Best Course Evaluation Software for Austrian Universities (2026)

If your Austrian university or Fachhochschule already runs Lehrveranstaltungsevaluierung (LVE) inside CAMPUSonline or EvaSys, the honest answer is that you probably do not need to replace it — you need to decide what layer to add on top of it. Standard Likert evaluation satisfies the letter of §14 Universitätsgesetz 2002, but it rarely gives a Studienprogrammleitung or a Qualitätsmanagement office the depth they need to actually improve teaching or to evidence a closing-the-loop culture for an AQ Austria audit. This guide compares the tools Austrian institutions realistically choose between in 2026 — EvaSys, the CAMPUSonline evaluation module, Tivian/Unipark (EFS), LimeSurvey and the AI-native platform Koji — and is honest about where each one fits.

What is legally required in Austria

Course evaluation is not optional. §14 of the Universitätsgesetz 2002 (UG 2002) requires public universities to evaluate their teaching, and every public university operationalises this through mandatory student course evaluations tied to its internal quality-management system. At the University of Vienna alone, roughly 2,000 courses are evaluated on a mandatory basis and around 1,300 more voluntarily every semester — the scale is significant.

The external check is different from most of Europe. For public universities, the Agentur für Qualitätssicherung und Akkreditierung Austria (AQ Austria), established in 2012, does not accredit individual programmes — it runs a periodic Audit des hochschulinternen Qualitätsmanagementsystems (typically on a seven-year cycle). The auditors ask whether your internal QM system — of which course evaluation is a core part — actually functions and feeds back into improvement. For Fachhochschulen (under the Fachhochschulgesetz) and private universities (under the Privathochschulgesetz), AQ Austria additionally runs programme and institutional accreditation, where evaluation evidence is examined directly.

Two Austrian specifics that global buyer''s guides miss:

Data protection. The Austrian Datenschutzgesetz (DSG) applies alongside the GDPR, and the Datenschutzbehörde (DSB) is the regulator. The university is the controller; any vendor is a processor requiring an Article 28 data processing agreement.
Co-determination (Mitbestimmung). Evaluating teaching staff touches employment conditions, so the Betriebsrat — specifically the works council for academic staff — has co-determination rights. In practice, how course evaluation data on individual lecturers may be collected, stored and used is often governed by a Betriebsvereinbarung (works agreement). Any new tool must be cleared with the Betriebsrat before rollout; this is the step buyers most often forget.

What makes the Austrian market different

Austrian universities are unusually likely to already own an evaluation tool they did not buy separately. Campus-management is dominated by CAMPUSonline, originally developed at TU Graz and deployed across many Austrian institutions (its instances carry names like TUGRAZonline, UNIGRAZonline, i3v/TU Wien variants, BOKUonline). CAMPUSonline ships an evaluation module, and there is an established CAMPUSonline–EvaSys integration so that course and enrolment data flow automatically into surveys. So the real procurement question is rarely "which survey tool" — it is "what does the tool we already have fail to do, and is that gap worth a second system?"

The gap is almost always qualitative depth and the closing-the-loop step. Numeric averages tell you a course scored 3.8; they do not tell you why, and they do not document the improvement action that an AQ Austria auditor wants to see.

Comparison table

Capability	Koji	EvaSys	CAMPUSonline eval module	Tivian / Unipark (EFS)	LimeSurvey
Primary model	AI-moderated conversational interviews	Standardised Likert surveys (+ paper scanning)	Built-in survey module of the campus system	Enterprise online survey / feedback platform	Open-source survey engine
Qualitative depth	High — adaptive follow-up probes each student	Open-text box, analysed manually or via add-on	Open-text box, manual analysis	Open-text box, text-analysis add-ons	Open-text box, manual analysis
Automatic thematic analysis	Yes — themes, sentiment, representative quotes	Limited / module-dependent	No	Add-on modules	No
Standardised, bias-aware moderation	Yes — same probing logic for every class	Consistent items, no probing	Consistent items	Consistent items	Depends on template
Closing-the-loop / action tracking	Built-in	Reporting only	Reporting only	Reporting / dashboards	Manual
Paper support	No (online/mobile)	Yes — scanning heritage	Online	Online	Online
Campus-system integration (Austria)	API / SSO	Native CAMPUSonline integration	Native	API/SSO	Self-managed
Hosting / data residency	EU/EEA, GDPR-first	German-hosted, ISO 27001	Runs on university infrastructure	German (Frankfurt) BSI-certified DC, ISO 27001	Self-host or EU cloud
Public pricing	Quote-based	Quote-based	Bundled with campus system	Quote-based	Free (self-host) + paid cloud

As of publication, none of the commercial vendors publishes standard per-institution pricing; all quote against institution size and modules. Facts above reflect publicly available vendor and university documentation.

