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Original Course View End of Life

Institutions will no longer be able to use the Original Course View for active teaching and learning after December 31, 2026. All courses and organizations will be required to use the Ultra Course View starting January 1, 2027.

Original Course View end of life timeline

Date

What happens

August 6, 2026

Blackboard LMS displays messages in courses and organizations for non-student roles, informing users that the Original Course View will no longer be supported after December 31, 2026:

  • Course message: This course is using the Original Course View, which will no longer be supported after December 31, 2026. On January 1, 2027, Original Course View courses will automatically be marked Complete and become read-only.

  • Organization message: This organization is using the Original Organization View, which will no longer be supported after December 31, 2026. On January 1, 2027, Original Organization View organizations will automatically be marked Complete and become read-only.

December 31, 2026

This is the final day to make changes to courses or organizations using the Original Course View.

January 1, 2027

All Original Course View courses and organizations are marked Complete:

  • Changes are no longer possible. Instructors cannot grade, and students cannot participate or make submissions.

  • Courses and organizations are put into read-only mode so users can still access data.

  • Reports and downloads are still possible; users just can't make changes to courses and organizations once marked Complete.

  • Courses and organizations can be Open or Closed when marked Complete. They cannot be unmarked Complete or used again for teaching and learning.

  • Courses and organizations imported or restored using the Original Course View are automatically marked Complete.

  • Course copies of an Original course initiated by a SIS integration will create an new Original course that is read-only and marked Complete.

Original Course View courses and organizations are no longer accessible in the Blackboard LMS App.

All teaching and learning must take place within Ultra courses and organizations.

Creating new courses and organizations using the Original Course View is no longer possible.

These changes will take place across all environments, test/stage and production, at the same time.

January 1, 2028

All Original Course View courses and organizations are converted to Ultra.

  • Our goal is to retain as much instructional history as possible, including items such as submissions, grades, feedback, attempts, and other learner data across supported content types. Throughout 2026 and 2027, we will expand the types of course data that can be preserved during conversion. This work will be delivered incrementally as support is added for additional objects, including areas such as Assignments, Discussions, Journals, Tests, SCORM packages, Gradebook columns, Rubrics, and more.

Courses and organizations imported or restored using the Original Course View are automatically converted to Ultra.

A Playback Environment is available for institutions that need to restore Original Course View courses in their original format, for circumstances such as grade disputes. More information about the Playback Environment will be available as we get closer to 2028.