An introduction to virtual training labs for companies looking to adopt outcome-based learning into their employee, customer and partner training programs.
The half-life of a skill is shorter than ever: five years for general skills and a measly two-and-a-half years for technology-related skills.¹ This means the longer it takes you to teach, develop, validate and then apply skills to the job, the less return you will make on your training investments.
To bring skills to market faster, “show and tell” simply isn’t enough anymore; neither are the rote “type this, click that” activities. The learning industry needs to set a new benchmark for what constitutes “hands-on learning.” It includes evolving to providing immersive, interactive and engaging environments that validate a learner’s skills through hands-on experiences with the intended learning outcome to be job ready.
Why trust Skillable? Since 2004, we’ve been helping leading organizations around the world such as Microsoft, Quest Software and Skillsoft build hands-on learning experiences, custom software labs, virtual IT labs and virtual training environments for practice and skill validation. To date, nearly five million people have launched more than 50 million labs on Skillable’s platform. We know hands-on labs.
The intent of this guide is to help lay the foundation for what is needed to get started with virtual lab environments.
It's for professionals who are responsible for the training and enablement of internal and external audiences, specifically those who: 
Oversee and/or work in workforce upskilling, training and education programs (e.g., Instructional Designer, corporate trainer, learning architect, curriculum development, learning & development)
Develop and manage customer education, technical sales training and partner enablement programs (e.g., Customer experience/ education, customer success, partner enablement, technical training)
Create and manage certification programs and performance-based testing (PBT) exams. (e.g., Head of Certification, Training and Certification)
In this virtual lab guide, you'll learn:
- What are hands-on labs aka virtual IT training labs
- What are the types of virtual training labs
- What’s the difference between simulations and virtual IT training labs?
- How virtual labs work
- What are common use cases for virtual labs?
- What you’ll find on the best virtual training platforms
- How the right provider can help you increase Instructor effectiveness
- How to get started with hands-on virtual IT lab experiences
- In-house or third-party provider: Which is better for virtual labs?
- How to integrate virtual labs into an LMS
- Best practices for virtual labs
- Common concerns about starting with virtual labs
- How to avoid common virtual lab mistakes
- How to build labs faster
- How to evaluate virtual training lab platforms and virtual IT lab providers
- Here are the top characteristics to look for in virtual lab providers
- Hot Takes about hands-on training and virtual labs
- Partner with Skillable to validate skills through hands-on experiences
Virtual labs have many use cases, but it’s important to start with one.
Chart a path and take an incremental approach to creating a “learn by doing” ecosystem. This helps you build a program unique to your organization’s requirements.
You’re not alone in this. If you need a sounding board or want to partner with an expert to get started, grab 30 minutes with a Skillable account executive to talk it out. We’ve helped organizations around the world strategize, author, build and launch more than 50 million labs in our 20+ year history.
We have the expertise and empathy to meet you where ever you are in your virtual lab maturity.
What are hands-on virtual labs?
Virtual labs go by many names, including virtual training labs, virtual IT labs, hands-on labs, immersive labs, vlabs and more. They are one of the types of hands-on software learning environments. They are VM (virtual machine) or cloud-based, non-production environments that provide people hands-on, interactive learning experiences. These learning environments immerse users in your technology, software or tool by giving them hands-on access to “learn by doing.” This increases skill retention rates and drives faster product adoption. Labs are designed to build user competency by providing outcome-based scenarios based on real-world tasks that simultaneously teach and validate skills.
Because virtual labs are hosted in the cloud, users can access them anytime, anywhere. Eliminating barriers to learning resources provides users with more consistent and accessible education which improves the overall training experience and increases user satisfaction.
For live events such as Instructor-led classes, Instructors can proactively monitor learners’ progress and offer feedback and guidance as needed. Coupled with hands-on practice and Instructor feedback, the solution allows for maximum learning and caters to the needs of modern learners. A study from the Research Institute of America found virtual training increases learning retention rates by 25-60%.²
In an ideal world, learning would transfer perfectly into practice and then to on-the-job application. Unfortunately, the reality is that it seldom does. Users are highly likely to make mistakes during the training. It’s only when users are on the job and the risks higher that mistakes are revealed. Skills-validating practice helps both users and Instructors recognize and correct mistakes during the learning process, reducing the chances of errors reoccurring while on the job.
