Enroll students in Learndash courses with new successful payments on Paddle

When a Paddle payment succeeds, FlowMattic finds the buyer’s WordPress account by email and enrolls that user into a LearnDash course, for students who already have a login on your site.

Paddle

WordPress

LearnDash

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3 steps Setup ~5 min Used on 3.1k sites Free to import

The Enroll students in Learndash courses with new successful payments on Paddle workflow on the FlowMattic canvas, with 3 steps across Paddle, WordPress, LearnDash — The workflow as it appears in the builder after import. Each step opens for editing.

What this workflow does

If you sell course access through Paddle checkout but host the course in LearnDash, someone has to connect each payment to a student account. This workflow does it for students who already have a WordPress login: it looks them up by the email they paid with and gives them the course.

The Paddle Payment Success trigger fires when a payment is successful. FlowMattic passes the payment data on. Run a test payment to confirm where the buyer's email appears in it.

The WordPress Get User by Email step then looks up a user profile by email. It ships unmapped, so after import you map the buyer's email from the Paddle payment into it. The LearnDash Enroll Into Course step is already wired to the user ID that lookup returns; you choose the course after import.

The lookup only finds accounts that exist. A buyer with no WordPress account, or who paid with a different email from the one on their account, gives the LearnDash step no user to enroll. If new customers buy through Paddle, see the tips for a step that creates the account instead. Open Task History to see the user each lookup found, if any.

Upgrades for registered members

A membership site where people register for free first sells a premium LearnDash course through Paddle. Paying members are found by email and enrolled.

Course add-ons for existing students

A software academy's students already have accounts from an earlier course. When they buy an advanced module with Paddle, the workflow enrolls their account.

Paddle for international pricing

A course creator uses Paddle to handle tax and currencies for logged-in students buying from abroad, while LearnDash keeps hosting the lessons.

How this workflow runs

What happens at each step once the workflow is on, and what you need before you import it.

Step 1Trigger
Paddle Payment Success
Starts the workflow whenever Paddle reports a successful payment. The payment details, including the buyer's information Paddle sends, are passed to the next steps.
Step 2Action
WordPress Get User by Email
Looks up a WordPress user profile by email. The template leaves it unmapped, so map the buyer's email from the Paddle payment. It only finds accounts already registered with that address.
Step 3Action
LearnDash Enroll Into Course
Enrolls the user found in the previous step into a LearnDash course. The user ID is preset from the lookup; choose the course after import and test with a known student's email.

What you need

FlowMatticCore
Paddle AccountAccount
LearnDash PluginPlugin

After importing, map your own data. To keep the template universal, not every step is pre-filled. Open each step in the builder and connect your accounts and fields (channels, lists, sheets, recipients) before you switch the workflow on.

Make it yours

Changes worth making after you import it.

If buyers may not have an account yet, replace Get User by Email with WordPress's New User step and map the Paddle email into it. For an email that's already registered, it returns that account's user ID instead of making a new one. Remap the LearnDash user ID to it.
Tell students on the checkout page to pay with the email address they use to log in, since the lookup matches on that exact address.
If you sell more than one product through Paddle, put a Filter between the Payment Success trigger and the Get User by Email step that continues only for this course's product.

Questions about this workflow

Does this enroll Paddle buyers who don't have a WordPress account?

No. Get User by Email only finds existing users, so a buyer without an account gives the LearnDash step no user ID. Swap in the WordPress New User step if new customers buy this way.

Which LearnDash course does a Paddle payment give access to?

The course you choose in the Enroll Into Course step. Only the user ID is set in the template, so every successful payment enrolls into that one course. For several courses, make one copy of the workflow per course, each with its own product check.

Do Paddle subscription renewals enroll students too?

This workflow uses Payment Success. Paddle's subscription events, such as Subscription Payment Success, are separate triggers. Run a test renewal and check Task History to see which events reach this workflow.