In September 2026, Annotate PRO will become Canopy, a new name for a broader set of tools designed to help educators provide thoughtful feedback, strengthen assessment, and turn learning data into useful insights.
No action is required on your part. The Annotate PRO features you already rely on are not going away. You will still be able to save, organize, find, and reuse feedback in Canvas SpeedGrader, Google Docs, Microsoft Word, and other education platforms. Your existing libraries, groups, Favorites, and settings will carry over.
Along with the new name, we’re improving our free offering and introducing two major capabilities: Canopy Assist and Canopy Insights.
Why are we changing the name?
Annotate PRO began as a better comment bank for educators. Since then, it has grown to include Feedback Forms, Dynamic Rubrics, shared libraries, analytics, and tools that extend well beyond document annotation.
Now we’re adding secure, educator-directed AI assistance plus LMS analysis for feedback, learning outcomes, assessment, and accreditation workflows. We needed a name for the whole tree, not just one branch.
To make the transition clear, Canopy will carry “formerly Annotate PRO” in its name and badging until 2027.
The same trusted workflow, with more possibilities
In Canopy, the reusable comments you know today are called Templates. The new name reflects how much they can do.
A Template can be:
- A reusable comment to annotate a paper or insert into an email
- A Feedback Form to provide personalized feedback
- A Dynamic Rubric with point values and deductions
- A structured set of instructions for drafting personalized feedback
- A framework for analyzing course activity and learning data
- A query to summarize a large discussion board and suggest options for engagement
Templates help you multiply your expertise, expectations, and voice. Feedback Forms and Dynamic Rubrics help you create detailed feedback, more quickly, on in-class essays and live presentations. Templates also make Canopy’s AI-assisted tools more useful than a generic prompt: you decide what the system should examine, what criteria it should apply, and what kind of response it should draft.
With Canopy, you are the decision-maker. Canopy Assist and Insights prepare the work. You review, revise, and share it.
Introducing Canopy Assist
Canopy Assist helps educators draft detailed responses to student work using their own Templates, rubrics, and instructions.
Because Assist begins with criteria you define, its drafts can reflect the assignment, your teaching priorities, and the feedback approach you want to use. You can quickly review and revise the result before adding it to a document or online gradebook.
Assist works with uploaded PDF and Word files and within Microsoft Word, Google Docs and Classroom, Canvas, and D2L Brightspace.
The goal is not to replace an educator’s judgment or voice. It is to reduce repetitive work so educators can spend more time on the feedback and interactions that matter most.
Introducing Canopy Insights
For Canvas and D2L Brightspace users, Canopy Insights uses Templates to turn course data into useful analysis and reports. Its value extends beyond grading papers or providing individual feedback.
Insights can help you:
- Draft a progress summary for an individual student using selected assignments, rubric scores, feedback, and quiz results
- Analyze learning outcomes using evidence across assignments, rubrics, quizzes, discussions, and submissions
- Review a large discussion and identify themes to prioritize your attention
- Draft course, program, or accreditation reports, including AACSB learning outcomes reports
Canopy retrieves and organizes the relevant information, applies the instructions in your Template, and prepares it for analysis. An educator can use Insights to synthesize learning evidence or draft an accreditation report without grading a paper or providing feedback to an individual student. This turns a time-consuming collection and synthesis process into a workflow educators can direct and review.
The screenshot below shows Canopy and the Canvas LMS. The Template provides instructions, in this case to read the submission and draft a response that can be further refined and then added to the Canvas feedback. Canopy uses a Canvas rubric, if available, to draft the response.
Subscribe now for $36/year and keep that price when Assist and Insights arrive. If you don’t have an account, create one to try for 14 days. No credit card required.
Built for educator control and institutional choice
Privacy and responsible use have shaped Canopy from the beginning.
