# A Cohort-Based Course Platform Inside Your Community > Run a course, program or challenge as a group, week by week, inside your Vonza community. Give each cohort a start and an end, its own space and its courses, let members join automatically or add them yourself, and follow everyone’s progress from one page. ## Everything a cohort needs, set up in five steps Open Cohorts in your community and choose New cohort. Five quick steps give the group its dates, its own space, its courses and a rule for who joins, and you can change everything later. - **A five-step cohort wizard**: Name the cohort, pick a start and an end up to a year apart, choose its space, link a course, bundle or product from your Content board, then decide who joins. A live timeline under the steps shows the weeks and the join window as you go. - **A space of its own**: Create the cohort’s space from the built-in “Cohort course” template: a private space named after the cohort, with Announcements, Week 1–3 and Q&A rooms and a pinned welcome post. Or use a space you already have. Announce opens a post in that space. - **Every member’s progress, in one table**: The Members tab lists who is in the cohort, their progress on the linked courses, lessons completed, when they were last active and how they joined. Search it, add members, move them to another cohort, or export it as a CSV. ## Run a cohort inside your community A cohort-based learning platform built into the community you already run: the group, the dates, the space and the courses stay together, and so do the people. - **Name and dates**: A name of 3 to 80 characters, an optional description, and dates up to 366 days apart. New cohorts start today or later; the wizard suggests next Monday for six weeks. - **Linked courses**: Link courses, bundles and products from the Content board. Progress is measured on the linked courses and on the courses inside a linked bundle. - **Join in a window**: Everyone who joins the community between two dates you pick is added to the cohort automatically, and to its space. - **Join by plan**: New members who join on one of the plans you select, inside the join window, are added automatically. Sell a seat, and the buyer lands in the cohort. - **Add people yourself**: Choose I’ll add people myself and add members from the cohort page whenever you like. Adding by hand works with every rule. - **Existing members included**: When you create the cohort, members who already joined inside a join window that has begun are added right away, up to 200 of them. - **Up to 1,000 members**: Each cohort holds up to 1,000 members, with search, add, move to cohort and remove on the Members tab. - **Upcoming, Running, Ended**: A cohort is Upcoming before it starts, Running while it runs and Ended after the last day. Archive one to hide it and stop new members, and restore it later. - **Several cohorts per member**: A member can be in more than one cohort at a time: overlapping join windows put them in each, and adding them to a new cohort keeps their other cohorts. ## Members see their cohort right in the community Members who are in a cohort see it the moment they open the community: a cohort card on the feed with the schedule, their progress and the next course to open, a reminder in the sidebar, and every cohort they are part of on their You page. It works on any phone, in the browser. - A “Your cohort” card on the feed, live or upcoming, with the days left or the days to the start - Their own progress bar and a Start or Continue button for the next course - One tap to the cohort space, where the weekly rooms are - All of their cohorts on the You page, with dates and lessons completed ## How to run a cohort-based course on Vonza From an empty Cohorts page to a group moving through a course together, in four steps. 1. **Name it and pick the dates**: Open Cohorts, choose New cohort, give it a name and a line about the goal, then set the start and end. The wizard draws the weeks as you pick. 2. **Add a space and a course**: Create a private space from the “Cohort course” template or use one you have, then link the course or bundle the group will take. 3. **Choose who joins**: Let everyone who joins in a window come in automatically, take new members on the plans you pick, or add people yourself. 4. **Run it week by week**: Follow the timeline, post announcements to the cohort space, watch the average progress and export the member list when you need it. ## Questions about community cohorts ### What is a cohort-based course, and how does Vonza run one? A cohort-based course is one a group of people take together, with a shared start date, end date and pace, instead of each person starting alone. In Vonza a cohort lives inside your community: it has its own dates, its own space and its linked courses, and you follow the group from a cohort page with a week-by-week timeline, the members and their average course progress. ### How do I create a cohort in my community? Open Cohorts in your community and choose New cohort. The wizard has five steps: Name (3 to 80 characters, with an optional description of up to 500), Dates (a start and an end up to a year apart), Space, Course (link a course, bundle or product from your Content board) and Who joins. A timeline under the steps shows the weeks as you go, and you can change everything after you create it. ### How do members join a cohort? You pick one of three rules. Everyone who joins in the window adds every member who joins the community between two dates. New members on selected plans adds members who join on one of the plans you pick, inside that window. I’ll add people myself leaves it to you. When you create a cohort with an automatic rule, members who already joined inside a window that has begun are added right away, up to 200, and you can add members by hand under any rule. ### How long can a cohort run, and how many members can it have? A cohort can run for up to 366 days, and a new one cannot start in the past. Each cohort holds up to 1,000 members. A cohort shows as Upcoming before its start date, Running while it runs and Ended after its last day. ### What is the cohort space? Each cohort has a space in your community where the group talks. The wizard can create it from the built-in “Cohort course” template: a private space named after the cohort, with Announcements, Week 1–3 and Q&A rooms and a pinned welcome post. You can also use a space you already have. Members added to the cohort join its space too, and Announce on the cohort page opens a post in it. ### How is cohort progress measured? Progress comes from the linked courses: each member’s progress and lessons completed on those courses, and the cohort’s average across its members. A linked bundle counts through the courses inside it; a product has no lessons, so it does not move progress. The Members tab shows each member’s progress, when they were last active and how they joined, and Export CSV downloads the list with name, email, progress, lessons, last active, the date added and how they were added. ### What do members see? Members in a cohort see a “Your cohort” card on the community feed, marked live or upcoming, with the days left or the days until it starts, their own progress and a button to start or continue the next course, plus links to the cohort space and all their cohorts. A smaller card sits in the community sidebar, and their You page lists every cohort they are in with its dates, progress and lessons completed per course. ### Can a member be in more than one cohort, and what happens when one ends? Yes. A member can be in several cohorts at once: overlapping join windows put them in each, and you can move members from one cohort to another. When a cohort passes its end date it shows as Ended. Archiving a cohort hides it from the list and stops it taking new members, while members keep their place and their space; you can restore it at any time. ## Related pages - [Online Community Platform](https://vonza.com/best-community-platform): Everything in Vonza Community: spaces, posts, members, chat, paid plans, events and cohorts in one place. - [Online Courses](https://vonza.com/free-online-courses-platform): Build the course your cohort takes: lessons, quizzes, certificates and drip content. - [Student Portal](https://vonza.com/student-portal): Where members open their courses and communities, and where the cohort card and You page live. - [Online Community Templates](https://vonza.com/community-templates): Start a whole community from the Course cohort layout or one of five other templates. - [Paid Community Platform](https://vonza.com/paid-community-platform): Sell seats with community plans and checkout through Stripe and Paystack, then fill a cohort by plan. - [Community Events and Live Streaming](https://vonza.com/community-events): Add live sessions, Q&As and office hours to the cohort’s weeks.