iorad
One capture, six ways to learn it, and a SCORM file at the end
iorad is an interactive tutorial platform: a browser extension or desktop app records a workflow in any web or desktop application and automatically generates a tutorial that a learner can consume in several interactive modes, including watching it play, practicing it in a simulated version of the screen, or being tested on it, with data masking, neural voiceover, translation, custom branding, analytics, and export to MP4, Word, HTML, SharePoint, and SCORM for a learning management system.
Overview
iorad is the oldest product in this category by a wide margin. Founded in 2012 by Sundeep Patel and still bootstrapped with no disclosed outside funding, it has been making interactive tutorials for over a decade and reports more than thirty million learners. That longevity shows in the product in both directions: the capture engine and the learning modes are unusually mature, and the pricing and packaging read like a company that has been selling to training departments rather than to product-led startups.
The job it does sits between the two obvious ones. Like Tango and Scribe, iorad captures a workflow you perform and turns it into a document nobody had to write. Unlike them, it does not stop at a document. The same capture is automatically rendered as multiple interactive learning modes, so a learner can watch the steps play out, try the steps in a simulated copy of the interface with the software guiding their clicks, or be tested with the guidance removed. That last mode is the differentiator: iorad is the only product in this comparison set where the output can demonstrate that somebody actually learned the process rather than merely opened the guide.
Pricing is where a small business will hesitate. There is a genuinely unlimited free tier, but everything you make on it is public and indexed. The first paid step is $200 a month for one creator, which is roughly thirteen times what Tango charges per seat and fifteen times Scribe's team rate. Team is $500 a month with one seat included and $50 for each additional seat. Those are training-department numbers, not startup numbers, and iorad does not pretend otherwise. What you are paying for is the interactive modes, SCORM export, and the fifty-plus publishing integrations, none of which the cheaper documentation tools offer at any price.
The maintenance question applies here as it does everywhere in this category, and iorad's answer is version history and drafts rather than surgical repair. You can roll a tutorial back, you can work on a draft without disturbing the published version, but there is no equivalent of Supademo's targeted screenshot replacement, which is the strongest maintenance tooling in this whole comparison set. On the other hand iorad is nowhere near the weak end either, where Guidde's narrated video output has to be reshot wholesale when a screen changes. iorad sits comfortably in the middle: recapture is the fix, and drafts keep the fix from breaking anything while it is in progress.
Best for
Training, enablement, and customer education teams that need tutorials which prove competence rather than merely describe a process, especially organizations that already run a learning management system and need SCORM output, and support organizations publishing tutorials into Zendesk or Salesforce at volume.
Not the right fit for
- Small teams on a startup budget; the first paid tier is $200 a month for a single creator, which is more than ten times what Tango or Scribe charge per seat for a comparable capture-and-document workflow.
- SaaS companies wanting in-app onboarding for their own signed-up users, because iorad has no user segmentation, no event-triggered checklists, no flow A/B testing, and no product analytics; Userpilot, Userflow, or Product Fruits is the right shape.
- Marketing teams that need an interactive click-through demo for prospects who have never signed up, which is Storylane, Supademo, Arcade, and Walnut territory.
- Anyone who wants to stay on the free tier for real work, since free tutorials are public and search-indexed, and privacy begins at $200 a month.
- Buyers who want live in-app guidance and advanced exports without a quote, since both are pushed to the unpriced Enterprise tier aimed at twenty or more creators.
How it works
- 1
You install the iorad capture extension for Chrome, Firefox, or Edge, or the desktop app for Windows or macOS if the process involves software that never opens in a browser. Nothing is installed inside the application you are documenting, so any vendor tool, internal admin panel, or legacy system is fair game without anybody's permission.
- 2
You perform the task while iorad records. It captures each screen and interaction, generates the step text automatically so no copywriting is required, and highlights the element you used. Sensitive values in the captured screens can be permanently masked, which is important because unlike a manual blur this is applied to the stored capture rather than drawn on top of it.
- 3
The single capture is then rendered into multiple learning modes without any extra work from you. A learner can have the tutorial played for them, follow along step by step, practice inside a simulated version of the interface, or attempt the process with the prompts removed so their competence is actually measured. You layer on voiceover from fifty voices, background music, closed captions, video per step, and translations with matching text to speech.