Virtual training labs put users in remote live, non-production environments where skills can be assessed, developed, applied and then validated in a meaningful way.
What are the different types of virtual training labs?
Simulation
This is not a real environment, but rather an imitation of one.
Sandbox environments
Acts as a safe, secure and isolated testing environment in which users can experiment.
Step-by-step
Most common training industry lab type and includes “read ‘n click” or “read ‘n type” labs.
Scored labs
Labs with assessment questions that are then scored by Instructors.
Automated scored labs
Assessments that use advanced scripts to objectively validate training outcomes automatically once a learner has completed an activity.
Collaborative "shared" labs
These are multi-person, “assembly line” or “shared labs” where multiple users are completing tasks simultaneously.
Attack/Defend
Simulated attacks that mimic likely attack paths and techniques used by cyber criminals. Designed to teach users how to properly defend against them.
Red vs. Blue team exercises
These shared labs let users assume the role of either hacker or defender. Hackers attempt to break into environments while defenders try to protect it in real-time.
What’s the difference between simulations and virtual labs?
Virtual training labs are designed to mirror real-world software or platforms where users can freely experiment and practice completing real-world scenarios. Simulated environments are more restrictive as users can only interact with software or tools under certain conditions.
Virtual labs provide:
- Freedom to explore in a live, non-production environment
- Flexibility to work towards specific outcomes that may have multiple solution paths
- Ability to easily manage and update the environment when software changes
Training simulation tools are:
- Non-live environments specifically built to mimic a specific use case of existing software or technology
- Reliant on prescriptive instructions which limit what a user can and can’t do
- Harder to manage and update when software changes
How virtual labs work
Labs provide users access to a copy of the software or tool. In technical terms, users access an instance (copy) of the software or tool image (image is a copy of the software used for the lab). They are hosted in secure, non-production environments either on-premises or in a datacenter (aka the cloud).
Virtual labs enable organizations and training providers to create labs and courses for their own software or topics such as:
- Coding and software development
- Cloud technologies
- Data and analytics Cybersecurity
- Artificial intelligence (AI)
- Network administration System administration
- Database administration
Organizations can build labs around specific learning objectives, then embed them directly in an existing LMS or launch them straight from a lab provider.
Skillable’s virtual training platform is a good example. You can create vlabs tailored to each audience, from a step-by-step guided walkthrough to a complex scored lab that uses automated scoring to validate skills, deliver instant feedback and track learner progress in real time. To get those labs in front of your audience, connect your LMS through our fully-documented API or serve content directly from our training management system (TMS).
That flexibility is what lets a single platform stretch across training, performance-based testing (PBT), technical sales demos and hands-on workshops at events.
What are common use cases for virtual labs?
Training and skills development
Virtual labs are designed to teach and reinforce what users learn in a classroom, on- demand course or event by enabling them to apply their knowledge, skills and abilities.
For example, you could task users on how to access valuable customer data inside an organization’s CRM system or how to troubleshoot and resolve a security issue. You’re not just reading slides or watching videos, you’re building and applying what you’ve learned. Take it a step further and create hands-on cybersecurity tabletop exercises.
For example, Comtech, a telecommunications company, wanted to improve the agility of its cybersecurity training and build an adaptive learning program based on a knowledge, skills and abilities (KSA) format. By providing employees with hands-on cybersecurity labs that are easy to update, they’re able to keep pace with fast-moving best practices and high stakes threats.
Erik Wallace, Director of Sales and Business Development at Comtech, said: “Performance-based assessments are an important initiative for us. We want performance-based labs that tie back to a KSA format so that if a learner is weak in a certain area that we can recommend content that aligns with skilling needs, whether that’s lab training, a wiki, videos, courseware or a Challenge Lab.”
Thanks to their partnership with Skillable, 90 to 95% of Comtech’s learners show real-world, job-ready proficiency after course completion.
