Release Date

Production Data Center Upgrade Schedule

July 10, 2025

North America, Central America, South America (Virginia, USA datacenter): Clients will be upgraded according to their timezone:

• Eastern, Amazon, and Newfoundland-Labrador Timezones: July 10, 2025, at 12:30 AM - 6:30 AM EDT

• Central Timezone: July 10, 2025, at 12:30 AM - 6:30 AM CDT

• Mountain and Pacific Timezones: July 10, 2025, at 12:30 AM - 6:30 AM PDT

• South America (Sao Paulo, Brazil datacenter): July 10, 2025, at 12:30 AM - 6:30 AM BRT

• EMEA (Frankfurt data center): July 10, 2025, at 12:30 AM - 6:30 AM CEST

• APAC excluding Australia and New Zealand (Singapore datacenter): July 10, 2025, at 12:30 AM - 6:30 AM SGT

• Australia and New Zealand (Sydney, AU datacenter): July 10, 2025, at 12:30 AM - 6:30 AM AEST

 

Non-Production Sites Upgrade Schedule

We will upgrade non-production (sandbox) sites on Thursday, June 12, 2025, between 9:00 AM - 5:00 PM EDT.

Non-production upgrades occur during North American business hours to improve the quality of the upgrade process and shorten the production upgrade window. 

Downtime will be required for your production and non-production sites during this window.

 

 

Major Features

Upgrade to Core 4.5.4

As part of this release, the team reviewed the code of 4.5.4 and upgraded the underlying systems, adding the corresponding fixes, improvements, and security patches.

Release Notes

For the full releases notes from https://moodledev.io, please see:

4.5 version

4.5 Release notes

4.5.1 Release notes

4.5.2 Release notes

4.5.3 Release notes

4.5.4 Release notes

 

Server requirements​

These are just the minimum supported versions. We recommend keeping all of your software and operating systems up-to-date.

• Moodle upgrade: Moodle 4.1.2 or later.

• PHP version: minimum PHP 8.1.0 Note: minimum PHP version has increased since Moodle 4.3. PHP 8.3.x is supported too. See PHP for details.

• PHP extension sodium is required. See Environment - PHP extension sodium.

• PHP setting max_input_vars must be >= 5000. For further details, see Environment - max input vars.

• PHP variants: Only 64-bit versions of PHP are supported. Note: Changed since 4.1.

Database requirements​

Moodle™ supports the following database servers. Again, version numbers are just the minimum supported version. We recommend running the latest stable version of any software.

Note that, since Moodle™ 4.3, the maximum length for the database prefix ($CFG->prefix) is 10 characters. Installation or upgrade won't be possible with longer prefixes.

Browser support​

Moodle™ is compatible with any standards compliant web browser. We regularly test Moodle™ with the following browsers:

Desktop:

• Chrome

• Firefox

• Safari

• Edge

Mobile:

• MobileSafari

• Google Chrome

For the best experience and optimum security, we recommend that you keep your browser up to date.

 

Moodle™ 4.5 highlights:

AI Subsystem

The AI subsystem is the foundation for integrating artificial intelligence tools into Moodle. Administrators can add AI providers to enable the following capabilities:

Text Generation

Users with the appropriate capability can generate text for course content.

Image Generation

Users with the appropriate capability can generate images for course content.

Summarisation

Users with the appropriate capability can request content summaries.

Admin Options

Administrators can configure and manage AI providers.

Subsections in Courses

New capabilities to organize content within course sections.

Add Subsections

If enabled by an administrator, teachers can create subsections when editing mode is on.

Organized Content

Expandable subsections help learners focus better and navigate more easily.

Assignment UI Improvements

Interface and grading improvements for assignments.

Key Actions at the Top

Essential actions are now accessible at the top of the page without the need to scroll.

Sticky Footer for Bulk Actions

A fixed footer provides quick access to bulk actions on the grading screen.

New Assignment Settings

Default Grade and Scale Types

Administrators can define default grade and scale types.

Grant Attempts Automatically

Teachers can configure automatic resubmission attempts.

Media Enhancements

Improvements in multimedia content creation.

Screen Recording in TinyMCE

A new option in the TinyMCE editor allows users to record their screen.

Share Screen Recordings

Recordings can be directly inserted into forums or other course areas from the editor.

New Notifications

Assignment Due Notifications

Students receive alerts for upcoming or overdue assignments.

Quiz Opening Notifications

Students receive notifications when a quiz is about to open.

Quiz Improvements

Disable 'Sticky' Defaults

Administrators can disable the automatic saving of previous question settings.

Regrade Selected Questions

Teachers can regrade specific questions in a quiz.

Question Bank Enhancements

Category Management

Modernized category management with drag-and-drop and inline editing.

Custom Reports Enhancements

Competencies as Data Source

Competencies can now be used as a data source in custom reports.

Timezone and Language in Reports

User reports can include timezone and language information.

Additional Improvements

Duplicate Badges

Courses can now include duplicate badges, with a smoother workflow.

Bulk Delete Cohorts

Administrators can now select and bulk delete cohorts.

