The Individual

You can look at an individual learner’s transcript. The transcript shows you what material the learner’s worked through so far and, if the LMS is gamified, how many points or badges they’ve earned. The learner can check this out, too. It’s helpful for the learner to look back and see what material they’ve finished before deciding what to work on next.

The Course

A course report shows you how many people have completed the material, and how much more those who haven’t finished it has to do. And if there’s a test, you can take a look at how learners are doing and tweak the test or the course if you don’t like what you see.

System-Wide

The system-wide view gives you a sense of how engaged learners are with the system. It’ll show you how many people have logged in over a given timeframe and how they’ve interacted with the system. You know, how much content they’ve finished and how active the learners are on the social side of things. It sounds a bit fluffy, but those are some of the most important analytics in an LMS—if people aren’t engaged they aren’t going to learn!
Reports and analytics give you a cut-and-dry sense of the system. But if you know what you’re looking for, those figures can tell a deeper story.
If you keep an eye on those system-wide numbers and how they change as new material goes out, for instance, you can get a sense of what resonates the most with your learners. It teaches you how to get more out of your system.