- 4
Publishing is unusually broad. Tutorials can be public and search-indexed, unlisted, embed-only, or invite-only; they can be grouped into role-based libraries, shared across a whole email domain, delivered through a widget or extension inside the software they document as live on-screen guidance, or pushed into more than fifty external platforms including Zendesk, Salesforce, Slack, Confluence, and HubSpot. Export covers MP4, Word, Google Docs, Google Slides, HTML, SharePoint, and SCORM, which is the one that matters if a learning management system is the destination.
Feature breakdown
28 features in 5 modulesCapture and generation
A mature engine that has been refined for more than a decade.- Browser extension capture
- Chrome, Firefox, and Edge extensions record any web application step by step with no integration required from the software being captured.
- Desktop capture
- Windows and macOS apps extend capture to native software that never opens in a browser.
- Automatic step text generation
- iorad writes the detailed step-by-step instructions from what it observed, so a capture arrives as a written tutorial rather than a stack of screenshots.
- Permanent data masking
- Account numbers, names, and email addresses can be masked permanently in the capture rather than covered with an overlay, which is a materially stronger control than a drawn blur.
- Drafts and version history
- Work on an unpublished draft while the live version stays untouched, and roll back to a previous version if an edit goes wrong. This is the main maintenance tool in the product.
- Video per step
- Record or upload video attached to an individual step where a screenshot cannot carry the explanation.
Interactive learning modes
The reason iorad costs what it costs, and the thing no cheaper tool here matches.- Automatic mode generation
- A single capture is rendered into several interactive modes automatically. You do not build a watch version and a practice version separately; iorad generates them from the same recording.
- Guided practice
- The learner clicks through a simulated copy of the interface with the software prompting each action, which is closer to doing the task than reading about it.
- Test mode
- Prompts are withheld so the learner attempts the process unaided. This is the only capability in this comparison set that measures competence rather than consumption, and it is why training departments buy iorad rather than a documentation tool.
- Learner choice of mode
- The person consuming the tutorial picks how they want to learn it rather than the author deciding for everyone, which quietly solves the argument about whether documentation should be text or video.
- Live on-screen guidance
- Enterprise adds in-app guidance that prompts the learner over the real application rather than a simulation, which is the closest iorad comes to the in-app guidance half of this category.
Audio, translation, and branding
Production polish that scales a tutorial to an international audience.- Basic audio and text to speech
- Choose from fifty voices across many languages, or record your own narration. Included from the Individual tier.
- Premium audio
- Team adds neural voiceover, closed captioning, and background music, which is the difference between a tutorial that sounds like a robot and one you would put in front of a customer.
- Translation with matched speech
- Tutorials translate into other languages with text to speech applied in the target language, and Enterprise extends this past a hundred languages. Notably this is available well below the enterprise tier, which is not true of Tango or Scribe.
- Fully customizable player
- Team adds custom branding across the player itself rather than only the content inside it, so an embedded tutorial matches the surrounding product.
- Customizable libraries
- Group tutorials by role, department, or category into libraries so a new hire is handed a curriculum rather than a search box.
Distribution, export, and integrations
The widest publishing surface of any tool in this category.- Privacy controls
- Tutorials can be public and search-indexed, unlisted, embed-only, or invite-only. Private tutorials require the Individual tier or above; everything on free is public.
- SCORM export
- Publish a tutorial as a SCORM package for a learning management system. Nothing else in this comparison set does this, and for a company that already runs an LMS it is often the whole reason iorad is on the shortlist.
- Document and video export
- MP4, Word, Google Docs, Google Slides, HTML, and SharePoint export, so one capture serves a video channel, a document library, and a slide deck without being rebuilt.
- More than fifty integrations
- Direct publishing into Zendesk, Salesforce, Slack, Confluence, HubSpot, and dozens of other platforms rather than only an embed code.
- Widget and extension delivery
- Surface the right tutorial inside the software where the learner is working through a widget or browser extension rather than expecting them to find a portal.
- Auto-domain sharing
- Share tutorials automatically with everyone on an email domain, which removes seat-by-seat access administration for internal audiences.
