Rich Content Editor
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Rich Content Editor (RCE)
One of the key features of Canvas is the Rich Content Editor (RCE).
This great tool allows you to bring all your resources into one place, giving you full control over how students access and interact with your materials.
You can build and customise material across multiple areas in Canvas such as:
- Canvas Pages
- Announcements
- Assignments
- Discussions
- Quizzes
In addition to styling, you can embed external content from resources such as H5P and other media such as YouTube.
Canvas Rich Content Editor - How To Guides
This guide will walk you through the key features of the Canvas Rich Content Editor so you can create clear, engaging content for your students.
We’ll look at the basics—like adding and formatting text, inserting links, embedding documents, adding images and including ReCap recordings. We’ll also explore how to embed more interactive resources such as H5P activities, Reading List citations and YouTube videos.
At the end of this section, we’ll highlight some handy tips too, including using the find and replace tool, checking how your content appears in Student View, and using page version history to revisit earlier drafts.
Rich Content Editor Essentials
The Rich Content Editor provides a versatile set of tools that allow you to create clear, engaging, and accessible learning materials within your Canvas course.
They work similarly to webpages, giving you the flexibility to link to and embed various types of content from different sources all within a single space.
In this section, you will explore the essentials: how to add and modify text, create and manage links to course materials and external web resources, embed documents such as Microsoft PowerPoint presentations or Word files, insert images, and embed ReCap recordings.
Tour of the Canvas Rich Content Editor Menu
The Canvas Rich Content Editor (RCE) menubar is a navigation bar located in the top of the text editing window. It provides access to editing functions to style and build you content in Canvas.
This video is an overview of the tools available and where you can find them in this menubar.
To find out more information on this menubar please visit the How do I use the menubar in the Rich Content Editor? guidance.
How do I add and modify text?
Canvas’s Rich Content Editor lets users type or paste text into editor which can then be styled using the tools available in the menubar. You can format headings, font sizes, bold, italics, underlining, text colour, and clearing formatting using the tools available in the menubar.
To find out more information on how to format text in the Canvas Rich Content Editor please visit the How do I add and modify text in the Rich Content Editor? guidance.
How do I add/manage links to course materials and external web resources?
External Links such as websites and web resources
You can add links to external websites and web resources in the Canvas Rich Content Editor allowing students to access useful resources outside of Canvas.
To find out more information on how to add a link to an external web site or resource in the Canvas Rich Content Editor please visit the How do I create hyperlinks to external URLs in the Rich Content Editor? guidance.
Course Links to course materials
You can add links to content you’ve created within your Canvas course, as well as to other key areas such as Discussions, Modules, and Assignments. This makes it easy to guide students directly to the specific resources you want them to access.
To find out more information on how to add a link to a Canvas course resource or to an area of Canvas in the Canvas Rich Content Editor please visit the How do I edit or remove hyperlinks in the Rich Content Editor? guidance.
How do I edit or remove hyperlinks?
If you need to remove or edit a link, whether it’s no longer needed or was added by mistake, you can do this easily using the Canvas Rich Content Editor.
To find out more information on how to remove a link in the Canvas Rich Content Editor please visit the How do I add and modify text in the Rich Content Editor? guidance.
How do I embed a document e.g. a Microsoft Powerpoint presentation or Word Doc?
You can link to and embed documents in the Canvas Rich Content Editor, including Microsoft PowerPoint presentations, Microsoft Word documents, and PDFs. These can be displayed in three ways:
Preview in overlay
The document opens in a full‑screen overlay. While the document is open, students cannot view any other content on the page.
Preview inline
The document is embedded directly within the page, allowing students to view it alongside other resources. For example, students can read lecture slides while simultaneously watching the lecture video.
No Preview The document is downloaded to the student device for it to be viewed.
To find out more information on how to add documents in the Canvas Rich Content Editor please visit the How do I upload a document in the Rich Content Editor? guidance.
How do I add an image?
The Rich Content Editor (RCE) includes built‑in tools that make it easy to upload images from your computer, embed them from your course files, or insert them directly from the web.
To find out more information on how to add images in the Canvas Rich Content Editor please visit the How do I upload and embed an image in the Rich Content Editor? guidance.
Embedding Interactive and External Content in the RCE
- H5P - This provides interactive activities such as quizzes and flashcards
- Library Reading Lists, - which let you insert essential course readings directly from the university library system
- External media - For example, YouTube, which enable you to embed online videos directly into your page.
How to embed H5P resources: Interactive Videos, Quizzes, and Activities
H5P allows you to create a wide range of interactive, browser‑based learning activities—including quizzes, drag‑and‑drop tasks, interactive videos, branching scenarios, flashcards, timelines, and image hotspots—without any coding skills.
These H5P resources can be embedded directly into your Canvas pages.
Find out more about H5P in the H5P guidance on the Learning and Teaching Website.
How to embed a reading list resource
The online reading list system is managed by the University Library and can be accessed through Canvas. You can embed reading list resources directly into your pages. For digital library resources this provides direct access to these resources rather than directing students to the reading list.
For more information on Reading Lists visit the Reading Lists for Academic Staff guidance on the Library website.
Find and Replace Tool
The Find and Replace functionality in the Canvas Rich Content Editor is a great tool designed to make editing more efficient. Imagine you’re working in the Canvas Rich Content Editor and you realise you’ve consistently used the wrong term or need to update a phrase. Instead of manually searching through each instance, Find and Replace allows you to quickly locate and update all occurrences all at once.
Student View - Seeing Your Content From a Students Perspective
With Student View, you can navigate the course from a student’s perspective, including viewing content which is useful to ensure content is displaying as intended in your course.
You can access Student View from various areas of the course, including Home, Modules, Assignments, Announcements, Discussions, Quizzes and Pages. You can do this by selecting the "View as Student" button in the top right of the screen, as shown below:
This allows you to view the course exactly as a student would.
Page Version History - Recover a Previous Version of Your Canvas Page
The “View Page History” feature in Canvas allows you to track and manage changes made to any editable page within a course. By accessing the page’s history through the options menu, users can see a list of all revisions, including the date, time, and author of each change. If you need to go back to a previous version, you can restore any of these previous revisions.
This will open a list of all the changes made to the page, including the date, time, and author of each revision. You can then choose a previous version to restore if needed by selecting the version then selecting "Restore this Version".