If a learner tells you they've completed activities but their progress bar isn't moving — or their course shows incomplete when it shouldn't — there are a few things to check. 🔍
Most cases come down to one of three things: the completion criteria, a specific activity that isn't tracking, or a browser issue on the learner's end.
Step 1 — Check the completion criteria
Go to Studio → Courses → [Course name] → Settings → Completion criteria and confirm what's required for the course to register as complete.
All activities completed means every activity in the course must be finished.
Specific activities means only the selected ones count — everything else is ignored.
Quiz passed means the learner must reach the pass score, regardless of whether they've watched all the content.
If the criteria are set more strictly than expected, that's usually the culprit.
💡 If the course uses Static or Manual Approval completion criteria, there is also a Static progress toggle. When enabled, learners who have already completed the course will have their progress locked at 100% — even if new content is added later. This only affects learners with a Completed status and does not impact learners still in progress. See Completion Criteria for details.
Step 2 — Locate the incomplete activity
Go to Studio → Courses → [Course name] and open the Progress tab. Find the learner to see a breakdown of each page and whether it has been completed. This lets you pinpoint exactly where the learner got stuck and point them to the right place.
Common reasons an activity doesn't register as complete:
Video: The learner didn't watch to the required minimum percentage. Check if a minimum watch time is set on the video activity.
PDF/Document: The learner may have opened but not scrolled through enough of the document — or the activity may require an explicit Mark as complete click.
SCORM: The file may not be reporting completion back to Learnster. See SCORM Troubleshooting.
Quiz: The learner didn't reach the pass score, or didn't submit their final attempt.
Step 3 — Ask the learner to do a hard refresh
Sometimes progress is tracked correctly in the backend but the learner's browser is showing a cached view. Ask them to press Ctrl + Shift + R (Windows) or Cmd + Shift + R (Mac) to force a refresh, then check again.
Step 4 — Manually update progress (if appropriate)
If you've confirmed the learner genuinely completed the activity but progress still isn't registering, you can manually mark the course as complete from the learner's profile.
Go to Studio → Users → [Learner] → Courses, find the course, and use the Mark as complete option.
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