Read the Comtech case study.
Certification exams and Performance-Based Testing (PBT)
For certification leaders, a credential is only as valuable as what it proves. In a market crowded with exam dumps, AI answer guides, and “paper-certified” candidates who pass the test but can’t do the job, traditional multiple-choice exams are losing the trust they were built on. Your credential has to demonstrate real job-readiness, not recall.
Performance-Based Testing closes that gap. Instead of asking candidates what they know, PBT puts them in a live environment and measures what they can actually do: configuring the resource, remediating the threat, deploying the product. Every action is scored against real job tasks, which is exactly what makes an exam legally defensible and mappable to a formal job task analysis.
For program owners, that shift delivers on four fronts:
- Defensibility. Tasks map to real job responsibilities, giving your exam the construct validity accreditation bodies like I.C.E. and NCCA expect.
- Integrity. You can’t dump or AI your way through a dynamic live environment. PBT is structurally resistant to the cheating methods eroding MCQ-only programs.
- Evidence, not inference. Itemized, task-level scoring shows precisely where candidates succeed or fall short, so you can pinpoint skill gaps and refine exam design without teaching to the test.
- Market trust. A hands-on credential signals rigor to enterprise buyers and differentiates your program from low-effort badges and certificates.
The result is a certification that proves competence, protects your brand, and carries real weight with the employers and candidates who rely on it.
Resources:
Technical sales and partner readiness and enablement
When you’re running a technical sales demo, practice makes perfect. If you’re pursuing product-led growth, that demo has to be flawless, and it won’t be if your sales and partner teams don’t have hands-on access to what they’re selling. A demo lab environment fixes that.
Give your account managers, solution engineers, technical account managers, and channel partners room to learn and experiment with the software they sell. Pair that hands-on practice with instructor-led or peer-to-peer discussion and you get sellers who know your solution inside and out: more prepared, more confident, and closing at higher rates. The result is better conversions and more revenue.
Events, user conferences and product roadshows
Hands-on workshops are where product awareness and demand get built. Eighty-two percent of potential buyers want to test a product before they buy,³ so give them exactly that by showcasing your products at events.
It’s also your team’s chance to have real-time conversations with prospects, spot serious buyers earlier in their cycle and help shape requirements before the competition does.
Talent acquisition and management
Continuously assess and develop both current and potential team members’ skills by having them complete hands-on labs. For example, you can identify the best talent for specific roles by validating candidates’ skills with scored labs. From here, you can continue to retain and develop learners’ skills with custom hands-on labs.
Customer support and QA environments
When issues arise, seconds feel like hours and tempers can flare. This makes having a well-trained help desk paramount. Virtual labs can be created and customized to replicate a customer’s specific environment, enabling the support agent to troubleshoot and resolve issues within the lab. This helps agents increase first-call resolution rates, answer time-sensitive email/chat support faster and easily transfer to next tier support, if necessary. As a result, overall resolution time is decreased, customer satisfaction is improved and issues that could potentially damage your credibility are extinguished.
Virtual training labs can present a large amount of content in an easy-to-digest way, ensuring agents have thorough knowledge of the platform they’re supporting.
Learn more about how labs can improve your software or platform help desk support.
Training content management
Tired of managing training documentation via screen shots in Word or PowerPoint? If you sell software with aggressive release schedules, your team is trapped in the nightmare that is maintaining up-to-date training materials. Virtual labs can wake you from this by minimizing the burden of constantly updating screen shots in Word or PowerPoint presentations.
Learn how our agile platform makes managing employee and customer education training materials easier.
Capabilities of the best virtual IT lab platforms
What makes a great hands-on lab platform? Virtual lab providers can provide a myriad of features and capabilities intended to improve learning and skill development. But not all software lab providers are the same. Features, ease of use, robustness and scalability will vary. We highlight some key features below.
Lab reporting and analytics
Reporting and analytics enable L&D leaders, Instructors and other business leaders to evaluate the success of courses and individual labs. The data and reports provided by the platform can provide insight into individual user activity or course success, allowing leaders to see how well learners are progressing or if adjustments are needed.
