Anchor vs LanSchool Air
Anchor
plinklabs.org
LanSchool Air
lanschool.comSide by side
| Figure | Anchor | LanSchool Air |
|---|---|---|
| Price from | €24/mo | — |
| Free plan | Yes | — |
| Free trial | — | Yes |
| Open source | Yes | — |
| Web | Yes | Yes |
| Windows | Yes | Yes |
| macOS | — | Yes |
| API | Yes | — |
| Self-hosted | Yes | — |
| Plans published | 4 | 1 |
| Spec score · Classroom Management Software | 9.5 (#1) | 7.6 (#17) |
| Integrations | The teacher page names Microsoft 365, Smartschool, and GeoGebra as selectable bundles; sign-in uses existing school Microsoft accounts. | Google Classroom, ClassLink, and Clever integrations sync courses and class roster changes upon login. |
| Purpose | Anchor lets a teacher run a classroom focus session where student Windows laptops enforce an allowlist of apps and websites, with off-list activity shown live on a dashboard. | LanSchool Air is cloud-based classroom management software for educators and school or district environments. |
| Support | The maker directs users to GitHub issues for product questions and says there is no support ticket queue. | LanSchool’s Customer Resource Center offers support tickets or chat, product guides, setup resources, videos, and webinars. |
Plans
Anchor
- AnchorFree
- Anchor softwareFree
- Azure hosting estimate€24 a month
- Azure hosting estimate with larger database€43 a month
In their own words
Anchor
Anchor is classroom software for schools using managed or bring-your-own-device Windows laptops. A teacher starts a focus session for a class, selects allowed app and website bundles, and watches student states and off-list events on a dashboard. Microsoft 365, Smartschool, and GeoGebra are named selectable bundles, and teachers sign in with existing school Microsoft accounts. Off-list apps are set aside rather than closed; off-list Microsoft Edge pages show a block page with an access-request option. Anchor provides activity monitoring, web filtering, and device controls, but no live screen view or behavior tracking. It observes activity only during an active teacher-started session. During that session, the extension sends off-allowlist visits, unblock requests, integrity signals, and liveness heartbeats to the school backend. Each school runs a single-tenant backend in its own Azure subscription. Anchor is GPL-3.0 licensed, self-hostable, and publicly auditable. It is free, with no licence fee or per-seat charge, though Azure hosting costs may apply.
LanSchool Air
LanSchool Air has no write-up on Specifiction yet; its figures are above.