A comparison through heuristic evaluation of two MOOC platforms:Coursera and Udemy

Abstract: In recent years thousands of people worldwide have been using Massive open on- line courses (MOOCs) for various reasons, including career development and change, continuing education, lifelong learning, and training. MOOCs are free online courses that anyone can enroll in and are an affordable and flexible way to learn new skills, develop professionally, and provide quality educational experience across the globe. Having an exemplary user interface will make users prefer most MOOC platforms, which inspired this study to know which MOOC platform has usability and better user experience by using the survey evaluation. The main objective of this study is to measure the usability components(effectiveness, efficiency, and overall user satisfaction level) to determine which MOOC platform, Coursera or Udemy, has a better user experience using the heuristic principles. A quantitative research method has been used in this paper, which focuses on sta- tistical, mathematical, and numerical analysis of data collected through surveys, questionnaires, and polls. In this paper, a questionnaire to determine user satis- faction through surveys has been developed. Usability has been evaluated for each MOOC platform (Coursera and Udemy) by calculating usability components. Sta- tistical methods like variance and standard deviations has been calculated using the survey results. Responses from the survey evaluation are collected and are graphically represented in bar graphs and pie charts. Respondent’s timings and statistical method results are presented in a tabular form. The satisfaction level is calculated and represented in a Likert scale format. The usability of two MOOC platforms (Coursera and Udemy) was measured by cal- culating usability components. Better user experience among Coursera and Udemy is measured using usability heuristic principles. This study concludes that effec- tiveness, efficiency, and satisfaction level while performing eight tasks given to the user is similar in both MOOC platforms (Coursera and Udemy). From the survey evaluation, the users preferred Udemy over Coursera.