Educator resource
Real SPICE for your whole class, right in the browser
Updated August 2026 · By the CircuitSim team · 6 min read
The friction in an electronics course is rarely the circuit theory. It is the first two weeks: the lab-machine image, the license server, the version of the tool a student cannot install at home, and the Chromebook kid who is locked out entirely. CircuitSim was built to make that friction disappear. It is a browser-based simulator with a real SPICE engine, class groups for sharing circuits with students, and a free plan that needs no credit card. If a student can open a browser tab, they can run a simulation.
The short version
- Real SPICE in a browser tab. Six analyses ship today: interactive, interactive operating point, transient, AC sweep with Bode charts, DC operating point, and DC sweep.
- Nothing to install. No lab-machine images, no license server, no Chromebook exception. A student on their own laptop and a student on a shared lab machine have the same experience.
- Class groups. Create a group, add students, share circuits and components with the whole class, and run a discussion board scoped to your course.
- Term-based license seats. Buy seats for the weeks your course actually runs, not a 12-month subscription for a 14-week semester. Start at the pricing page today; NET-30 invoicing is supported.
- Private student seats, if you need them. Students join through a private link with no email, no name, and no personal information collected, keeping the classroom FERPA and COPPA compliant.
Where the usual tools fall short
Classroom simulation tools tend to fail in one of two directions. In one direction sit the desktop heavyweights. LTspice and its cousins are powerful, free, and trusted by working engineers, and that respect is earned. They are also clunky, dated, and, let us be honest, kind of ugly. The interfaces predate modern UI conventions by decades, drawing a wire has a learning curve of its own, and nothing in them knows what a class is: no shared circuits, no roster, no way to hand a student a starter schematic that is not a file attachment. Students spend the first lab learning the tool instead of the circuit.
In the other direction sit the friendly browser tools. Tinkercad Circuits is the most-used in classrooms, deservedly: the breadboard view and Arduino integration are excellent for a first course, but the simulation is built for intuition rather than analysis, so a course that reaches frequency response runs out of road. The Falstad simulator's animated current flow has taught more people how a filter works than any textbook figure, and its idealized models are the right trade for intuition and the wrong one for a lab report that has to match a bench measurement.
CircuitSim sits deliberately between the two: a real SPICE engine underneath, and a modern editor, link sharing, live interactive simulation, and class groups on top.
Best for
Courses that need SPICE-accurate results, where a student's simulated waveform has to match what they measure on the bench, while keeping the no-install workflow that browser tools made normal.
The simulation, plainly
CircuitSim runs the same class of SPICE engine used in professional EDA tools, so results are accurate in the way LTspice results are accurate. Six analyses ship today: DC operating point for bias points, DC sweep for I-V curves, AC sweep with Bode magnitude and phase charts for every filter and amplifier lab, transient for behavior over time, and two interactive modes that were made for teaching: students change component values, flip switches, and turn potentiometers while the simulation runs, and the waveforms and component symbols react live. LEDs light up. Seven-segment displays count. The demo that used to need a bench now needs a projector. Parameter sweep, Monte Carlo, and noise analysis are not available today.
The component library is growing and already covers what courses specify: op-amps, BJTs and MOSFETs, diodes and regulators, logic gates, 555 timers, transformers, relays, and the rest. When a part is missing, the custom component creator turns a manufacturer's SPICE model into a reusable part, which also makes a decent assignment in its own right.
Class groups
A group in CircuitSim is a shared space for a course, a section, or a lab.
- Shared circuits. Publish a circuit into the group and every student opens their own copy. This is how you hand out a starter schematic instead of a screenshot of one.
- Shared components. Build the device model once, share it to the group, and the whole class places the identical part.
- Discussion and announcements. The "why is my op-amp railing" question gets answered once, in a place the next student will find it.
- Members and roles. Instructors manage the group; students participate in it. An activity log shows what changed.
Seats built around a semester, not a calendar year
A semester is 14 or 15 weeks and a summer course is six, so paying for 52 weeks is a tax on the way teaching actually works. Educational group licenses are priced per seat, per week, for the term you specify, and rates fall as seat counts grow. An assigned seat carries the paid tier for the length of the term, whatever plan the student is on personally. Start at the pricing page and get set up today: pay by card, or generate a formal quote your procurement office accepts online and pays by NET-30 invoice. You can add seats mid-term for late enrollment and extend the term if the course runs long.
