What Is Instructional Design? Definition and 8 Real Examples

Instructional design is the practice of creating learning experiences (courses, simulations, job aids, and training programs) that help people build skills and perform better at work or school. It is a multidisciplinary field that draws on learning theory, psychology, design thinking, and digital media.

Good instructional designers do more than build courses. They figure out why people are not performing the way an organization needs them to, and then they design the most effective fix. Sometimes that fix is an immersive simulation. Sometimes it is a laminated checklist taped to a desk. If you want the thinking behind that, start with the core principles of instructional design, or trace the field's roots in World War II military training.

I have worked in this field since 2017, and I still think the golden age of instructional design is ahead of us. Most people in the corporate world do not yet know the field exists, and the ones who discover it tend to be surprised by how much value instructional designers can add.

The fastest way to understand instructional design is not another definition, though. It is seeing real examples. So let's look at some.

What is an example of instructional design?

A compliance eLearning course, a laminated job aid at a returns desk, and an AI role-play simulation for difficult conversations are all examples of instructional design. Any deliberately designed experience that closes a knowledge or performance gap counts.

Here are the eight example categories this article covers, at a glance:

Example type	Problem it solves	Typical deliverable
Scenario-based eLearning	Judgment and decision-making skills that need safe practice	Branching scenario or story-driven simulation
AI conversation simulations	Conversation skills that need realistic, repeatable practice	Voice or text role-play with AI evaluation
Software and systems training	Knowledge gap on a new tool or system	eLearning with realistic hands-on practice
Job aids and performance support	Support at the moment of need	Checklist, flowchart, or poster
Microlearning	Small, specific knowledge gaps	Short video or five-minute module
Compliance training	Legal or regulatory requirements	eLearning module with assessment
Education examples	Converting classroom courses for online delivery	Online course in an LMS
Fixing the real problem	Environment or system issues that training cannot solve	Process or software change recommendation

Not sure which type of solution fits the problem in front of you? Answer a few questions and get a shortlist:

What does the instructional design process look like?

Most instructional design projects follow five steps: meet the client, analyze the problem, design and storyboard a solution, develop it, and evaluate whether it worked. Different instructional design models slice these steps differently, but the underlying flow is remarkably consistent.

1. Meet the client

   The client might hire you as a freelancer or come from another department in your company. In this first meeting, they explain what they want: a performance problem solved, a new skill built, or existing knowledge deepened.

2. Analyze the problem

   Survey, observe, or interview the people closest to the problem. This step gets skipped far too often, and it is the one that tells you whether training is even the right answer.

3. Design and storyboard a solution

   Propose a solution backed by your analysis, then map it out. This is where you write strong learning objectives and capture your decisions in an instructional design document or storyboard that stakeholders can react to before anything gets built.

4. Develop the final product

   Once stakeholders approve the storyboard, build it: an interactive eLearning experience, a training video, a job aid, or whatever the design calls for. Some instructional designers develop everything themselves, and others hand off to a developer.

5. Evaluate the solution

   Test whether the solution actually accomplishes the project's goal. Ideally you evaluate throughout, then follow up afterward to confirm people are performing better on the job.

These steps map loosely to the ADDIE model, while SAM, its iterative alternative, loops through them in smaller cycles. If you want the whole thing in plain language, I wrote a simplified walkthrough of the full ID process.

What are some real instructional design examples?

Below are eight instructional design examples, from scenario-based eLearning you can play right now to job aids and AI-powered practice simulations. I have spent nearly a decade in this field, including a few years of freelance client work for companies like GitLab, Robinhood, and IHG, so where I can, I will show you real projects rather than hypotheticals.

Scenario-based eLearning

Scenario-based eLearning puts the learner inside a realistic story where they make the same decisions they would face on the job, then experience the consequences. It is one of the most effective formats we have for building judgment, because people practice in a safe space before the stakes are real.

Two examples you can play right now:

• Connect with Haji Kamal by Cathy Moore is the classic branching scenario. You help a young lieutenant build rapport with an Afghan leader, and every dialogue choice branches the story.
• Shady Sam, from Next Gen Personal Finance, flips the script by making you the loan shark. Squeezing borrowers for profit teaches you exactly how predatory loan terms work.

