Tutor LMS
Course Recommendations
Automatically shows students a recommendation popup when they complete a course — pointing them to what to study next, with an optional WooCommerce coupon to incentivize enrollment.
Overview
Tutor LMS Course Recommendations automatically shows students a recommendation popup the moment they complete a course. Admins configure a recommended next course and an optional WooCommerce coupon on each course — and the rest is handled automatically. The popup fires on completion, shows the course thumbnail, title, excerpt, and a View Course button, with no student action required to trigger it.
The plugin supports both the modern Tutor LMS Course Builder and the legacy WordPress post editor, so it works regardless of which editing workflow your site uses.
What it does
- Adds a recommendation configuration panel to every course in both the Course Builder and the classic WordPress editor
- When a student completes a course, a popup appears showing the recommended next course with its thumbnail, title, excerpt, and a View Course button
- Optionally displays a WooCommerce coupon code and description in the popup to incentivize enrollment in the recommended course
- Popup triggers automatically — zero student action required after the initial completion
- Works on both course pages and lesson pages within the same course
- Recommendation data is served via a secure AJAX endpoint, validated server-side before anything is sent to the browser
WooCommerce is entirely optional. If WooCommerce is not active, all recommendation features work normally — only the coupon code fields are hidden.
Requirements
| Requirement | Details |
|---|---|
| WordPress | 5.8 or higher |
| PHP | 7.4 or higher |
| Tutor LMS | Any current version (Free or Pro) |
| WooCommerce | Optional — required only for coupon code features |
| User role | Administrator access required to configure recommendations |
If Tutor LMS is not installed and activated, WordPress will automatically deactivate the plugin on activation and display an error message. PHP 7.4 or higher is also enforced at activation time.
Installation
Upload and activate
- Log in to your WordPress admin dashboard
- Navigate to Plugins → Add New → Upload Plugin
- Select the plugin ZIP file, click Install Now, then Activate Plugin
Activate your license
After activation, navigate to the License Management page. Its location depends on which other Ksajie plugins are installed:
- If the Ksajie hub is present: Ksajie → TCR License
- If Tutor LMS is active but no Ksajie hub: Tutor → TCR License
- If neither is present: Settings → TCR License
Enter your license key and click Activate License. The plugin will not function until a valid license is active.
Configure your first recommendation
Open any published course in the Tutor LMS Course Builder or the classic WordPress editor, enable the recommendation, select a target course and optionally a coupon, then save. The popup will fire automatically the next time a student completes that course.
Configuring a Course Recommendation
Each course is configured independently. The same three fields are available in both the Course Builder and the classic editor — they save to the same underlying course settings.
| Field | Description |
|---|---|
| Enable Course Recommendation | Checkbox. When checked, the Recommended Course and Coupon Code fields appear below it. |
| Recommended Course | Dropdown listing all published courses. Select the course to recommend when this course is completed. |
| Coupon Code (Optional) | Dropdown listing all published WooCommerce coupons. Only shown if WooCommerce is active and at least one coupon exists. |
If the Enable Course Recommendation checkbox is unchecked when the course is saved, the recommended course and coupon settings are deleted. If recommendation is enabled but no course is selected, no popup will show on completion.
Using the Tutor LMS Course Builder
When editing a course in the Tutor LMS Course Builder (version 3.3.0 or higher), the three recommendation fields appear in the Basic settings panel after the course description. The Recommended Course and Coupon Code fields are hidden until the Enable checkbox is checked. Save the course using the Course Builder’s standard Save button.
Requires Tutor LMS Course Builder v3.3.0+. Older versions do not support the field registration API used by this plugin. If you are using an older version, use the Classic Editor method below.
Using the Classic WordPress Editor
When editing a course via the classic WordPress editor (not the Course Builder), a Course Recommendation meta box appears in the right sidebar. It contains the same three fields. Check Enable course recommendation, select the Recommended Course from the dropdown, optionally select a Coupon Code, and click Update to save.
Both interfaces save to identical post meta keys, so switching between editors at any point will carry your settings across correctly.
The Recommendation Popup
The popup appears automatically when a student completes a course — no student action is required to trigger it. Here is the exact sequence of events:
showPopup: true flag is passed to the page’s JavaScript. The popup can only show once.
Popup preview
Here is an example of what the popup looks like when a coupon is configured:
Congratulations!
Ready for your next learning adventure?
Closing the popup
Students can dismiss the popup in any of these ways: clicking the ✕ button in the top-right corner, clicking Maybe Later, clicking anywhere on the overlay background outside the popup, or pressing the Escape key. Body scroll is locked while the popup is open.
The popup only fires once per completion. The transient is consumed on first read and deleted immediately — revisiting the lesson page afterwards will not show the popup again.
WooCommerce Coupon Integration
When WooCommerce is active, an optional coupon can be attached to each course recommendation. The coupon code and its WooCommerce description are both displayed in the popup to give students a clear incentive to enroll in the recommended course.
Selecting a coupon
In the recommendation configuration fields (both Course Builder and classic editor), a Coupon Code dropdown lists all published WooCommerce coupons by their coupon code. Select one to attach it to this course’s recommendation. Leaving it blank is perfectly fine — the coupon section simply won’t appear in the popup.
How coupons appear in the popup
When the AJAX endpoint builds its response, it looks up the selected coupon and retrieves its description from WooCommerce. Both the coupon code and the description are included in the response. In the popup, the coupon code is displayed in bold under a “Use Coupon:” label, with the WooCommerce coupon description shown as supplementary text below it. The coupon section is only visible if a coupon was configured — it is hidden entirely otherwise.
Without WooCommerce
If WooCommerce is not active, the coupon dropdown is not shown in either editor. Any previously stored coupon value is ignored and the coupon section will not appear in the popup. All other recommendation functionality works exactly the same.
Frequently Asked Questions
Troubleshooting
Work through the steps below before contacting support. Most issues fall into one of these categories.
- Confirm the license is active on the License Management page
- Open the course in the editor and verify that Enable Course Recommendation is checked and a Recommended Course is selected
- Confirm the recommended course is published — draft or private courses are not returned by the AJAX endpoint
- Confirm the student is on a Tutor LMS course or lesson page when they complete — the popup scripts are only loaded on those page types
- Check the browser console for JavaScript errors that might prevent popup.js from running
- Temporarily deactivate other plugins to check for conflicts
The fields require Tutor LMS Course Builder version 3.3.0 or higher. If you meet that requirement:
- Check the browser console for
[TCR] Failed to initializemessages — this means the Course Builder’s JavaScript API was not available within the 5-second initialization window - Try refreshing the Course Builder page — the script retries 50 times at 100ms intervals
- If the issue persists, use the classic WordPress editor as a fallback — it provides the same configuration options
- Confirm WooCommerce is active — the coupon section is completely hidden if WooCommerce is not detected
- Confirm the selected coupon is still published in WooCommerce — trashed or expired coupons will not be returned
- Confirm the coupon code was saved correctly by re-opening the course in the editor and checking the Coupon Code field
This indicates the AJAX request is either failing or being blocked. Check:
- Open the browser Network tab and look for a request to
admin-ajax.phpwith the actiontcr_get_recommendation— check its response for an error message - Confirm the recommended course is published and has not been deleted
- Confirm no security plugin or server firewall is blocking AJAX requests to
admin-ajax.php
Support
Need help? Visit the support portal
If you’re experiencing an issue not covered in this documentation or the troubleshooting section, submit a support request through the portal. Please include the details below to help resolve your issue as quickly as possible.
Open Support Portal →