Analytics and administration
Reporting built for a training function rather than a product team.- Engagement dashboard
- Track how learners move through tutorials, where they stop, and which tutorials perform. Available from the Individual tier.
- Advanced analytics
- Team adds deeper performance reporting and customizable dashboard statistics.
- Creator activity tracking
- See who is producing tutorials and how much, which is how a training manager justifies the seat count internally.
- SSO
- SAML, Okta, Auth0, and Azure single sign-on, available from the Team tier rather than being reserved entirely for Enterprise, which is unusually generous in this category.
- Multi-account and collaboration
- Team supports multiple creators collaborating on a shared library across accounts and departments.
- Enterprise security controls
- Encryption, anti-tracking compliance, advanced exports, and a private Slack support channel on Enterprise.
Use cases
4 documentedEnablement lead rolling out a new CRM to 200 staff
A written guide will be skimmed and forgotten, and the company needs to be able to say who has actually demonstrated they can run the process, not just who received the document.
Each workflow is captured once, published in practice and test modes, exported to SCORM into the existing LMS, and completion becomes a measured fact rather than an assumption.
Customer education team at a software vendor
Support tickets keep repeating the same configuration question, and the help center article describing it in prose is not landing with customers.
The same capture is published into Zendesk as an interactive tutorial, embedded in the product through the widget, and exported as an MP4 for the YouTube channel, all without producing three separate assets.
Operations team supporting a multilingual workforce
Staff across several countries need the same process documentation, and maintaining parallel translated documents by hand has already failed twice.
Tutorials are translated with matched text to speech in each target language from the original capture, so one recording covers the whole workforce and an update propagates from a single source.
Support organization publishing at volume
Dozens of subject matter experts across departments each know one process, and a central documentation team is the bottleneck.
Capture is decentralized so experts publish into role-based libraries themselves, auto-domain sharing removes access administration, and creator activity tracking shows the training manager where knowledge is actually being written down.
Pricing
from $0 (Free, public tutorials only), then $200 per month for one creatorPer-creator subscription with a flat monthly price per tier, extra creator seats charged individually on Team, and no monthly active user or learner meter at any point.
| Plan | Price | Includes |
|---|---|---|
| Free | $0 per month |
Unlimited but public. If your tutorial shows an internal admin screen, this tier is not usable for the work you actually have. |
| Individual | $200 per month for 1 creator |
The privacy tier. Everything a solo creator needs, at a price that will stop most small businesses in their tracks. |
| Team | $500 per month, 1 seat included, $50 per additional seat |
SSO arriving at Team rather than Enterprise is genuinely unusual and worth crediting, but $500 before the second seat is a serious commitment. |
| Enterprise | Custom quoted, aimed at 20 or more creators |
Live in-app guidance being Enterprise-only is the main reason a buyer who wanted a digital adoption platform ends up quoted. |
Billing notes
- Annual payment includes one month free, and can be invoiced rather than charged to a card; monthly billing is by credit card.
- Team includes one seat at $500 and charges $50 for each additional creator, so a five-creator team is $700 a month.
- There is no learner meter, no monthly active user meter, and no per-view charge on any tier, so audience size never affects the bill.
- The free tier is unlimited in volume but publishes everything publicly and search-indexed, which makes it an evaluation tool rather than a plan.
- Enterprise is unpriced and holds live in-app guidance, advanced exports, and translation past a hundred languages.
Value assessment: Judged as a documentation tool, iorad is very expensive: $200 a month for one creator against $15 per seat for Tango or $13 for Scribe on a five-seat team. Judged as training software it looks entirely different, because nothing cheaper here produces a practice mode, a test mode, or a SCORM package, and replacing those with an authoring tool plus a documentation tool costs more than $200 a month and produces two artifacts to maintain instead of one. The meter is also the right one and worth appreciating in context: you pay per creator with unlimited learners, whereas the in-app guidance half of this category prices on monthly active users and publishes almost nothing, with UserGuiding showing only its 2,000 MAU point, Inline Manual exactly one point, and Candu no thresholds at all. iorad's price is high but it is knowable, and it does not move when your audience grows.
Strengths & limitations
Strengths
- The only product in this category whose output can test whether someone actually learned the process, rather than only whether they opened the guide.
