Online Learning Statistics for 2026: Key Trends & Insights
The industry of e-learning is a young one, but each year it grows rapidly. Especially, this rising trend can be seen during and after 2020, the year of the COVID-19 pandemic. Thus, this article is aimed at revealing the main online learning trends for 2025 and then, it focuses mainly on important statistics broken down by subtopics.
Online Learning Statistics Highlights
Online Learning Stats for 2025
General Industry Stats
Summary
The industry of e-learning is growing quickly as this type of learning provides more flexibility and is focused on gaining practical knowledge and skills. The United States, China, and the United Kingdom were the leading countries in terms of e-learning revenue in 2024.
MOOCs (Massive Open Online Courses) Stats
In 2024, the MOOC (Massive Open Online Course) market was valued at $13.2 billion. This figure is expected to reach as high as $212.7 billion by 2034.
Universities that offer the highest number of open online courses:
- Stanford University – 2089 courses
- The Open University – 1141 courses
- Yale University – 1015 courses
- Tsinghua University – 822 courses
- Santa Fe Institute – 806 courses
Top MOOCs companies by the number of courses offered:
- Udemy – 250,000 courses
- Coursera – over 10,000
- EdX – over 4,900
- FutureLearn – over 1,400
Top MOOCs providers by the number of students (as of May 2025):
- Coursera – 168,000,000
- Udemy – 77,000,000
- EdX – 86,000,000
- Udacity – 21,000,000
- FutureLearn – 18,000,000
Most popular subjects to learn online (based on Udemy, Coursera, and eDx’s data):
- AI
- Personal Development
- Programming
- Data Science
- Marketing
Most popular additional services offered by MOOC companies:
- Online mentorship
- Help with job search
- CV review
Summary
Top universities offer plenty of online courses today on different subjects. Also, while there are companies that provide more than a couple of thousand courses, online students seem to be interested more in such subjects as personal development, tech skills (coding), and marketing.
Mobile Learning (M-learning) Stats
- As of March 2025, the share of mobile for Internet access is 63.3%, and desktop is 36.7%.
- The m-learning market has valued $135.3 billion in 2024 and is predicted to reach $2274 billion by 2031.
- This industry is forecasted to maintain a CAGR of 42.3% from 2024 to 2031.
- 67% of students use mobile devices to finish online course tasks.
- 71% of millennials prefer mobile learning over more formal ways of learning.
- Learners who use mobile devices complete course materials 45% faster compared to those using computers.
- Time spent during online learning – desktop (one interaction): 20-60 min.
- Time spent during mobile learning (one interaction) – 3-10 min.
Summary
Mobile learning is a logical trend in the development of e-learning. This is caused partly because of the fast growth of mobile Internet users and also because online learners are seeking even more flexibility and freedom, which is possible by using mobile devices for educational purposes.
AI in online education
- According to a research report by Global Market Insights, AI in the education market will surpass $54.5 billion by 2032.
- In 2025, the market size of AI in education is projected to reach $244.22bn.
- At the beginning of 2024, there are already 30 EdTech unicorns worth $89 billion.
- NLP (natural language processing), an AI segment that is used for working with speech and text in e-learning, reached 42.47 billion in 2025 and is predicted to attain around USD 571.65 billion by 2033.
- The market share of AI in education is made up of the following groups: higher education takes 44%, K-12 education has 53%
Summary
The education AI market is experiencing rapid growth, driven by the increasing adoption of technologies such as natural language processing and the growth of Edtech companies. AI is transforming both higher education and K-12 education (kindergarten to 12th grade), shaping the future of digital education with innovative tools and solutions.
Traditional Education vs Online Courses Stats
- Almost 80% of online course learners have a Bachelor’s degree or higher.
- In the first 13 months of its operation, Coursera offered about 325 courses for students to study on the platform, including 30% in the sciences, 28% in the humanities, 23% in information technology, 13% in business, and 6% in math.
- Research by Oxford College shows what students like the most about online learning: flexibility (84%), studying at your own pace (81%), and accessibility (56%).
- What students don’t like the most is the lack of in-person support (53%), missing out on social interaction (46%), and lack of practical learning (41%).
- There are 70 MOOC-based fully online Master’s degrees available today.
- E-learning has increased information retention rates up to 60%, compared to 8-10% for traditional learning.
