Hosted sessions vs SCORM: how to deliver your training

Choose SCORM when your receiving LMS must launch the course and hold its completion or score record. Choose a hosted session when learners need a browser link and you want participation inside Intle. A saved course can support both routes, but they have different access, expiry, reporting and update behaviour. Confirm the plan allowance and test the exact delivery route before inviting learners.

The same content, two front doors

SCORM export produces a downloadable zip for testing in a learning management system. What the LMS launches, records and displays varies by platform version and configuration. Packages target SCORM 2004 4th Edition and SCORM 1.2. The LMS evidence matrix separates local resume checks, a historical SCORM Cloud run, the scoped Blackboard pilot and pending platform gates. Use the LMS delivery guide, then verify import, completion, score and resume in your exact environment.

A hosted session is a link. Intle publishes the same generated content at /s/ followed by a short, random slug, and anyone with that link opens it in a browser — no account, no install, no LMS in sight. You can optionally collect names and email addresses, cap the number of participants, and run it either self-paced or facilitator-led, where you drive everyone through the sections together and watch responses land live. Participant and session allowances still depend on the plan. It is the quickest way to get something in front of a room or a cohort, which is why workshop and seminar formats lean on it. You can spin one up straight from the AI workshop generator.

Reach for SCORM when…

• Your organisation already runs an LMS and expects completion to land in the gradebook.
• Your LMS is the agreed system of record and the administrator has validated the package's completion and score behaviour.
• Learners need LMS-managed attempts and resume; verify these with the exact package and LMS configuration.
• The content is a solo, self-paced module rather than a shared, live event.
• Your organisation controls the LMS upload and its retention settings, subject to its own policies.

Reach for a hosted session when…

• You don't run an LMS, or getting a package approved into it would take weeks you don't have.
• You're running a live workshop, seminar, icebreaker or all-hands and want participant responses in the room.
• You need it live today, shared with nothing more than a link or a join code.
• Participants are external or one-off — contractors, students, event attendees — and shouldn't need to create accounts.
• You want live polls, word clouds and paired discussion, not a static record filed away in a gradebook.

What 'hosted' really means for privacy

A hosted session uses an unlisted link and a random slug. Its noindex directive asks search engines not to list it, but noindex is not access control and a shared link can spread. Set a password where appropriate, restrict distribution, and follow your organisation's privacy policy for any participant data.

• Unguessable slugs — random and collision-checked, not incremental database IDs.
• Noindex / nofollow directives on session pages; these are indexing signals, not a privacy guarantee.
• Optional session password on every individual plan, stored only as a hash and never sent to the browser.
• Participant caps plus pause and end controls, so you can close a session the moment you need to.
• Automatic expiry, after which the link stops accepting responses and shows a friendly 'session ended' page.

Records and tracking: the honest difference

SCORM sends completion and score through the LMS API; whether those values appear in a gradebook depends on the platform's configuration and import type. A hosted session records participation and response information inside Intle according to the enabled session features and plan. It is not automatically an LMS gradebook entry. For regulated training, agree the system of record and test the learner and administrator views before relying on either route.

A worked example

The academic integrity seminar example shows a stored lesson with poll, discussion and decision sections. The public page offers a learner preview and an on-demand SCORM 2004 sample. It is not a live hosted session or proof of results in a university VLE. An author can use a similar brief, review the generated course, then test hosted and LMS deliveries separately.

You usually don't have to choose

The same saved content can support a hosted session and a SCORM export, subject to plan limits. If you later edit the course, export a fresh SCORM ZIP and replace the LMS upload after checking how existing attempts will be handled. Do not assume an already exported package changes in place. Test a hosted session separately; confirm whether edits to an active session are reflected before promising learners an update.