can share the free Team plan. School is the more natural fit for schools and colleges that need unlimited courses, standards reporting and school-wide planning structures and can meet its 10-user minimum. Districts and university clusters with more than 200 users can consider Network. Those needing a very small paid team should weigh the School minimum against the free-plan caps.

Pros and cons

• Pro: Free plans cover both solo and small-team use, with distinct user, course and storage allowances.
• Pro: Planning views, standards alignment, resource libraries and collaboration tools support a connected curriculum workflow.
• Pro: School adds unlimited courses and per-user storage, alongside reporting and school-wide planning capabilities.
• Con: Teacher is capped at 10 courses and Team at 50, so growing programs may need to move to a paid plan.
• Con: School requires at least 10 users at $5 / user, per month, which may be an awkward fit for a smaller paid group.
• Con: Team’s 1.5 GB storage is shared across users, unlike School’s 1 GB per user.

Alternatives

For other options, browse Curriculum Management Software. Outcomap is a web-based freemium alternative with a free plan capped at one map, five AI map generations and edits per month, and PDF exports up to five pages; choose it when that map-based scope fits better than OpenCurriculum’s course planning. Its Pro plan is $7.50 a year, billed $90.

PeopleGrove Engagement Hub is a paid web option with a free plan. mapEDU is another web-based freemium option with a free plan. Modern Campus CMS is a paid alternative available on Android, iOS, web, API and self-hosted platforms. Kuali Curriculum Management is a paid web and API option with pricing available through a personalized demo. Akari offers a paid web curriculum management solution by demo request. Atlas is a paid web option with a free standards library that schools can add to or customize, and a public sharing page for $500 a year. CourseLoop is a paid alternative available on web and API.

Verdict

OpenCurriculum is a strong fit for educators and institutions that want planning, standards alignment and shared teaching resources in one web workspace, especially when a free plan covers their scale or a school can use the School plan’s full seat minimum. Its course caps make the free tiers less suitable for expanding programs, while the 10-user School threshold is a meaningful cost commitment. Choose it for connected curriculum planning; look elsewhere if you need a small paid team without that minimum.