- One capture becomes several interactive learning modes automatically, so you are not authoring a watch version and a practice version separately.
- SCORM export makes it the natural choice when a learning management system is the destination, and nothing else in this comparison set offers it.
- The widest publishing surface here: more than fifty integrations, plus MP4, Word, Google Docs, Slides, HTML, and SharePoint export.
- Permanent data masking applied to the capture itself, which is a stronger control than an overlay blur that can be defeated.
- Translation with matched text to speech is available well below the enterprise tier, unlike Tango and Scribe where translation is Enterprise only.
- SSO arrives at the Team tier rather than being reserved for Enterprise, which is rare in this category.
- Bootstrapped since 2012 with no outside funding, so there is no investor-driven pressure to reprice at renewal and no acquisition overhang.
Limitations
- The price floor is the dominant objection: $200 a month for one creator is roughly thirteen times the per-seat cost of the cheaper documentation tools that do the capture-and-publish part perfectly well.
- The free tier publishes everything publicly and search-indexed, so it cannot be used for any tutorial containing internal screens, which makes the practical entry price $200 rather than $0.
- Live in-app guidance is Enterprise only, which means the capability that would make iorad a digital adoption platform is behind a quote.
- Nothing detects that a tutorial has gone stale after the underlying software changes; drafts and version history help you fix it safely but not find it.
- There is no targeted screenshot replacement, so a single changed screen means recapturing rather than swapping one image, which is where Supademo is meaningfully ahead.
- No user segmentation, no event-driven triggers, and no A/B testing of flows, so this is not a substitute for an in-app onboarding platform.
- The interface and packaging reflect a company that has been selling to training departments since 2012, and it feels less modern than the newer tools in this comparison set.
Head-to-head comparisons
5 alternativesiorad vs Scribe
from $0 (Basic), then $13 per seat per month on annual billing with a five-seat minimumBoth capture a workflow and publish a step-by-step guide, and for that job Scribe is better value by an order of magnitude at $13 per seat on a five-seat team against iorad's $200 for one creator. What Scribe cannot do is render the capture as a practice mode or a test, or export SCORM into a learning management system. Pick Scribe when the output is documentation people follow while working; pick iorad when the output has to be training that demonstrates competence and lands in an LMS.
Full iorad vs Scribe comparisoniorad vs Tango
from $0 (Free), then $15 per user per month on annual billing at three or more seatsTango is the cheap end of the same capture motion at $15 per seat, and it delivers guides back into the software through Guide Me and pinned Nuggets, which is a better in-context story than iorad offers below Enterprise. iorad wins on learning modes, SCORM, translation availability, permanent masking, and publishing breadth. If your readers are staff following a process, Tango is the sane purchase; if your readers are learners you have to certify, iorad is the only option here.
Full iorad vs Tango comparisoniorad vs Helppier
from $49 per month up to 1,000 monthly active usersHelppier is genuine in-app guidance for your own product's users, priced on monthly active users from $49 a month, with tooltips anchored to your live DOM and NPS surveys. iorad is tutorial authoring with live in-app guidance reserved for Enterprise. A software vendor onboarding its own signed-up users wants Helppier and its MAU meter; a company training staff on software it bought wants iorad. They only look similar from a distance.
Full iorad vs Helppier comparisoniorad vs UserGuiding
from $174/mo billed yearly (Starter, 2,000 MAU)UserGuiding is an in-app onboarding platform for signed-up users of your own product, with checklists, tooltips, surveys, and a resource center, metered on monthly active users and publishing only its 2,000 MAU price. iorad has no MAU meter and no user segmentation at all. The relevant contrast is what you pay for: UserGuiding's bill scales with your audience and is not fully knowable in advance, iorad's is flat per creator and knowable but starts at $200. Different problems, opposite pricing philosophies.
Full iorad vs UserGuiding comparisoniorad vs Guidde
from $0 (Free, 25 videos), then $19 per creator per month billed annuallyGuidde captures a workflow and produces an AI-narrated how-to video, cheaply and attractively. iorad produces an interactive tutorial the learner can practice and be tested on. Guidde is the weakest tool in this category on staleness, because a changed screen means reshooting and renarrating a video, while iorad's drafts and version history at least make a recapture safe to stage. Take Guidde when watching is enough; take iorad when the process has to be practiced.