Instructor tools
The best platforms equip your Instructor with tools and resources to increase their effectiveness and classroom management. Tools such as over-the-shoulder monitoring enable Instructors to track classroom lab progress and jump into a specific student’s lab to provide one-on-one instruction.
Third-party integration capabilities
If you have an existing LMS or CRM platform, look for a lab vendor who provides seamless integrations with these tools. These integrations yield many benefits, including an enhanced user experience, deeper lab insights and faster issue resolution.
Building and delivering labs
Pay attention to the lab development tools vendors provide and understand how different technical roles will interact with them. You should also see how the vendor is focused on helping you build better labs through training, automated checks and issue identification
Lab provisioning
With learners accessing labs from around the world, you’ll want to ensure vendors can easily provision labs without sacrificing performance or speed. The number of datacenters a vendor has is typically a good indicator of what you can expect in terms of performance and latency. For example, if a vendor only has two to three datacenters. It’s likely that learners who are geographically far from the datacenter will experience latency or performance issues.
How the right lab provider can increase Instructor effectiveness
Your Instructors have a lot of face time with learners, even if the class is virtual. They can make or break the learning experience.
When it comes to classes or events with virtual labs, equip your Instructors with better classroom control and management. This experience starts with having earlier access to class materials for preparation and extends to providing capabilities such as over-the-shoulder monitoring for Instructors, enabling them to log into a learner’s lab instance and provide one-on-one support. It also includes providing Instructors with a dashboard of all active labs so instead of disrupting the class asking about lab progress they can see exactly where users are so they can better manage time.
How to get started with virtual lab hands-on learning experiences
Whether you want to foster a culture of continuous hands-on learning or boost success of training activities, incorporating virtual labs into learning may not be as significant an effort as you think.
Here’s a high-level overview of the technology, employee skills and cost associated with virtual IT labs.
What technology do you need in your tech stack?
If you outsource to a virtual lab provider all you need is a secure internet connection and a current web browser. You don’t even need an LMS as enterprise- grade providers offer an LMS platform in addition to a lab development studio and management tools. If you have an LMS or other training platform, you can leverage their APIs to build connections.
If you build an in-house, homegrown virtual lab environment you would need the following equipment:
- Server(s)
- Switch(es)
- Router(s)
- Rack equipment
- Network cables
Essentially, you would need to build and deploy your own infrastructure-as-a-service (IaaS) platform or datacenter. This means you would need a physical location in which to set up, store and maintain servers (this may mean purchasing and setting up equipment for climate control) as well as implementing proper security measures.
Select your lab environment
If you already have a subscription to a public cloud such as Microsoft Azure, Amazon Web Services (AWS) or Google Cloud Platform or you want to use your own cloud, you could build your lab environment here. You’ll want to ensure you have the right personnel and resources in place to set up and maintain the environment.
Lab UI integrator
Next, you’ll need to implement a UI integrator. This acts as the interface on which you’ll build labs and is what users will interact with directly. Finally, you’ll need a delivery mechanism to bolt all the pieces of the lab together (UI, cloud computing platform, tools, etc.). Skillable Studio, for example, would be considered a delivery mechanism as it binds together the UI, lab environment and tools in a single environment.
It’s important to note that building and deploying your own homegrown lab environment is entirely possible, though it does require significant time, effort and money to accomplish. If you’re looking to spin up and deploy labs quickly, you should to consider going with a third-party lab provider such as Skillable.
What employee skills are needed?
From an end-user perspective, learners do not need significant technical skill. Users simply login via their browser to access the lab.
From a strategic development and management perspective, the skills you need depend on your use cases. At a high level, you need people who understand the technology enough to write training materials, build and test the labs and then manage the learning content. Some organizations have dedicated headcount for each role. Others have one or two people that do it all.
If you’re looking to build performance-based tests for a high-stakes skill validation use cases as such certification exams, you’ll need someone who is versed in how to measure people’s knowledge, skills and abilities (KSAs), such as a psychometrician.