 

Open LMS highlight for 4.5

Enhanced Course Cards on "My Courses" Page

We’ve updated the look and feel of the course cards on the My Courses page to align better with the Snap theme and provide a cleaner, more user-friendly experience. Key improvements include:

• Modernized design with rounded corners for a softer visual appearance.

• Progress bar indicator: A green progress bar now visually displays course completion instead of just a percentage number.

• Improved readability: Long course names and category names now display with ellipses and tooltips, maintaining consistent card sizes while preserving accessibility.

• Favoriting made easy: A star icon is now prominently displayed, allowing users to quickly mark favorite courses.

 

New feature: Open LMS Sessions (Instructor-led training).

We’re excited to share that the Open LMS Sessions feature is now enabled by default, allowing instructors and administrators to immediately explore and adopt it in their learning environments. This feature provides a comprehensive set of tools to support blended learning with scheduled, instructor-led sessions.

⚠️ Note: This feature is designed to replace the legacy Face-to-Face module. For clients currently using Face-to-Face, a migration tool is available to help convert existing Face-to-Face activities into Sessions activities with minimal effort.

Key Functionalities Available:

📅 Multiple Instances & Tracks

• Add multiple Sessions instances to a course

• Create several tracks within each instance

• Define multiple sessions/dates within each track

🏢 Capacity Management

• Control session and track capacity based on room/location availability

🔐 Roles & Permissions

• Support for context-aware custom fields (e.g. tenant-specific values)

• Role and permission control beyond site admins

• Enrollment validation for user assignment

✅ Completion & Attendance

• Define track-specific completion criteria

• Track attendance at session level

📬 User Registration & Notifications

• Send confirmation emails and calendar invites

• Configure notifications for bookings, track registrations, and sessions with rich-text support

📊 Report Sources

The Open Reports engine now supports six Sessions report sources:

• Sessions Activities

• Sessions Attendances

• Sessions Attendees

• Sessions Sessions

• Sessions Tracks

• Sessions Wait-list

These enhancements make Sessions a powerful and scalable solution for managing instructor-led training in Open LMS.

New Feature (Exploratory Phase): CJK Character Count Plugin for Assignment Submissions

We are introducing a new CJK Character Count plugin in an exploratory phase, designed to enhance the assignment submission process for online text entries. This plugin allows teachers to set a limit on the number of characters students can submit in Chinese, Japanese, and Korean (CJK).

Key Features:

• Counts characters from the three supported languages: Chinese, Japanese, and Korean.

• Includes punctuation and numbers in the count.

• Excludes spaces from the total character count.

• Custom character limit setting available.

How to Enable:

1. Navigate to the Assignments section.

2. Under Submission Types, select the Online text option.

3. Check the box labeled CJK Character Count.

4. A field will appear to set the desired character limit.

5. Ensure the Online text submission option is enabled, as the plugin works in conjunction with it.

Note: This feature is currently in an exploratory phase and may be subject to changes based on user feedback.

New Programs Layout and Improved Visualization

A new Programs layout has been introduced, offering users a more modern and visually engaging experience. This layout can be enabled by administrators via:

admin/settings.php?section=programssettings 

Simply select the "Grid layout" option to start using the new layout. Administrators can also choose to keep the traditional "Table layout", which remains available.

In the My Programs block, each program the user is enrolled in is now displayed as a card, featuring the program image in the header and key details such as start date, due date, end date, and a color-coded status (Open, Overdue, Completed, or Failed).

In the Program Details view, the courses or training elements of each program are also shown as cards. These cards display course images, completion progress, and points. Subsets of courses within a program are grouped and shown in the same card format. This is in addition to the program-level information like description, dates, and status.

These changes offer a more intuitive and visually appealing way for users to view and track their progress in programs and related courses.

 

New Payment Gateway: PayU Latam Now Available in Open LMS eCommerce

We’re excited to introduce PayU Latam as the newest payment gateway supported by the Open LMS eCommerce solution.

This addition brings greater flexibility to training providers across Latin America by enabling:

• Support for multiple local currencies

• Payment processing in more countries across the region

• A localized and seamless purchase experience for learners

By expanding our e-commerce capabilities, this update empowers users to more easily sell their training services and scale their reach regionally, all while continuing to use the robust tools offered by Open LMS.

 

New Plugins

Updated Plugins

Additional fixes and minor improvements.

Removal of the mdl_log Table in 4.5

As part of our ongoing efforts to optimize database performance and reduce unnecessary storage usage, we removed the mdl_log table in the Open LMS 4.5 upgrade. This table can be significantly large, and since there is no longer a scheduled task to delete old logs, it may consume excessive storage.

The mdl_log table stores logs for the legacy logstore, which has been deprecated and was removed from core Moodle in version 4.2. Open LMS has not logged any data to this table since EDU 4.3 Release.

 

Subsections in Snap Theme
The Subsections feature introduced by Moodle Core in version 4.5 is not yet fully supported in the Snap theme. While the content within a subsection is visible and accessible, it is currently displayed in the form of standard activity modules rather than using the visual structure of a subsection. Full support for this feature in Snap is planned for the 4.5 MP2 release.