Where each tool fits

EvaSys (Electric Paper Evaluationssysteme GmbH, Lüneburg) is the DACH default and a safe institutional choice: ISO 27001, German hosting, native CAMPUSonline integration, and — still relevant in Austria — genuine paper-scanning for lectures where online response rates collapse. If your priority is a robust, standardised, works-council-friendly instrument that IT and the Betriebsrat already understand, EvaSys is hard to beat. Its weakness is the same as every Likert tool: the qualitative signal sits in an open-text box that someone has to read by hand.

The CAMPUSonline evaluation module is the pragmatic zero-marginal-cost option — you already own it, it is inside the system of record, and data residency is entirely on your own infrastructure. For a small department that just needs to satisfy §14, it is often enough. It is not built for deep qualitative analysis or cross-cohort longitudinal reporting.

Tivian / Unipark (EFS Survey) — Cologne-headquartered, with a BSI-certified Frankfurt data centre and an academic edition — is the right pick when you need a powerful general-purpose survey platform for research and evaluation, with complex logic and panel management. It is heavier than a pure course-evaluation tool.

LimeSurvey (German open-source, Hamburg) is the data-sovereignty choice: self-host it and no personal data ever leaves your servers, which appeases the strictest DSG reading and the Betriebsrat. The trade-off is that you own the maintenance, security patching and analysis effort.

Koji is the newest category: instead of a static questionnaire, each student has a short AI-moderated interview that adapts its follow-up questions to what the student actually says, then automatically produces themes, sentiment and representative quotes across a whole cohort. The same shared AI interview engine powers general customer and user research on the Koji platform (koji.so). For Austrian institutions the honest positioning is a layer, not a rip-and-replace: keep CAMPUSonline or EvaSys as the system of record for mandatory numeric LVE, and use Koji where qualitative depth and documented follow-up matter most — programme reviews, curriculum redesign, new or problematic courses, and the closing-the-loop evidence an AQ Austria audit rewards.

When a competitor is the better choice

Be honest with yourself. If you must scan paper evaluations for large lectures, choose EvaSys. If your budget is zero and §14 compliance is the only goal, use the CAMPUSonline module you already own. If you run a large mixed research-and-evaluation survey operation, Tivian/Unipark consolidates it. If self-hosting for absolute data control is a non-negotiable Betriebsrat condition, LimeSurvey wins. Koji earns its place when the value of understanding why — and evidencing that you acted on it — exceeds the cost of running a focused second instrument alongside your system of record.

Three procurement mistakes to avoid

Skipping the Betriebsrat. Clearing tool selection and data-use rules with the works council before signing, not after, is the difference between a smooth rollout and a stalled one.
Buying a second full survey suite when you needed a layer. You rarely need to replace CAMPUSonline/EvaSys; you need to fill the qualitative and closing-the-loop gap.
Treating response rate as solved. Mandatory evaluation drives coverage but not engagement; a conversational, mobile-first format tends to earn richer answers than a 20-item Likert grid.

Frequently asked questions

Is course evaluation legally required at Austrian universities?

Yes. §14 of the Universitätsgesetz 2002 requires public universities to evaluate teaching, and every public university runs mandatory student course evaluations as part of its internal quality-management system. Fachhochschulen and private universities have parallel obligations under the FHG and PrivHG, examined during AQ Austria accreditation.

Does AQ Austria accredit individual courses?

No. For public universities, AQ Austria audits the internal quality-management system (typically on a seven-year cycle) rather than accrediting individual programmes. Course evaluation matters because it is core evidence that the system works and closes the loop. AQ Austria does run programme and institutional accreditation for Fachhochschulen and private universities.

Do we have to involve the Betriebsrat when choosing evaluation software?

In practice, yes. Because evaluating teaching staff touches employment conditions, the works council for academic staff has co-determination rights, and data collection and use are often governed by a Betriebsvereinbarung. Clear any new tool and its data rules with the Betriebsrat before rollout.

Can Koji replace EvaSys or CAMPUSonline in Austria?

It usually should not. Most Austrian institutions keep EvaSys or the CAMPUSonline module as the system of record for mandatory numeric evaluation and add Koji as a qualitative, closing-the-loop layer where depth of understanding matters most. Koji integrates via API/SSO and hosts data in the EU/EEA.

Is course evaluation software GDPR- and DSG-compliant?

It can be, if configured correctly. The university is the data controller; the vendor is a processor requiring an Article 28 DPA. EU/EEA hosting avoids third-country transfer questions, and anonymised aggregate reporting keeps most accreditation evidence outside personal-data scope. Always confirm hosting location, sub-processors and retention.

What about Fachhochschulen specifically?

Fachhochschulen are accredited at programme and institutional level by AQ Austria, so evaluation evidence is examined more directly than at public universities. The tool choice is the same, but FHs often value tighter action-tracking because they must demonstrate continuous improvement at accreditation, not just at a system audit.