How much do virtual labs cost?
Investing in virtual training depends on a number of factors, including:
- Vendor
- Use case
- Lab functionality and lab size
- RAM usage
- Number of concurrent users/concurrency
- Datacenter location(s)
- Cloud subscriptions
Below are the most common pricing models for virtual lab platforms:
Pay-as-you-go: Vendors charge customers based on the number of user hours.
Subscription: Prices vary depending on the provider, though most charge a certain rate per user per month or per year.
License: Customers are charged a flat rate for a specific time period such as 6 or 12 months.
Exact quotes can be obtained by contacting vendors directly.
Is the solution worth the investment?
According to a recent Gallup report, 85% of employees are not engaged or actively disengaged at work. To combat this, L&D leaders need to create engaging training and learning experiences that develop skills faster and make it easier for learners to apply what they’ve learned.4
Build labs in-house or outsource to a third-party provider: Which is better for virtual labs?
Organizations looking to implement virtual labs need to first evaluate this initiative against their core competencies. This is a critical step in assessing whether to build, host and manage labs in-house or with a third-party provider. Do you want to invest time and money into hosting and maintenance or do you want to invest in developing lab experiences that accelerate skills development?
From there, you need to define your organization’s requirements, technical acumen, headcount, budgets, timelines and gauge your appetite for learning curves and hard lessons learned.
Building an in-house lab solution
With on-premises hosting, you are responsible for developing, maintaining, securing, upgrading and troubleshooting your environment. You need to determine if you want to dedicate employee time to these tasks, especially if your software has an aggressive release schedule. You will have complete control over the lab authoring, development, publishing, auditing and cost control tools. While organizations can save money utilizing equipment and software currently in-place, it’s important to evaluate the total cost of ownership (TCO).
Partnering with a third-party lab vendor
Working with a dedicated lab vendor provides agility, scalability and other benefits such as:
All-in-one access: Because virtual labs are hosted in the cloud, admins, Instructors, employees, customers and partners can access the platform directly from a web browser. This ensures training resources are always available, allowing users to complete training or learn new skills on their own time.
Less maintenance: Well-rounded third party providers can handle as little or as much of the development and maintenance of the labs and platform as needed.
Cohesive experience: Users enjoy a more seamless, cohesive experience as providers have APIs that help different systems connect seamlessly.
More flexibility: The cloud provides organizations with more flexibility than local servers both in terms of cost and maintenance. Because outside companies are handling IT hosting and other infrastructure needs for virtual labs, IT workloads are lightened, which may help to reduce costs. Organizations can also spend more time on training and learning rather than on time-consuming lab maintenance tasks.
Access to lab insights and analytics: Lab providers can include powerful reporting and analytics that offer quantitative insights into lab and learner performance. While reports can be generated for in-house labs, they may require organizations build them themselves which can get overwhelming and complicated.
Be mindful of the “IKEA Effect” with your home-grown sandboxes and training labs.
The IKEA Effect⁵ is our tendency to overvalue what we build ourselves, rating a self-made product as highly as one an expert made (a close cousin of the Endowment Effect⁶). We’ve met plenty of organizations whose lab environments started as skunkworks side projects, and that pride is earned: building lab environments from scratch takes real time and effort.
But it’s a risk to your agility. Teams that migrated from homegrown environments to Skillable consistently tell us the same thing: they poured too much time, money and talent into something that was never core competency of their business.
So which path is right for you?
Every organization operates differently. Some have to build internally and hit the wall before they’ll consider a vendor. Others stay locked on their core competencies and bring in partners for the rest. Technology and training leaders like Microsoft, Cisco, Docebo and CompTIA trust Skillable to power many of their hands-on programs and credentials.
So, which path should you choose?
Every organization has their own way of operating. Some must attempt and fail to build something internally before they can look at external vendors. Others remain keenly focused on their core competencies and bring in partners to support their initiatives. Technology leaders such as Microsoft, CompTIA and others trust Skillable to support many of their hands-on programs.
Leading organizations focus on their core competencies and partner with proven experts to help them succeed. That’s how you increase agility.