Canopy does not store student work or course data. Educators and institutions can choose between two approaches:
- Use CanopyAI for a streamlined, integrated workflow
- Use an institution-approved AI service, such as ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, or another provider
When you use your preferred AI service, Canopy can organize the relevant information and instructions for you to transfer yourself. The data is not sent to Canopy.
Institutional AI features are turned off by default so each institutional client can review the capabilities, privacy approach, and appropriate uses.
What isn’t changing?
- Canopy Essentials remains free for nonprofit educators.
- Existing comment libraries, groups, and Favorites will carry over.
- The Chrome extension and Microsoft Word app will continue to work in the same places and with the same features.
- Educators remain in control of what feedback is delivered to students.
- Our focus remains where it has always been: helping educators improve student learning through personalized feedback, stronger assessment, and useful insights.
In fact, the free experience is getting better. Canopy Essentials will include features that were previously paid, including Favorite sorting and grouping, Subgroups, and access to all of 11trees’ expertly written Template Libraries.
Canopy plans and pricing
Beginning in October 2026:
Canopy Essentials: Free
For nonprofit educators who want to save, organize, and reuse feedback more efficiently.
Essentials includes the core Template tools, organizational features, and 11trees Template Libraries.
Canopy Plus: $4 per month or $36 per year
For educators who want more structured and measurable feedback workflows.
Plus includes everything in Essentials, along with Feedback Forms, Dynamic Rubrics, and feedback analytics. Feedback Forms and Dynamic Rubrics are especially useful for in-class writing, live presentations, oral examinations, and other authentic assessments. Educators can apply consistent criteria, record observations in real time, calculate scores, and deliver personalized feedback efficiently.
Canopy Assist: $6 per month or $60 per year
For educators who want secure, Template-directed assistance drafting responses to student work.
Canopy Assist includes everything in Plus and works with uploaded documents, Microsoft Word, Google Docs and Classroom, Canvas, and D2L Brightspace.
Canopy Insights: $10 per month or $96 per year
For educators who want to analyze course activity, learning outcomes, and assessment evidence, whether or not they use Canopy to draft feedback.
Canopy Insights includes everything in Assist and adds LMS analysis for learning outcomes, assessment, accreditation reporting, and course-level insights across assignments, rubric scores, quizzes, discussions, and submissions in Canvas and D2L Brightspace.
Annual plans are billed once per year.
Try every individual feature in September
Existing free Annotate PRO users will receive a complimentary trial of Canopy Insights, including all individual features, through September 30, 2026.
Existing paid individual subscribers will receive access to Canopy Assist and Canopy Insights for as long as they maintain their current subscription.
Subscribe now for $36/year and keep that price when Assist and Insights arrive. If you don’t have an account, create one to try for 14 days. No credit card required.
Planning for your institution in 2027?
Canopy can help colleges, universities, schools, and departments move beyond isolated grading workflows to institutionally governed feedback, learning outcomes, program assessment, and accreditation reporting. Educators retain flexibility in how they work.
Institutional licensing can support:
- Shared, expert-designed Templates for feedback, assessment, and reporting
- More consistent feedback, rubric, and learning outcomes practices
- Support for authentic assessment workflows, including in-class writing, presentations, performances, and oral examinations
- Course and program assessment workflows that synthesize evidence across the LMS
- Accreditation reporting support, including AACSB learning outcomes reports
- Secure, institution-governed AI with Canvas and D2L Brightspace integration
- Better visibility into student learning, with training and implementation support
AI capabilities remain off by default for institutional customers while their teams review privacy, governance, and instructional fit.
If your institution is planning its 2027 teaching, learning, or AI initiatives, contact us to discuss licensing, security review, and a pilot program.
A broader name, with the same purpose
Canopy represents a significant expansion of Annotate PRO, but our purpose remains unchanged: helping educators turn their expertise and course data into better feedback, stronger assessment, and more useful learning insights.
Technology can make that work faster and easier. Educators supply the judgment, care, and context that make it meaningful.
Because feedback is a teacher’s superpower.