Full iorad vs Guidde comparisonImplementation & onboarding
- Setup time
- Fifteen minutes to a first published tutorial. Install the extension, record a process, review the auto-generated step text, publish. No developer is required to install iorad and no developer is required to publish a tutorial. The exception is Enterprise live in-app guidance, which does require deploying a widget or extension to the audience.
- Learning curve
- Low to create, moderate to use well. Capturing is trivial. The judgement is in deciding which learning mode a given process warrants, whether a test is appropriate, and how libraries are organized by role, and that is a training design skill rather than a software skill.
- Onboarding
- Self-serve on Free, Individual, and Team, with monthly credit card or annual invoicing. Enterprise adds a private Slack support channel and is quoted. Training-oriented buyers usually spend the first month designing the library structure rather than producing volume.
- Migration notes
- There is no importer for tutorials built in another authoring tool, so migration means recapturing, which is fast. Leaving is unusually clean for this category because export covers MP4, Word, Google Docs, Google Slides, HTML, SharePoint, and SCORM, so the content is portable in formats other systems can actually consume rather than only as PDF.
Platform, API & security
- Platforms
- Chrome extensionFirefox extensionMicrosoft Edge extensionWindows desktop appmacOS desktop appWeb app for editing, libraries, and analyticsWidget and extension delivery inside third-party software
- API
- Publishing is handled through more than fifty direct platform integrations and embeds rather than a heavily marketed public API; programmatic access and advanced export are part of the Enterprise conversation.
- Compliance
- Encryption in transit and at restAnti-tracking compliance controls on Enterprise
- Data residency
- No regional hosting options are advertised publicly.
- SSO
- SAML, Okta, Auth0, and Azure single sign-on from the Team tier, which is earlier than most competitors in this category.
- Security notes
- Data masking is applied permanently to the captured screens rather than as an overlay, which is a stronger control than the drawn blur most competitors offer. Tutorial privacy has four levels, from public and search-indexed through unlisted, embed-only, and invite-only, but private tutorials of any kind require a paid tier, so nothing on the free plan should ever contain internal data.
Support & resources
- Channels
- Email supportIn-app supportPrivate Slack channel on Enterprise
- Documentation
- Help documentation and a large public tutorial library on iorad.com, much of it built in iorad itself, which is the most honest possible product demonstration.
- Community
- No large official forum; the public tutorial library and template examples serve that role.
Company
- Founded
- 2012
- Headquarters
- Raleigh, North Carolina, United States
- Ownership
- Bootstrapped
- Founders
- Sundeep Patel, Dipti Patel
- Employees
- Not disclosed; a small team relative to its reach
- Funding
- No disclosed outside funding rounds; the company has operated independently since 2012.
Timeline
- 2012Founded by Sundeep Patel and Dipti Patel to make interactive step-by-step tutorials that anyone could create by simply doing the task.
- 2016Publishing surface widens with direct integrations into help desks, CRMs, and knowledge bases rather than embed codes alone.
- 2020Learning modes mature into the multi-mode model where one capture is rendered as watch, practice, and test experiences automatically.
- 2023Adds neural voiceover, closed captioning, and translation with matched text to speech, extending tutorials to international audiences from a single recording.
- 2026Reports more than thirty million learners after over a decade of operation, still bootstrapped, with live in-app guidance positioned as the enterprise capability.
Integrations
- Zendesk
- Salesforce
- Slack
- Confluence
- HubSpot
- SharePoint
- Learning management systems via SCORM export
- Google Docs and Google Slides export
- Microsoft Word and MP4 export
- More than 50 direct publishing integrations in total
- SSO via SAML, Okta, Auth0, and Azure
Frequently asked questions
10 questionsWhat is iorad?
iorad is an interactive tutorial platform. A browser extension or desktop app records a workflow while you perform it and automatically produces a tutorial with written steps and highlighted screenshots. The same capture is rendered into multiple interactive modes so a learner can watch it, practice it in a simulated interface, or be tested on it without prompts, and it can be exported to SCORM for a learning management system.
