Exporting a course from MOODLE to the CANVAS LMS

Migrating Courses from Moodle to Canvas: A Step-by-Step Guide

Hello everyone! Chris Richter from ricoshae.com here.

Welcome back! Today, we’re diving into something a little different: Canvas — another Learning Management System (LMS) that’s becoming increasingly popular. I recently had a project where I was asked to export over 40 courses from Moodle into Canvas, and I wanted to share what I learned with you.

In this blog, I’ll walk you through:

  • What Canvas is
  • How to import a Moodle course into Canvas
  • Common challenges and tips based on my experience

Let’s get into it!

What is Canvas?

Canvas is an LMS developed by Instructure. Much like Moodle, Canvas offers an open-source version you can install yourself. Alternatively, you can set up a free account through Canvas Cloud if you just want to explore without hosting it yourself.

Canvas is a great LMS, but like any platform, it comes with its pros and cons. Knowing both is important before making the switch.

Can You Import a Moodle Course into Canvas?

Yes, you can!
And here’s how I did it:

1. Export the Course from Moodle

First, I selected a course called Practice Course One. It included pages, tasks, quizzes, and an assignment.

  • Go to More > Course Reuse in Moodle.
  • Choose the Backup option.
  • Exclude enrolled users (you don’t want user data, just course content).
  • Complete the backup and download the .mbz file.

2. Set Up a New Course in Canvas

  • Log in to Canvas and create a new course (I named mine Demo One).
  • Choose Import Course Content.
  • Select Moodle 1.9/2.x as the content type.
  • Upload your Moodle backup file.

3. Import Settings

  • Create a default question bank (important for quizzes).
  • Select All Content to bring over everything.
  • Start the import.

Canvas will upload and process the backup, and notify you if there are any immediate issues.

Validating and Fixing Content

Very important step:
After the import, go to Settings > Validate Links in Content.

This tool checks for broken links. In my case, Moodle had internal links (like a link to another Moodle course) that naturally broke during the import into Canvas. You’ll want to fix or remove any broken links found.

What Transfers Well and What Doesn’t

Here’s what I observed:

✅ Pages, Assignments, and Forum posts came through just fine.
✅ Bootstrap-based layout elements mostly transferred.
✅ Embedded videos (YouTube, Vimeo, etc.) worked without any issues.

However…

❌ Font Awesome icons did not transfer.
❌ Some Bootstrap components (like certain cards and borders) didn’t fully render.
❌ Quiz structures came through, but questions were only saved to the question bank — they didn’t populate inside the quizzes automatically.
❌ Completion tracking from Moodle didn’t carry over in the same way into Canvas.

A Special Note on Quizzes:

You will need to manually add quiz questions back into the quizzes after import. Luckily, you don’t have to retype them — just pull them from the question bank you set up during the import.

Annoying? A little.
Manageable? Definitely.

Student View

Once everything is cleaned up, you can check Student View to make sure:

  • Pages display properly.
  • Quizzes and assignments are accessible.
  • Videos and other embedded elements (except CodePen embeds — which don’t fully work) appear correctly.

Final Thoughts

Moving courses from Moodle to Canvas is mostly painless, but it’s not completely “set and forget.” You’ll need to:

  • Validate all links
  • Rebuild quizzes
  • Adjust formatting where necessary

Overall, Canvas does a great job importing Moodle content, but be prepared for some manual cleanup, especially around quizzes and formatting nuances.

I hope this guide helps make your Moodle-to-Canvas migration easier! If you found this helpful, stay tuned for more tutorials coming soon.

Thanks for reading,
Chris Richter