Summary
While many universities are now offering a hybrid type of learning (offline + online), many have moved to the fully online form of education. Also, many people choose online courses and bootcamps over a traditional degree, or opt for online courses after gaining a bachelor’s or master’s degree.
Challenges of Online Education
- 24% of online students are concerned about lackluster quality, instruction, and academic support for online learning courses versus on-campus education.
- 15% of students are afraid that lack of interaction with classmates and professors because of online learning will be detrimental to their education in general.
- Despite having many courses available through mobile devices, 17% of online students complain that their e-learning program does not support mobile access.
Summary
There are still disadvantages and challenges in online education like lack of social interaction or quality of online education but offline education has also its downsides.
Corporate Online Learning Stats
- 72% of organizations believe that eLearning puts them at a competitive advantage.
- On average, employees only have 25 minutes per week to spend on learning.
- 84% of employees would stay at a company longer if it invested in their careers.
- 56% of employees would take a manager-suggested course.
- 44% of Gen Z would spend more time learning if their manager recognized it.
- 62% of businesses affected by changes due to COVID-19 are spending more on training in 2021
- Recent research conducted by Skillsoft found that over 94% of IT decision-makers have identified training and development as a critical priority within their organization.
- 84% of remote workers report that employee training programs improve their engagement.
Summary
Employees have become pickier with choosing the company to work for, and companies have realized that they need to invest in upskilling their employees, especially younger ones. Thus, corporate online training is shifting from an advantage that a limited number of companies can offer to their employees to a must-have for almost every company.
E-learning History
In 1994, the first accredited wholly online high school, CompuHigh, was established.
The term “e-learning” was first utilized in a professional context by Elliott Masie during TechLearn and was referred to as learning using the web or any other electronic medium. However, the term “online learning” is older and is originated from the University of Illinois in 1960.
The term “MOOC” appeared in 2008 by Dave Cormier from the University of Prince Edward Island in Canada.
The first MOOC was the course “Artificial Intelligence” by Sebastian Thrun and Peter Norvig from Stanford University in the fall of 2011.
2012 is the year of the MOOCs as many top players were born in this year. Coursera, Udacity, and edX were founded in 2012.
Summary
While the industry’s indirect beginning can be traced back to the end of the 60s, its actual beginning is dated after 2011 with a real beginning after the first huge MOOCs company such as Coursera were born.
Sources
- https://research.com/education/elearning-statistics
- https://www.gminsights.com/industry-analysis/elearning-market-size
- https://www.oxfordcollege.ac/news/online-education-statistics/
- https://www.thinkimpact.com/elearning-statistics/
- https://www.skillsoft.com/press-releases/skillsoft-new-it-skills-and-salary-report-highlights-trends-impacting-technology-careers-investments-and-talent-strategies-for-2025?constituency=316259
- https://www.classcentral.com/report/mooc-based-masters-degree/
- https://market.us/report/ai-in-teaching-market/
- https://www.researchandmarkets.com/reports/6026789/ai-in-education-market-global-forecast-report?utm_source=GNE&utm_medium=PressRelease&utm_code=txplgx&utm_campaign=2022876+-+AI+in+Education+Market+Trends+and+Revenue+Forecast+(2024-2032)+by+Component%2c+Application%2c+End+User%2c+and+Country%2c+with+Detailed+Company+Analysis&utm_exec=jocamspi
- https://www.precedenceresearch.com/press-release/natural-language-processing-market
- ttps://www.verifiedmarketresearch.com/product/global-mobile-learning-market-size-and-forecast/
- https://gs.statcounter.com/platform-market-share/desktop-mobile/worldwide/
- https://www.classcentral.com/universities
- https://www.factmr.com/report/3077/mooc-market
- https://www.statista.com/outlook/emo/online-education/worldwide?currency=USD
- https://www.imarcgroup.com/asia-pacific-e-learning-market
- https://www.rootsanalysis.com/e-learning-market
- https://www.imarcgroup.com/mobile-education-market
- https://www.imarcgroup.com/asia-pacific-e-learning-market
- https://www.grandviewresearch.com/industry-analysis/education-technology-market
If e-learning has only been around for 10 years, how is it that the 2nd major standard is Scorm 2004? 17 years ago.
Hi Rachel, you’re right. Thank you for pointing that out, we edited the article.