How Open CPD works
CPD isn’t a qualification with a gatekeeper. It’s a structure you can get right — aims, skills, outcomes — that you document, publish under your own name, and back with certificates and badges that hold up to scrutiny.
CPD is a structure, not a qualification
There’s no single accepted authority for CPD. Different bodies, different logos, different prices — and none of them are regulators. That’s not a gap you need someone else to fill. It’s clarity: nobody outside your organisation grades this.
What CPD actually needs is structure. Open CPD calls it Aims, Skills, Outcomes. Aims are what the training sets out to do. Skills are what the learner can do as a result. Outcomes are how their practice changes. Document those three clearly, and you have something a learner, their employer, or their insurer can actually understand and trust.
You decide whether your structure is right, because you know your training. That’s what makes self-accreditation principled rather than a shortcut.
How self-accreditation works, in three steps
You deliver the training, however it happens — a course, a conference, a single webinar.
Log in, set up the course profile against the Aims, Skills, Outcomes framework, and accredit it yourself, in minutes.
Branded CPD certificates and Open Badge 2.0 digital badges are generated instantly for every learner.
Every provider using Open CPD agrees to the Open CPD Charter — Principles for Responsible Recognition. It commits you to recognising genuine, intentional learning, describing it accurately, and never misrepresenting what a certificate means. That’s what makes self-accreditation through Open CPD principled, not just convenient.
A record that holds up
Every certificate resolves to a public achievement page anyone can open — no login, no PDF attached to an email that gets lost. It shows the provider, the course, the aims, skills and outcomes, the CPD points, and a unique verification ID.
Once issued, the record stays tamper-proof — the detail and date can’t drift after the fact. That’s not blockchain hype, it’s IPFS/Pinata: a permanent, verifiable record, nothing more dramatic than that.
Anyone — a learner, an employer, an insurer — can check a certificate online instantly through Verification. Or see a real one for yourself: a live sample achievement page.
Each certificate resolves to an achievement page anyone can open, no login, no PDF attachment.
Your logo and course name lead. Certificates are powered by Open CPD, issued by you.
Once issued, the record stays tamper-proof — the date and detail cannot drift.
One thing we want to be absolutely clear on
There’s no global authority checking CPD content against a master standard — because none exists. Open CPD doesn’t validate, review, or endorse the quality of your training. We never will.
The credibility comes from you publishing your own training under your own name, in a structured, permanent, checkable place. That’s the entire mechanism — there’s no hidden review board behind it.
Never “accredited by Open CPD” — we don’t accredit anyone, so it isn’t an accurate description of what happens here.
Whoever you train, however you deliver it, there’s a way to fit your course to this structure. See who we help.
See it work with your own training
Set up your first course profile today, or talk it through with us first — no pressure either way.
Want more detail first? Download the full guide to CPD accreditation.