If you've ever commissioned an online course, you've probably been asked which standard it should be published in. SCORM, xAPI, and cmi5 are the three names you'll hear most often. They all define how an eLearning course communicates with a learning management system (LMS), but they differ in what they can track and where learning can happen.
SCORM (Sharable Content Object Reference Model) is the long-standing industry workhorse. A SCORM course is packaged as a zip file, uploaded to an LMS, and launched inside the browser. It reliably reports completion, pass or fail status, scores, and time spent, and it lets learners resume where they left off. Almost every LMS on the market supports SCORM 1.2 or SCORM 2004, which makes it the safest choice when compatibility matters most.
The limitation of SCORM is scope. It only tracks what happens inside a course launched from the LMS, and it needs an active browser session to do so. Mobile apps, offline learning, simulations, on-the-job activities, and informal learning sit outside its reach.
xAPI (Experience API, sometimes called Tin Can) was designed to solve that. Instead of reporting a handful of fixed fields, xAPI records learning experiences as simple statements — for example, 'Priya completed the fire safety simulation' or 'Rahul watched the onboarding video'. These statements are stored in a Learning Record Store (LRS) and can come from almost anywhere: courses, apps, games, virtual classrooms, or even real-world activities. This gives L&D teams much richer data, but it requires an LRS and a bit more planning around what you actually want to measure.
cmi5 bridges the two. It is a profile of xAPI that adds clear rules for how courses are launched, registered, and marked complete from an LMS — the structure people liked about SCORM, combined with the flexibility and modern tracking of xAPI. It's an excellent option for organisations that want future-ready content but still manage training through a central LMS.
So which should you choose? If you need maximum compatibility with an existing LMS and standard completion tracking, SCORM is still a great fit. If you want detailed insight into learning across many platforms, devices, and activities, xAPI is the way to go. If you want modern tracking with LMS-friendly launching and reporting, consider cmi5 — as long as your platform supports it.
At Codemarine Technologies, we build Articulate Storyline 360 and custom HTML5 courses published to SCORM 1.2, SCORM 2004, xAPI, and cmi5, and we test every package on your target LMS before delivery. Not sure which standard your project needs? Talk to our eLearning team and we'll help you decide.