The fastest way to duplicate a course in Canvas

Canvas lets you copy an entire course—all its pages, assignments, discussions, and files—into a new course shell in a few clicks. The copy happens in your course settings, and you can choose to copy everything or pick and choose what you want to bring over. The process takes about five minutes, though the actual duplication can take longer if the course is large.

You need to be a teacher or have course admin rights to copy a course. You also need an existing course to copy from and either an empty course shell waiting to receive the content, or permission to create a new one. Canvas will not copy student grades or enrollment records—only the structure and materials.

Key Takeaways

  • Course copying happens in the Settings menu of the course you want to duplicate, not in the destination course.
  • You can copy to an existing empty course or ask your Canvas administrator to create a new shell for you to copy into.
  • Canvas copies content like assignments, pages, and files, but not student grades, submissions, or enrollment data.
  • Large courses may take several minutes to copy; Canvas will send you a notification when the copy is complete.
  • You can select specific content to copy rather than duplicating everything at once.

Finding the copy course option in Settings

Open the course you want to copy from. In the left navigation menu, scroll down and click Settings. On the Settings page, look for the button labeled Copy This Course. It is usually near the bottom of the page, in a section with other course management options.

If you do not see the Copy This Course button, you may not have the right permissions. Check with your Canvas administrator or course owner to confirm you have teacher or admin access to the course.

Choosing what to copy and where

When you click Copy This Course, Canvas opens a dialog box with two main choices: where the content goes, and what gets copied.

For the destination, you can either select an existing course from a dropdown list or ask Canvas to create a new course. If you choose an existing course, it must be empty or you must be willing to add the copied content to what is already there. If you want a brand-new course, you may need your Canvas administrator to create the shell first, depending on your institution's setup.

For the content, Canvas shows you a checklist of everything in the course: assignments, discussion topics, quizzes, pages, files, modules, and more. You can uncheck anything you do not want to copy. Most people copy everything, but if you are reusing a course and want to remove old announcements or student-facing messages, you can deselect those items here.

Starting the copy and monitoring progress

After you choose your destination and select what to copy, click the button to start the process. Canvas begins copying when ready, but the speed depends on the course size. A small course with a few assignments and pages might finish in a minute or two. A large course with hundreds of files, many discussion threads, or complex quiz banks can take ten minutes or longer.

Canvas does not lock you out while copying—you can keep working in your original course. However, do not make major changes to the source course while the copy is running, as it may cause the copy to fail or become incomplete.

What happens after the copy finishes

Canvas sends you a notification (usually by email and in your Canvas inbox) when the copy is done. Open the new course and check that everything arrived correctly. Look at a few assignments, open some pages, and verify that files and images loaded properly. Occasionally a large file or embedded media does not copy perfectly, and you may need to re-upload or re-embed it.

Once you confirm the copy is complete and correct, you can enroll students, adjust due dates, and make any other changes you need. If you copied to a new course shell, make sure the course is published and visible to students before they try to access it.

Copying only part of a course

If you do not want to copy the entire course at once, you can copy individual items instead. Open the course, find the assignment, page, or quiz you want to duplicate, click the three-dot menu next to it, and select Copy. You can then paste it elsewhere in the same course or in a different course. This method works well if you are building a new course gradually or reusing just a few pieces from an old one.

The downside of copying items one at a time is that it takes longer if you have many things to move. The full course copy is faster when you need most or all of the content.

Troubleshooting a copy that fails or gets stuck

If the copy appears to hang or never completes, wait at least 30 minutes before assuming something went wrong—large courses genuinely do take time. If it still has not finished after an hour, contact your Canvas administrator. They can check the copy job status on the backend and restart it if needed.

If the copy finishes but some content is missing, check the checklist you used when you started the copy. You may have accidentally unchecked an item. If you did check everything and something still did not copy, try copying that specific item individually using the three-dot menu method, or contact your administrator for help.

Frequently Asked Questions

Does copying a course include student grades and submissions?

No. Canvas copies only the course structure and content—assignments, pages, files, quizzes, and discussions. It does not copy student grades, submissions, or enrollment records. This is intentional, because you usually want a clean slate when you reuse a course in a new term.

Can I copy a course to multiple destinations at once?

No. You start one copy job at a time. If you need the same course in three different shells, you copy it once, then copy it again to the second destination, then a third time to the third. Each copy job runs separately.

What if I copy a course but then want to undo it?

Canvas does not have an undo button for course copies. If you copied to a new course and want to remove it, you or your administrator can delete the destination course entirely. If you copied into an existing course and want to remove just the copied content, you have to delete the items manually.

Can I copy a course from a previous term into this term's course?

Yes. As long as you have access to both courses and the destination course is empty or you have permission to add content to it, you can copy from any course you can open. This is the most common use case—reusing a course design from last year in this year's section.

Do I need to republish the course after copying?

Not necessarily. If the source course was published, the copied content is usually published in the destination course too. However, check the destination course's publish status and any individual assignment or quiz settings to make sure everything is visible to students before they enroll.