That’s how you deliver on your business goals.
How to integrate virtual labs into your LMS, LXP, CRM or exam delivery provider
Organizations looking to enhance the performance of virtual labs can do so by integrating them into their LMS/LXP. The integration provides organizations with additional data insights such as the effectiveness of training programs, employee performance, user activity and more.
Furthermore, learners gain fast, easy access to learning resources on a single platform. For example, users can access Instructor videos or notes on a particular subject and immediately put the knowledge to use by following the objectives outlined in the virtual lab.
Configuring the integration between the two platforms is relatively straightforward. To demonstrate, we’ll look at how Skillable’s virtual labs integrate with an LMS.
Learning tools interoperability (LTI) integration: Once connected via LTI, Skillable’s virtual labs are launched through their LMS without any additional development. Once launched, users can immediately begin navigating through the lab and completing objectives. When finished, labs can be marked as complete, graded as pass/fail and manually or automatically scored.
API integration: While this integration requires additional development, it provides teams with significantly more functionality than LTI integration. Once connected, the integration enables users to launch, complete and score labs just as the LTI integration allows. However, the API connection provides admins with additional functionality, including:
- Update lab instructions
- Add labs to a course via real-time query
- Provide more granular scoring results
- Send notifications to users
- Monitor users in real-time
- Receive user-submitted evaluation data
- Receive lab metadata
- Retrieve all lab and class data available
Regardless of the integration, the connection enables L&D and other business leaders to elevate the effectiveness of training. Users can seamlessly transition from learning material to hands-on practice without switching platforms. Additionally, Skillable’s multiple API opportunities allow for additional customization and functionality, enabling L&D teams to create training that meets specific business needs.
Best practices for virtual training labs
To avoid reinventing the wheel and hard lessons learned, here are best practices to jump start the creation, launch and maintenance of a lab program:
1. Create a framework for sustainable labs
Regardless of class size, material, use case or audience, labs will be the most successful when they’re created with specific goals already identified. Lab Authors should create project plans for each lab to ensure all learning objectives and goals are captured and that specific business goals are being met.
Additional factors to include in the project plan are:
- Architectural design
- Software used
- Software versions
- Background information on the lab build
- Potential pitfalls or project issues and their solutions
- Test results and subsequent changes
Remember, you’re in the beginning stages of lab development. Your plans do not need to be overly complex or sophisticated. Keep it simple. Considering each of these factors leads to sustainable labs that further business growth.
Read more about how to create a sustainable virtual lab framework.
2. Adopt the scenario-based, challenge-centric learning approach
Learning experiences that prescriptively tell users where to click and what to do are not suitable for maximum learning or skills retention. This rote learning approach is essentially memorization through repetition. While it may be useful in providing users with base knowledge and context, the method denies users the opportunity to think through problems and resolve them.
For training labs to have maximum effect, they should utilize challenge-centric learning. In this approach, users are encouraged to explore the interface or tool, experiment, make and correct mistakes and ultimately accomplish a series of tasks. The ‘learning by doing’ approach is a more effective teaching approach as it challenges learners to critically think through available options and choose the appropriate action.
Read more about challenge-centric learning in our “A Case for Challenge-Centric Learning” white paper.
3. Choose the right lab technology
The underlying technology that drives your virtual lab environment requires careful planning as this is what users will interact with. Skillable understands the importance of a purpose-built infrastructure and supports a variety of lab technologies to meet your business needs.
With Skillable, you’re not limited to a handful of environment platforms. We support eight environment platforms so you can create labs from a variety of sources, including:
- ESX / ESXi
- HyperV
- AWS VMs
- Azure VMs
- Docker
- Azure Cloud
- AWS Cloud
- Bring Your Own Cloud (BYOC)
This flexibility not only ensures that you can avoid vendor lock-in but also enables you to support a wide variety of use cases. Whether it’s Instructor-led training (ILT), virtual Instructor-led training (VILT), certifications or live events, Skillable’s platform is built for any hands-on scenario.
For example, users who work in Azure can use Skillable’s virtualization fabric to ensure all users get the same Azure training experience.
