Paatya

How to sell your courses online in India

From your first recorded lesson to enrolled, paying students: where to host, how to price, how to collect fees and how to keep students.

Last updated 16 October 2026

Selling a course online in India comes down to five decisions: where the course lives, how you structure it, what you charge, how you collect the money, and how you keep students coming back. This guide takes each in turn.

1. Choose where your course lives

You have two kinds of choice:

  • A marketplace lists your course among thousands of others. It brings some visitors, but the students belong to the marketplace, it sets or discounts your price, and it takes a share of every sale.
  • Your own academy — a site with your name and address, such as learn.yourname.in — where students sign in to you. You keep the student list and the relationship, and you set the price. You bring the students yourself, usually from people who already know you: your current batches, WhatsApp groups, YouTube or Instagram.

If you already have students, your own academy almost always pays better. Paatya is one way to run one: create an academy at yourname.paatya.net in a couple of minutes.

2. Record and structure the course

  • Break it into sections (weeks or units) and topics (one idea each). Short topics of 5–15 minutes get finished; hour-long ones get abandoned.
  • Put notes or a worksheet on each topic, so students have something to do after watching.
  • End each section with a short test. A pass mark tells students they're ready to move on, and tells you who isn't.
  • Record on your phone in a quiet room with a clip-on microphone. Sound matters more than video quality.

3. Price it

  • Start from what you charge for the same material face to face. A recorded course gives students less of your time, so it usually sells for less than a live batch.
  • Offer one paid course and one free sample lesson. A free lesson does more selling than any description.
  • Set an access period — for example 180 days — so the course has a natural deadline and you can sell a renewal.

4. Collect the fees

The simplest start is the one you already use: take payment by UPI or bank transfer, then enrol the student. On Paatya you add the student and enrol them in one step, and they get an email to set their password. You don't need a payment gateway on day one.

5. Keep your students

  • Watch progress: see who has stopped watching and message them.
  • Certificates on completion give students something to share on LinkedIn — which is free marketing for you.
  • A public page for your academy, with reviews and your faculty, turns a shared link into an enquiry.

What it costs to run

On Paatya there is no monthly subscription. You pay for the students active each month and for video storage and streaming, from a prepaid balance starting at ₹1,000. See the pricing page for the live rates and a calculator.