Student privacy
If you need seats without student identifiers, educational groups offer private student seats: you hand out a private join link or code, optionally passphrase-protected, and a student who opens it has a working seat with no email, no name, and no sign-up form. Nothing is collected, so the classroom stays FERPA and COPPA compliant and your district's privacy review has little to review. Rosters behave like real classrooms: reset a seat for a newly enrolled student, rotate a join code if it leaks, clear the lot for next year's cohort.
How CircuitSim compares for classroom use
| CircuitSim | Tinkercad Circuits | Multisim Live | Falstad | LTspice | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Runs in a browser | Yes | Yes | Discontinued | Yes | Requires install |
| SPICE-accurate models | Yes | Simplified | Yes | Idealized | Yes |
| Works on a Chromebook | Yes | Yes | n/a | Yes | No |
| Class groups and shared circuits | Yes | Classes, basic | Limited | No | No |
| Student access without email | Yes, private seats | Via school account | No | No account needed | No account needed |
| Term-length licensing | Yes, per week | n/a | n/a | n/a | n/a |
Falstad and LTspice are free and excellent, and neither is trying to be a classroom management tool. That is not a criticism; it is their design. If you need shared circuits and a roster, they are not the shape of tool you are looking for.
Coming from Multisim Live?
Your course circuits are not lost. CircuitSim imports Multisim Live .ms14 and .msjs files directly, ZIP batches included, with components, wiring, placement, and captions carried over. The import guide walks the steps, and the SPICE knowledge your students built transfers as-is, because the analyses are the same analyses.
Evaluate it in an evening
Three steps, no license required
- Build the circuit you teach in week three. Not a demo circuit. Yours. If the simulation matches what you expect on the bench, that is the only benchmark that matters.
- Create a group and share it. Add a colleague, publish the circuit into the group, and see whether the handout workflow you actually use survives contact with the tool.
- Try it on the worst machine in the lab. The oldest Chromebook, the shared desktop with the locked-down browser. That machine decides whether this works for your class.
K-12 classrooms
Everything above applies, with one honest note on depth: if your course stops at Ohm's law, series and parallel resistance, and a blinking LED, Tinkercad Circuits is a strong tool and you may not need SPICE at all. CircuitSim earns its place when a course crosses into op-amps, filters, and frequency response, the point where idealized models stop telling the truth and students start asking why the simulation and the oscilloscope disagree. And with private student seats, the privacy review that used to block browser tools in K-12 has little left to block.
Frequently asked questions
Is CircuitSim free for students?
Yes. The Basic plan is free forever, with no credit card and no time limit. Paid plans raise the limits on circuits, custom components, and components per circuit, and a class license assigns a paid tier to every student seat for the length of the term.
Do students need an email address?
Not if you do not want them to. If you need seats without student identifiers, educational groups offer private student seats: students join through a private link or code, with no email, no name, and no personal information collected, keeping the classroom FERPA and COPPA compliant.
Does it work on Chromebooks?
Yes, and on locked-down lab machines. There is nothing to install and no extension to sideload.
Is the simulation real SPICE?
Yes. Six analyses ship today: interactive, interactive operating point, transient, AC sweep with Bode charts, DC operating point, and DC sweep. Parameter sweep, Monte Carlo, and noise analysis are not available today.
How does a class license work?
Create an educational group, choose a seat count and a term length in weeks, and assign seats. Rates fall as the seat count rises. Start at the pricing page and pay by card today, or generate a quote for NET-30 invoicing if procurement prefers.
What happens to student work when the term ends?
Nothing is deleted. Seats stop carrying the paid tier, but circuits stay owned by the people who made them, and downgrading never deletes or locks existing work.
We are moving off Multisim Live. How much transfers?
Nearly all of it. CircuitSim imports .ms14 and .msjs files directly, ZIP batches included. The import guide has the steps.
What if CircuitSim is missing something my course needs?
Email us and say so. We are two people, Britt and Sam, and we read everything. A specific request from a teacher with a deadline gets our attention in a way a feature-request form never would.
More guides
Multisim and Multisim Live are trademarks of National Instruments (Emerson). Tinkercad is a trademark of Autodesk, Inc. LTspice is a trademark of Analog Devices, Inc. Falstad is the work of its author. CircuitSim is not affiliated with any of these organizations. Product names are used for identification only. Capability details are current as of August 2026.