And here's an ancedote from my own work. One of the largest Canadian mining companies reached out because they determined that some best practices around lead safety were not intuitive, and they identified a knowledge and skill gap. I worked with their team to design a realistic, story-driven eLearning simulation where learners made the same choices they would make on the job, like what PPE to wear, whether to report safety issues, and to whom. When they made a mistake, they watched the impact on a gamified blood lead meter, tying every choice directly to their own health. That safe space to fail meant they were better prepared to protect themselves when the consequences were real.

I break down my five favorite scenario-based examples, including Haji Kamal, Shady Sam, and the Financial Times' Uber Game, in this video:

If this format appeals to you, my guide to designing scenario-based learning goes deeper, and Gagne's nine events of instruction explains a lot of the theory these experiences quietly follow.

AI conversation simulations

AI conversation simulations let learners practice real conversations by speaking with an AI-powered character, then get evaluated against a rubric the designer defines. A sales rep rehearses a discovery call, a manager practices a difficult feedback conversation, a nurse practices patient intake, and the score reports back to the course.

This is the biggest change in the field since I first wrote this article. When this page was originally published in 2022, this category barely existed. Now it is the example type that makes the biggest impact in a modern portfolio: these projects show instructional design thinking, scenario design skill, prompt engineering, and AI readiness in a way that typical Storyline courses do not, since most of those use AI for visuals at best.

Full disclosure: this is where I spend most of my time now. My company, devlin.ai, is a simulation builder where you describe a scenario in plain English and get a working voice or text simulation that embeds in Storyline, Rise, or any LMS, with AI evaluation, transcripts, and scores flowing back to the course.

The next evolution of instructional design is designing complete solutions with custom software built in, not churning out one eLearning course after another.Devlin Peck

Software and systems training

Software training closes the gap between "we bought a new system" and "our people can actually use it." The key is realistic practice, not feature tours.

Picture a shipping company rolling out new order-tracking software that is more powerful but harder to use. You meet with the management team to define what employees must be able to do, interview the few employees who have already struggled through it, and experiment with the system yourself. Because the training should mirror real work, you build an eLearning experience where employees practice entering and tracking orders exactly as they will on the job. During storyboard feedback, employees flag that some tasks management listed are no longer necessary, so you cut them. That feedback loop is the process working as intended.

To see an example of a software simulation, check out this video by Sabrina Gonzales:

Job aids and performance support

A job aid supports someone at the moment of need instead of asking them to memorize anything. It is often the cheapest, fastest instructional design solution, and frequently the best one.

Example: a store's returns desk keeps accepting and rejecting returns incorrectly, and staff call a manager at the first sign of uncertainty. Instead of building a course, you work with the managers to distill the return rules into a clear, colorful reference chart and mount it on the desk where the team can see it. Errors drop, managers get fewer calls, and nobody sat through an hour of training.

Microlearning

Microlearning delivers one small, specific chunk of learning in a few minutes: a short video, a five-minute module, or a quick interactive check. It works best when the gap is narrow and the audience is busy.

Imagine a bank adds a new fraud flag to its teller software. Nobody needs an hour-long course for that. A three-minute module showing what the flag looks like, what to do when it appears, and one practice example gets everyone up to speed by Friday. Short does not mean sloppy, though. Mayer's multimedia learning principles explain how to make every one of those three minutes count.

Compliance training

Compliance training exists because laws and regulations require it, which means learners often arrive already checked out. The instructional design challenge is to cover the required content without wasting anyone's time, and ideally to make people care.

The craft here is motivation design: connect the regulation to consequences learners actually care about, use scenarios instead of policy walls, and keep it as short as the requirement allows. The ARCS model of motivation is a useful framework for making mandatory training feel less mandatory.

Instructional design examples in education

In higher education, instructional designers mainly help faculty turn classroom courses into effective online learning. The work splits into two broad modes: supporting faculty (training them on eLearning tools, coaching them on online course design, and providing LMS support) and co-designing courses, where the professor acts as the subject matter expert.

A quick example of the second mode: a professor's Introduction to Management course includes a long assignment where students write an employee handbook for a fictional company. Together you rework it for the online format, giving students short managerial problems to solve with policy decisions instead of one massive writing project. The learning objectives stay intact, grading gets faster, and the assignment now generates material the professor can reuse in future semesters.