Read our virtualization lab fabrics 101 for additional information.
4. Backup lab data.
Data loss is disruptive and costly part of digitalization. Even small data loss instances (around 100 records) can cost organizations between $18,000 to $35,000, depending on company size and data value.7 Because virtual labs contain thousands of pieces of valuable data (lab preferences, user information and progress, course attendance, etc.), it’s crucial to regularly back up to a secure location, preferably the cloud.
5. Maintain lab storage and organization
Labs that are not properly stored and organized risk becoming lost as organizations scale. To avoid admins or Instructors being unable to find materials, all labs should:
- Follow a detailed storage map that includes instructions for naming and organizing folders.
- Follow a consistent organization method that has been communicated to all Lab Authors and Lab Developers.
- Be regularly updated and organized to ensure consistency.
- Regularly review labs and courses to ensure content is still relevant and up to date.
Bonus: Use Skillable’s Professional Services team
Our team of expert Instructional Designers, Lab Developers and Program Managers can help you accelerate development and delivery.
That what Majesco did. They used Professional Services to launch their new program in under four months. The implementation won a Brandon Hall Group award for “Best Technology Implementation.”
Common concerns about starting with virtual labs
As with any transformative technology, questions around whether it is right for your organization and your learners are common. The top two concerns we hear most often are around limited resources and security. Let’s put those concerns to rest.
Limited headcount or technology resources
Organizations with small training teams or a limited budget may worry that they’ll have to handle the setup, maintenance and troubleshooting of labs singlehandedly. Teams may also be wary of moving away from existing processes or training methods.
Luckily, small teams (and even individuals) can set up and maintain labs. Established lab providers will provide you with the tools to create, deploy and manage your labs.
If you’re not to that level yet, the best virtual IT lab providers have a professional services team to manage this for you. You will have 24/7/365 live technical support as well.
Established lab providers also often have ready-built hands-on content available via subscription, enabling your team to offer skilling without having to create your own content. For example, Skillable offers more than 1,000 ready-built labs across topics and technologies, such as Cybersecurity, AWS, Azure, IT Operations, Programming and Data Science. Learn more about Skillable Challenges.
With Skillable, you can enhance your training program by optimizing existing resources and budget via our comprehensive platform and services team.
Security
Eighty-three percent of organizations are concerned about security,8 specifically, protecting data and networks from threat actors. While security is everyone’s responsibility, security teams are responsible for reducing vulnerabilities by minimizing their organization’s ever-evolving risks through external partner networks. They rarely have enough resources to do their job, so make it as easy as possible for them to help you by being proactive.
Look for providers that prove they take security seriously and practice good cyber hygiene. For example, Skillable is SOC2 and ISO-27001:2013 certified. The SOC 2 (Service Organization Control 2) certification is a voluntary compliance standard on how organizations manage customer data. The ISO-27001:2013 certification signifies an organization has been extensively audited on how they manage the security of assets such as financial information, intellectual property, employee details or information entrusted by third parties.
How to avoid common virtual lab development mistakes
To drive maximum value from your training time, labs need to perform and augment the learning experience, not drive the learner into a state of frustration. We’ve helped our customer base launch over 60 million labs, which has provided us significant insight into common mistakes Instructional Designers, Lab Authors and Lab Developers make.
Here are quick tips to help you sidestep common mistakes:
1. Ensure labs promote active learning
To be serious about building real competencies, you need to exit the rote “click this, click that” lab approach—they do little to promote active learning, build learner confidence and provide data around skilling intelligence. In these cases, users are watching or reading material, answering multiple-choice questions and moving on.
Labs should be created with a ‘learn by doing’ mentality where users must use critical thinking to solve problems and learn skills. This results in more skills retention and more confident users.
2. Provide clear instructions
A training lab should contain clear, detailed instructions on the lab objectives and desired outcomes. This enables users to see the relevancy of the skills being taught and helps them understand how the skill will be useful in the future.
For example, instructions that simply read “Give Janet access to the database” are unclear and do not provide the same type of context as instructions like “Give Janet appropriate access to the Sales Orders database so she can run revenue reports.”