How much does iorad cost?
The free tier is unlimited in volume but every tutorial is public and search-indexed. Individual is $200 per month for one creator and adds private tutorials, data masking, and audio. Team is $500 per month with one seat included and $50 per additional seat, adding branding, premium audio, SSO, and advanced analytics. Enterprise is quoted and adds live in-app guidance and translation past a hundred languages.
Why is iorad so much more expensive than Tango or Scribe?
Because it is training software rather than documentation software. Tango at $15 per seat and Scribe at $13 per seat on a five-seat team both capture and publish a guide very well, but neither produces a practice mode, a test that measures competence, or a SCORM package for an LMS. If you only need a readable document, iorad is bad value. If you need to certify that people can perform a process, nothing cheaper in this category does it at all.
Is the free plan actually usable?
For evaluation and for genuinely public content, yes: it is unlimited in tutorials, learners, and capture, with the interactive modes included and no credit card required. For real internal work, no, because everything published on free is public and indexed by search engines. Any tutorial that shows an internal admin screen, a customer record, or an unreleased feature needs the $200 Individual tier at minimum.
Do I need a developer to install iorad or to publish a tutorial?
No for both, in the normal case. Capture is a browser extension or desktop app, and publishing is a link, an embed, or a direct push into Zendesk, Salesforce, Slack, or Confluence. The one exception is Enterprise live in-app guidance, which prompts learners over the real application and requires deploying a widget or extension to the audience, and that is a rollout task rather than a code change.
What happens to a tutorial when the software it documents changes?
Nothing automatic, as with everything else in this category. iorad gives you drafts and version history, so you can rebuild a tutorial safely without disturbing the published version and roll back if an edit goes wrong, but it will not tell you a screen has changed and it has no way to swap a single screenshot. Across this category, Supademo handles staleness best with targeted screenshot replacement, and Guidde handles it worst because a narrated video has to be reshot; iorad sits between them.
Can iorad replace an in-app onboarding platform like Userpilot or UserGuiding?
Not below the Enterprise tier, and not fully even there. iorad has no user segmentation, no event-triggered checklists, no flow A/B testing, and no product analytics, so it cannot decide that a user on a particular plan who has not completed a particular action should see a particular tour. Live in-app guidance on Enterprise gets you prompts over the real application, but the targeting intelligence that defines a digital adoption platform is not there.
How does iorad protect sensitive data in captures?
Data masking permanently alters the captured screen rather than drawing a box over it, which is a stronger control than the overlay blur most competitors use, because there is no underlying image left to recover. Masking requires a paid tier. Tutorial privacy has four settings, from public and search-indexed down to invite-only, and all of the private options are paid.
Does iorad support other languages?
Yes, and earlier than most competitors. Translation with matched text to speech in the target language is available on paid tiers rather than being reserved entirely for Enterprise, and Enterprise extends coverage past a hundred languages. This is a real advantage over Tango and Scribe, where translation is Enterprise only in both cases.
Is iorad a stable vendor?
Unusually so for this category. It was founded in 2012 by Sundeep Patel and Dipti Patel, is headquartered in Raleigh, has taken no disclosed outside funding, and reports more than thirty million learners over more than a decade of operation. Being bootstrapped means no investor pressure to reprice at renewal and no acquisition overhang, which is a real consideration in a segment where Hexus was acquired in 2026 and several competitors have been absorbed into larger platforms.
Editorial verdict
iorad is the only product in this category that produces training rather than documentation, and that is the entire case for paying $200 a month when Tango and Scribe do the capture part for a tenth of the cost. One recording becomes a watch mode, a practice mode, and a test that measures whether someone can actually do the job, plus a SCORM package for the learning management system you already run. Nothing else in this comparison set comes close on that axis, and the permanent data masking, early SSO, and translation availability are all quietly better than the cheaper alternatives. Buy it if you are an enablement or customer education function that has to prove competence. Do not buy it as a documentation tool, do not plan to live on the free tier since everything there is public, and do not expect it to replace an in-app onboarding platform, because the targeting intelligence that defines one is not present at any price.
Written by the SaaSTracker editorial team. Awards, when shown, are judged against the published criteria in our methodology.