Product News

August 28, 2026

Retirement of LTI 1.1 Support in Blackboard LMS

# 3rd Party Integrations

# Administration

# Announcements

# Blackboard LMS

# Integrations & APIs

# LTI

# System Administrators

# Support

Update to LTI 1.3 by September 30, 2027

Wade Weichel

Overview

Blackboard is announcing the retirement of support for LTI 1.0 and LTI 1.1 in Blackboard LMS. These are the oldest versions of the Learning Tools Interoperability (LTI) standard defined by 1EdTech, the standards organization responsible for LTI. Blackboard takes security seriously, and we’re always looking for ways to improve the security stance of our products. These older LTI versions are built on older, weaker security approaches with known and documented vulnerabilities. Additionally, 1EdTech deprecated these legacy versions in 2019 and no longer certifies tools on these versions.

LTI 1.3 (LTI Advantage), the current standard, uses OAuth 2.0 and OpenID Connect — a substantially more secure foundation. Transitioning to LTI 1.3 protects institutional data, maintains certification eligibility for tool providers, and unlocks additional integration capabilities that create better user experiences for educators and learners.

Blackboard is committed to making this transition as smooth as possible. The timelines below give institutions and vendors the time needed to plan, test, and complete upgrades.

Retirement Timeline

Date	For End Users	For Administrators
Now – December 31, 2026	LTI 1.0 and LTI 1.1 tools continue to work for end users normally.	Administrators may register new LTI tools of any version. Begin reviewing your LTI tool inventory and engaging tool providers about their upgrade plans.
January 1, 2027	LTI 1.0 and LTI 1.1 tools continue to work for end users normally. Registered tools remain active. The option to allow instructors to register completely new tools without administrator review is removed. This option may already be disallowed in many Blackboard environments.	Registration of new LTI 1.0 and LTI 1.1 tools in Blackboard LMS is no longer permitted. The registration button will be removed for these older versions.
September 30, 2027	All LTI 1.0 and LTI 1.1 tools are turned off in Blackboard LMS. Instructors and students can no longer create new links or access old links.	All LTI 1.0 and LTI 1.1 tools are turned off in Blackboard LMS and can’t be made active. The older tools can be upgraded if a newer version becomes available. Administrators can delete an older tool registration if all prior link data should be purged.

Next Steps for Developers and Tool Providers

Blackboard supports an in-place upgrade method that allows tool providers to update an existing LTI 1.1 tool to LTI 1.3 without breaking existing course links. Links in all courses—current and past—are updated automatically. This is the recommended approach when technically feasible. Alternately, tool providers and require instructors and course designers to update links manually.

Note to developers: It won’t be possible for an administrator to register a tool with LTI 1.1 starting in December. If you expect to have new customers or adopters in 2027, you should target your upgrade to LTI 1.3 support by January 2027 rather than September 2027.

Option 1: In-place upgrade (recommended)

When an LTI 1.3 tool is registered at the same fully qualified domain name (FQDN) as an existing LTI 1.1 registration, Blackboard LMS detects the overlap and prompts the administrator to migrate all existing links to the new registration. Upon confirmation, all LTI 1.1 links update automatically — no action is required from instructors.

To support this path, the LTI 1.3 implementation must correctly handle the target_link_uri so that launch URLs from the original LTI 1.1 placements continue to resolve. Detailed technical guidance and sample code are available in the migration documentation:

● Migrating from LTI 1.1 to LTI 1.3 — Blackboard Developer Documentation

● LTI Migration Walkthrough (video)

Blackboard partners (Developer Network or higher) can create a support request with Blackboard Product Support. For community developer support, contact the Blackboard developer relations team at [email protected] .

Option 2: Re-linking (when in-place upgrade is not possible)

If your tool architecture does not permit an upgrade in place, you will need to provide administrators with a new LTI 1.3 registration and communicate to your customers that existing links will require recreation. Clearly document the steps for administrators and publish updated setup guides to minimize disruption.

Next Steps for Administrators

Administrators should assess their institution's LTI tool landscape and initiate conversations with tool providers as soon as possible.

Review your LTI tool inventory

To identify which tools in your environment are using LTI 1.0 or 1.1, navigate to the Administrator Panel in Blackboard LMS and select LTI Tool Providers under the Integrations section. The list displays the LTI version for each registered tool. Contact providers whose tools appear as LTI 1.1 or earlier.

Determine utilization

We don’t recommend relying on the “usage count” data in the LTI Tool Providers menu. We’ve found this to be unreliable. We have Illuminate reporting improvements coming in the next few weeks to help admins make better informed decisions with more reliable LTI usage data.