One note: the instructional design role is still not well understood in higher education, and designers regularly report a lack of faculty buy-in. A professor who has taught a course for fifteen years may bristle at suggestions from a designer. Managing that tension, along with coordinating developers, video producers, and graphic designers, is often part of the job.

When the answer is not training: fixing the real problem

Sometimes analysis reveals that no amount of training will fix the problem, and the most valuable thing an instructional designer can do is say so.

The classic case: a hospital hires you to train staff on its patient tracking software because too many patient files are incomplete. Your analysis shows the software is dangerously buggy. The staff is not the problem. You recommend fixing the system, not building a course.

I learned a version of this lesson myself. I ran a 90-minute workshop teaching my students how to build an AI-powered chatbot inside an Articulate Storyline course, and I watched technical issues and knowledge gaps pile up on machine after machine. My first instinct was to plan a ten-part tutorial series. Then I realized I could build software that handled all the technical pieces for them instead, so people could just describe their scenario in plain English and get a working simulation. That software became the simulation builder I mentioned above. The experience taught me that software can sometimes get people to their goal faster than any learning experience can.

How is instructional design different from LXD, eLearning, and other terms?

Most competing terms, including learning experience design, learning design, and instructional systems design, describe the same core discipline with a different emphasis. Here are the ones people ask about most.

Frequently asked questions

What is instructional systems design (ISD)?

Instructional systems design is an older term for instructional design. ISD emphasizes designing complete systems that produce measurable results, while instructional design has become the broader everyday label. The underlying instructional design theory is shared.

What is eLearning?

eLearning is short for electronic learning: any learning experience delivered digitally, including videos, podcasts, and interactive web-based courses. It is one delivery format instructional designers use, not a separate discipline. Here is a full breakdown of what eLearning is and how it works.

What is learning experience design (LXD)?

Learning experience design positions itself as a more learner-centered evolution of instructional design. I used to get genuinely fired up about this one, because some people claimed LXD was a different and superior discipline. In practice, good instructional design was doing everything LXD claims is new some 40 years ago. I compare the two labels honestly in LXD vs instructional design.

Is an instructional designer the same as a curriculum developer?

Mostly, yes. The difference is semantics that vary by company. Amazon and AWS, for example, used to call their instructional designers "curriculum developers" on a lot of teams. Read the job description, not the title.

What is educational design?

Educational design is a less common term for instructional design with more focus on the education sector, such as curriculum and assessment development.

What is instructional technology or educational technology?

Instructional technology and educational technology describe instructional design with a heavier emphasis on the technology itself: internet-based education, mobile learning, virtual environments, and K-12 tools.

What is learning technology?

Learning technology is an umbrella term for the digital tools that support learning, teaching, and assessment, from learning management systems to authoring tools.

What are the 5 principles of instructional design?

There is no single canonical list of five, but most versions trace back to Merrill's first principles: real-world problems, activating prior knowledge, demonstration, application, and integration. My guide to the principles of instructional design covers them in depth.

What does the future of instructional design look like?

Instructional design is growing. According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, employment of training and development specialists is projected to grow 11 percent from 2024 to 2034, much faster than the average for all occupations. And AI is reshaping what designers actually build: practice simulations, adaptive experiences, and custom tools are moving from novelty to expectation.

The other thing worth knowing: starting in instructional design does not mean ending there. This is an interdisciplinary field, and I have watched instructional designers move into UX research, software engineering, and product management. The skills transfer because the core skill, designing experiences that change human behavior, is valuable everywhere.

How do you get started in instructional design?

Start by learning the fundamentals, building real portfolio projects, and studying how working designers approach the problems in this article. My step-by-step guide to becoming an instructional designer walks the whole path.

That guide exists because I lived it. Back in 2018, I started creating content for instructional designers right after making the transition myself, so I knew exactly what I had been googling and looking for resources on. Those questions have not changed much, even as the tools have.

If you want more structure and support than free content provides, that is what Peck Academy is for. It is my licensed career school built to help people transition into instructional design and land a corporate role they are happy with, and an advisory committee of 10 independent industry experts reviews the curriculum to keep it current.

Whichever route you take, come back to the examples above often. The best way to learn instructional design is to study real work, then make some of your own.