Courses, memberships and communities for a coaching business

Updated 2026-09-19

HighLevel includes courses, memberships and a community area on every plan, as at September 2026, which removes a separate course-host subscription for a coach delivering program material to paying clients. If your course is sold on its own to strangers and its polish is the product itself, a platform built only for courses will serve that more closely.

This page is part of the coaches hub; a cohort running on the same membership area is covered separately in group programs.

What is included

The courses and memberships area lets you host videos, PDFs and audio files, build them into modules and lessons, and schedule content to open up over time or by membership tier, mixing free and paid material inside the same group. The community area adds a "Go Live" feature for real-time video, audio and chat, useful for a group Q&A or a workshop alongside the recorded material. Checkout and access for both are handled through the same Stripe connection used everywhere else in the account, and a custom-domain client portal can bundle courses, communities and mobile access together rather than sending clients to a separate site.

What it is enough for

Enough if the members are your own coaching clients, the material supports live delivery rather than replacing it, and you charge by program or by month. A private cohort watching a module between calls, or a membership that opens up a new lesson each week, sits comfortably inside this. Payment plans, one-off program fees and recurring membership billing all run through the same payments setup covered in what a coach can cancel.

What to look elsewhere for

Look at a platform built only for course delivery if you need a public marketplace, a certificate on completion, or detailed learner analytics as the point of the product rather than a support to your own delivery. HighLevel for course creators sets out that split in more detail. Video storage terms and any numeric limits on course size are not published clearly enough by HighLevel to state a figure here; check the current terms in your account before building a large library.

The branded portal add-on

A branded client portal app is available as a paid add-on at $49 a month, as at September 2026, for a coach who wants the course and community area to carry their own name rather than HighLevel's. It sits alongside the other paid extras listed in add-ons, and is worth adding once the program itself is selling, not before.

Where this goes wrong

The common mistake is building the full course library before the program has sold a single spot: hours go into lessons nobody has paid for yet, while the pipeline that would have brought a paying client sits empty. The second is moving an existing student list over and emailing it immediately from a brand-new sending domain, which is the fastest way to have a launch email land badly. Warm the domain first; see email deliverability.

If you are moving an existing course business over rather than starting fresh, Kajabi or HighLevel sets out the conditions for that move in more detail. Run the fit test to see where your own course fits, check what it would cost in year one against what you pay now for a separate course host, or start here if you have already decided.

Questions people ask

Can I put my course inside HighLevel?

Yes. Courses, memberships and a community area are included on every plan, with content that can open up over time or by tier.

Is there a community feature like a forum?

Yes, with a live video, audio and chat feature for real-time sessions alongside the recorded material.

Can members pay monthly?

Yes, through the same Stripe connection used for one-off program fees and payment plans.

Can I drip content?

Yes, content can be scheduled to open up over time or by membership tier rather than all at once.

Do my clients need to download an app?

No, unless you add the branded client portal app, which is optional and separate from the core course and membership area.