Screencastify vs. Loom: Which Is Better for Teachers? Education is a dynamic field, and blended learning, flipped classrooms, and remote instruction are all more popular than ever. And just like students need appropriate tools to learn, teachers need high-quality screen recording tools to succeed. Teachers use screen recording tools to improve educational video courses, give feedback, explain advanced concepts, and communicate with students. Scrrecastify and Loom are two of the most popular and efficient tools. However, which one of them is better for teachers who have to deal with the demands of the classroom? This comparison will examine both options and help you choose the one that best meets your educational needs. .
The Power of Video in Education
Now that we have established the potential of screen recording let’s briefly go over just why it has been such a paradigm shift for educators:
* Engagement: Unlike static content videos are more engaging and, as such, will bring the needed attention to the educational message.
* Differentiation: cater to different styles and the pace of learning. Students are able to pause, rewind, or unexpectedly rewatch video explanations or instructions.
* Feedback: video assignments will provide more detailed and connected to the student reality observations then text comments.
* Flipping the classroom: Video lectures are a way to save precious lesson time for interaction and other extremely important activities.
* Accessibility: if video materials of the lesson are available students that are temporarily unavailable due to illness or traveling can catch up.
* Demonstrations: Some subjects are outright worthy of video explanation since procedures like mathematical problem resolution or software usage need step-by-step instruction.
Back to the topic, we can now compare Screencastify to Loom.
Screencastify: The Google Classroom Companion
- Similarly to Loom, Screencastify is a Chrome extension, although it is extremely popular in the educational field, mainly due to tightly embedded functionality within the Google ecosystem. The key features that school teachers can benefit from are “recordings saved in Google Drive,” “easily shared directly to Google Classroom,” “record offline,” user-friendly interface, ability to “edit video recordings with Trim, Crop, and Annotate. “draw on screen, highlighting clicks, add intro/outro overlays, interactive questions, and other features”. The rest functions do not seem to be relevant to this activity. Finally, “Screencastify is COPPA, FERPA, and SOPPA certified”.
Pros for Teachers:
- Seamless Google Integration: Unbeatable for schools and districts already heavily invested in Google Workspace and Google Classroom.
- Offline Capability: Ensures uninterrupted recording even without an internet connection.
- Ease of Use: Low learning curve, making it quick for teachers and students to get started.
- Interactive Features: Embedding questions directly into videos enhances learning.
- Student Submissions: The “Submit” feature allows teachers to easily collect video assignments from students.
- Ad-Free Experience: Provides a clean, focused learning environment.
- Education-Specific Pricing: Offers special pricing for educators and schools.
Cons for Teachers:
- Chrome Extension Dependent: Primarily functions as a Chrome extension, meaning it’s less versatile for recording outside the Chrome browser or on mobile devices (though it works well on Chromebooks).
- Limited Free Plan: The free plan has significant limitations (e.g., 10 videos, 30-minute max per video, 10GB storage), requiring an upgrade for more extensive use.
- Basic Editing: While functional, the editing tools are not as robust as dedicated video editing software.
Loom: The Versatile Communication Powerhouse
Loom has been widely used in all domains for its fast video messaging and focus on asynchronous communication. Some of the key features for teachers include: cross-platform compatibility; instant sharing; viewer analytics; emoji reactions and comments on videos; basic editing and screening; AI features while using Loom’s premium plan, such as automatic titles, summaries, chapters, filler word removal; customizable CTAs while using Loom’s premium plan for adding call-to-action buttons. Loom is available as a Chrome extension and desktop and mobile apps for Mac and Windows, and iOs and Android, which makes it highly convenient to record from various devices. All videos are instantly uploaded to Loom Cloud, generating a link that you can share via email, instant message or messenger, or embed in your web page. Additionally, Loom provides you with valuable audience insights on whom watched your video and for how long. Student reactions with emojis and comments on videos are timestamped and ensure feedback. The recording can be trimmed as well, edit or remove filler words, add them. Loom is increasingly integrating AI features such as automatic titles, summaries, chapters, and filler words, removal, making videos easier to find and consume. Customizable CTAs helps add call-to-action buttons that link viewers to an external URL or an assignment. Free for Educators: Loom’s free plan is more than adequate for teachers and verified educators, including unlimited recordings and access to a wide range of premium features.
Pros for Teachers:
- Highly versatile: it can be used on different devices running on diverse platforms, making it useful for teachers regardless of their jobs.
- Sharing is fast and straightforward: As a consequence, sharing links is a quick and efficient way to make announcements, give responses, or share portions of a class or lecture.
- Engagement is tracked: Viewer insights help track how much your students are or are not participating.
- Mobile App: Allows for on-the-go recording and viewing.
- Generous Free Education Plan: Offers significant features for free to qualified educators, including unlimited recordings and storage.
- AI Enhancements: Growing AI capabilities can save time and improve video quality.
Cons for Teachers:
- Fourth, it requires the Internet for recording. Loom still does not support offline recording, while Screencastify would be able to upload your video in a saved state and start processing and uploading it later.
- Video is stored in the cloud and free accounts should keep in mind that there may be limits to video file storage and that frequent recording may require an upgrade to a paid plan.
- It is less integrated with Google Classroom links can be shared in Google Classroom, but the integration is less seamless, and this is one area where Screencastify clearly wins.
- Additionally, the editing options can be limited. There is a basic editor in place, but for more difficult video production, you may need to invest in an external one.
Which is Better for You?
- The “better” tool is ultimately determined by your teaching context, existing technology ecosystem, and individual preferences. Use Screencastify if: – You are deeply embedded in Google Workspace and Google Classroom. If your whole teaching stack is already in Google – its native integrations will save you an immense amount of time. – You find yourself working offline or in low-internet environments. The offline recording feature is a huge game-changer. – You want a simple, no-frills tool for in-browser screen recording. – You appreciate the interactive questions you can embed right into your lessons. – Your students are almost exclusively on Chromebooks Use Loom if: – You need a tool that works on most devices desktop, mobile and across operating systems – You prefer fast, asynchronous video communication for feedback, announcements, or short lessons – You want to know who is watching your content and for how long – You want the ability for students to leave timestamped comments and emoji reactions – For every verified educator, Loom offers its education plan for free, with unlimited recordings – You are interested in what AI can bring to optimizing your video creation.
Conclusion
In conclusion, it is clear that both Screencastify and Loom are excellent tools that can greatly benefit teaching and learning. Screencastify is best suited for teachers who use Google as their central suite of technology tools due to its exceptional Google integration and offline capabilities. Meanwhile, Loom is perfect for those looking to create fast, easily shareable video messages across a wide variety of platforms with the use of engagement insights, After all, many teachers opt to use both in their practice, with Screencastify being used for more organised teaching moments such as sending out lessons or assignments organised in Google Classroom. Loom comes in handy when teachers need to send out a quick personalised video with some feedback, to make a quick announcement, or for communication that does not happen in the primary LMS. I believe that educators who are reading my article should experiment with both, especially since each application has a free education tier, and see which one is more compatible with their teaching style and the needs of their students.
