The market for AI-assisted lesson planning has grown considerably over the past two years. New tools have launched, existing tools have added AI features, and a growing number of teachers are using some form of AI in their planning workflow. Navigating the options is harder than it used to be.
This is an honest roundup — not sponsored, not a definitive ranking, but a practical guide to what's available and who each tool suits.
ScholaPlan
Best for: Teachers who want AI generation integrated with timetable management and a teaching diary. Particularly strong for international schools and non-English-speaking teachers.
ScholaPlan is a purpose-built lesson planning platform: teaching diary, timetable scheduler, reusable unit library, and AI generation in one place. The AI generates complete lesson structures — objectives, starter, main activity, differentiation, plenary, homework — tailored to your class profile. Supports 32 languages.
Pricing: £15/year (~$19/year). 30-day free trial, no credit card required. Substantially cheaper than most alternatives.
Limitations: AI generation uses a credit system. The interface is clean but not the most visual tool in the market.
MagicSchool AI
Best for: Teachers who want a wide range of AI tools beyond lesson planning — rubrics, parent emails, IEPs, and more.
MagicSchool offers over 60 AI tools for teachers, of which lesson planning is one. The breadth is impressive; the depth on any individual tool is lower than a specialist platform. Useful if you want to use AI for multiple admin tasks, less useful if lesson planning is your primary need.
Pricing: Free tier with limited usage; paid plans around $10/month.
Curipod
Best for: Teachers who want AI-generated interactive presentations and student-response activities rather than lesson plans as documents.
Curipod generates interactive slide decks with built-in student response features — polls, word clouds, open-ended questions. It's less a lesson planning tool and more an interactive presentation tool with AI generation. Excellent for the activity delivery side; doesn't help with the wider planning structure.
Pricing: Free tier available; premium plans for more features.
Planboard
Best for: Teachers who want a clean digital lesson planner with curriculum mapping and standards alignment.
Planboard is a well-established digital planning tool focused on curriculum mapping and standards alignment. It's strong on the organisational side — linking lessons to standards, tracking coverage — but lighter on AI generation than newer tools. Good fit for schools with strong standards-alignment requirements.
Pricing: Free for individuals; institutional pricing for schools.
ChatGPT / Claude (general AI)
Best for: Teachers who are confident with prompting and want maximum flexibility without paying for a specialist tool.
A well-prompted general AI tool produces surprisingly good lesson plans. The workflow — open a chat, describe your class, ask for a lesson plan — is accessible and flexible. The trade-off is no persistent storage, no timetable integration, no unit library, and the need to know what to ask for. For a confident teacher planning occasional lessons, this is viable. For systematic weekly planning across multiple classes, it's limited.
How to choose
The right tool depends on what you're trying to solve:
- If your main problem is planning time across a full timetable: ScholaPlan or a similar integrated platform
- If your main problem is interactive activity creation: Curipod
- If your main problem is curriculum mapping and standards alignment: Planboard
- If you want AI for a wide range of teacher tasks beyond planning: MagicSchool
- If you want flexibility and already know how to prompt AI: ChatGPT or Claude directly
Most tools offer free trials. The best approach is to try two or three with a real planning task — a lesson you'd actually teach — and see which one fits your workflow.
Try ScholaPlan free for 30 days
AI-generated lesson plans for any subject, any year group. No credit card required.