3. Include support based on the use case
Users must be able to easily connect with the appropriate support channel whenever needed—preferably at the click of a button. For example, users who are completing time-limited certifications or Performance Testing (PBT) should be able to contact technical personnel to help troubleshoot issues or resolve questions immediately.
Labs that are used for events or live training should include support access as well as direct links to documentation or resources on specific topics. Access to the right support channels and personnel help to ensure a seamless experience and more satisfied users.
Avoiding these common virtual lab mistakes ensures business teams create a truly immersive training experience that yields incredible results and benefits employees.
How to build virtual IT labs faster
Leverage Skillable’s template gallery to streamline the time and effort it takes to develop labs at scale.
The IT training lab template gallery allows Lab Developers to choose pre-built templates to use as the base for a new lab. Each template includes information about specific components (whether virtual or cloud) featured in the environment as well as instructions on how to further modify the template.
Skillable’s templates have been organized into topic areas that are available as filters. Each one defines the best use case, the technology it’s designed to support, the necessary configurations and tools needed to begin building content. This allows Lab Developers to quickly search for and find necessary information needed to build labs.
Skillable currently has topic-focused lab templates in the following areas:
- Coding/software development
- Cybersecurity
- Data and analytics
- Database administration
- DevOps/cloud technologies
- End-user productivity
- Machine learning/artificial intelligence
- Network administration
- Systems administration
Once new labs have been created, users can save them as an organization-specific template which is only available and accessible to the organization’s Lab Developers.
With labs readily available, and Lab Developers only needing to customize certain fields (such as name, series and organization), teams are able to quickly deploy labs and spend more time accomplishing learning objectives than on lab development.
Here are some free Skillable resources to help you build effective, high-performance labs:
- Optimizing Virtual Lab Performance
- Analyzing Virtual Lab Performance Data
- Create a Sustainable Virtual Lab Framework
- Virtual Lab Development Tips from a Lab Developer
- Tidy Up your Lab Storage in 3 Simple Steps
How to evaluate virtual lab platforms and virtual IT lab providers
Virtual labs are an ideal solution for organizations serious about modernizing their training and certification programs and promoting a culture of continuous learning. However, as more lab providers enter the market, it’s critical to filter out the noise and select the best virtual lab provider that meets your needs.
Here are the top requirements to look for in virtual lab providers:
Hands-on capabilities
Virtual labs are designed to provide users with hands-on practice. Vendors who don’t promote this functionality and instead offer click-through or check box labs are not an ideal solution.
Instead, organizations should look for lab vendors that clearly emphasize hands-on capabilities. This could include functionalities such as providing feedback to users or validating actions as this ensures vendors are providing a ‘learning by doing’ approach.
Easy lab set up
Organizations should not need to spend excessive amounts of time learning a platform to become competent on it. Instead, they should be able to integrate with the provider’s ecosystem and soon after begin developing and deploying labs. Organizations should look for vendors that provide lab templates and a user-friendly interface.
Comprehensive feedback system
Vendors who feature a built-in feedback system provide organizations with a direct way to collect and gather user feedback. Organizations should look for providers who offer both qualitative and quantitative feedback as both methods will provide more in-depth explanations on how to drive improvement and enhance lab performance.
Reporting and analytics
In addition to feedback systems, organizations should be able to track multiple aspects of labs. Vendors who provide reporting and analytics that delve deep into lab performance provide teams with valuable information needed to make improvements.
Scalability and stability
Whether teams are looking to train a handful of employees or tens of thousands, virtual labs should scale with ease without sacrificing performance. Typically, cloud-based platforms ensure reliable, high performance on a global level.
Ultimately, because a virtual training platform is a long-term strategic investment, you will want to carefully evaluate vendors, not only for today’s needs, but for where you’re headed too. Select a provider that emphasizes hands-on experiences that are high-performing, intelligent and stable. This allows organizations to enhance their training strategy and successfully train and prepare learners.
Book a demo of Skillable’s virtual lab platform
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Article updated July 2026
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