Engage your tool providers

Contact each affected tool provider to understand their upgrade timeline. Ask specifically whether they support the in-place upgrade path which updates existing course links automatically, or whether they require new tool registrations — in which case instructors will need to recreate links in their courses.

Test tool upgrades

Blackboard LMS supports an in-place upgrade of links if the tool provider supports the documented link update path using the same registered domain. Updating an LTI 1.1 tool to LTI 1.3 is a one-time, one-way action. It isn’t possible to revert. If a tool doesn’t support the link upgrade method and uses the same domain for both versions of the tool (1.1 and 1.3), this can break all links for that tool in all Blackboard courses.

Important: Be certain to test tool upgrades thoroughly in non-production environments. The upgrade process is destructive if not implemented correctly.

Plan for link recreation if required

Some tool providers may not support the in-place upgrade path and will require administrators to register a new LTI 1.3 tool and instructors to recreate links in their courses.

Communicate early with instructors

If link recreation will be required for any tools in use at your institution, notify affected instructors well in advance. Provide clear guidance on which tools are changing, what action is needed, and by when.

Frequently Asked Questions

Why is Blackboard making this change?

Blackboard regularly reviews opportunities for hardening its products’ security stance. Older versions of LTI have known and documented security vulnerabilities, and the consortium responsible for the standard has discontinued support and certifications. An updated standard has been available since 2019, giving technology providers many years to transition.

Does the lower security of LTI 1.0 and LTI 1.1 put my Blackboard environment at risk?

No. While Instructure has communicated that older LTI tools may have been an aspect of their recent security incidents, Blackboard’s implementation of LTI doesn’t have the same vulnerabilities as the Canvas LMS. Blackboard’s implementation of LTI 1.0/1.1 is limited to single sign-on launches into the tool and score updates only. There are no web services exposed over this channel.

Canvas has numerous proprietary services built atop the older LTI standards that allow tools to communicate back to the LMS to read additional data and make system changes. Despite requests to support similar functionality in Blackboard LMS, this approach didn’t meet Blackboard’s security standards. This perspective led to Blackboard’s advocacy and leadership in developing LTI 1.3.

However, it should be noted that the lower security of LTI 1.0 and LTI 1.1 does put integrated tools at greater risk, particularly in the areas of personal data exposure and privilege escalations within the tools themselves. For this reason, we encourage tool developers to move quickly to update their tools.

How will Blackboard support customers through this transition?

We plan to leverage the experiences of the Building Block retirement process and apply some of the practices here. We look to assist the community with crowdsourcing and sharing tool provider contact information and upgrade availability. As these activities develop, we’ll share more information in the Community Site.

Will Blackboard contact LTI tool providers or should administrators?

The Blackboard team plans to directly support tool providers that have large adoption footprints and existing partner relationships. However, there are thousands of unique LTI tools across the global community with whom Blackboard has no relationship. Administrators should plan to reach out to and work with all affected tool providers directly.

Can I determine LTI1.1 usage data?

We have Illuminate reporting improvements coming in the next few weeks to help admins make better informed decisions with more reliable LTI usage data. We don’t recommend relying on the “usage count” data in the LTI Tool Providers menu.

What should I do if a tool seems to be no longer in use?

If an administrator believes a tool is no longer in use, we recommend setting the tool to “excluded” from the tool’s drop-down menu in LTI Tool Providers. This retains the data. If it’s discovered the tool is needed longer, it can be approved again. Retaining the data also supports upgrading the tool’s links in courses if the tool provider releases an updated version capable of this process.

Important: Deleting a registered tool will delete all link data associated with that tool. This is permanent. All LMS relationships with the tool will be gone. Registering the tool again will not reconnect all prior links to the tool. Only do this if you’re certain the historical link data is no longer necessary because they will never work again in the future.

We have a custom tool created in-house, but our team now lacks the expertise or capacity to build an updated LTI 1.3 tool. What options are available?

Because the LTI open standards are public and well documented, these types of projects are well suited to using AI development tools.

You can also contact your Blackboard representant and request a quote from our professional services team. We’re willing to provide guidance, training or development of the upgraded tool.

Is this change as complex as the Building Block retirement?

No. Building Blocks was an extensibility technology that required significant software rewrites for apps to function as LTI tools. Here, the application code will need to change very little. Only the method for connecting and securing a tool needs to be upgraded. These changes are clearly documented and common across the educational technology space.