Triggers connect a certificate template to activity on your site, so certificates are awarded the moment a learner earns them. The Award tab is also where you set what each certificate is called and how long it stays valid.

The Award Tab

Open a template in the designer and switch to the Award tab. Click Add trigger and choose the event that should issue this certificate. The available trigger types depend on which supported plugins are active on your site. With PressPrimer Quiz, PressPrimer Assignment, LearnDash, LifterLMS, Tutor LMS, and LearnPress all installed, you would see events like “Quiz passed (PressPrimer Quiz)” and “Course completed (LearnDash)”.

After choosing the trigger type, pick the source it watches, like which quiz or which course. Some triggers offer scoped pickers (for example, choosing a course first and then a lesson within it) and conditions like a minimum score. Every source picker also starts with an “Any” option, described below.

A template has one trigger. To award the same design for a different kind of event (say, a quiz pass and a course completion), use Duplicate on the Templates list and give the copy its own trigger.

Important: Only published templates issue certificates. A trigger on a draft template does nothing until the template is published.

Awarding for Any Course or Quiz

The last picker of every trigger type has a pinned first option that awards for any matching source instead of one specific one. Choose it when one certificate design should cover your whole catalog. The options are:

• PressPrimer Quiz: Any quiz
• PressPrimer Assignment: Any assignment
• LearnDash: Any course, Any lesson in this course, Any topic in this lesson, Any quiz in this course
• LifterLMS, Tutor LMS, and LearnPress: Any course, Any quiz in this course

Notice the wording on the scoped options. “Any lesson in this course” means you still pick the course, and the trigger fires for every lesson inside it. “Any topic in this lesson” means you pick the course and the lesson. The parent pickers stay specific; only the final picker offers Any.

Merge fields fill from whichever course or quiz fired the trigger, so {{source.course_title}} prints the course the learner actually completed. Conditions like a minimum score still apply to each one. When you choose a custom meta key for an Any trigger, the picker previews values from your most recent matching course or quiz, and each certificate prints the value from its own source.

Repeat Completions

By default, a recipient can earn a given certificate only once per source. If they complete the same course again, the repeat completion is suppressed rather than issuing a duplicate. On an Any trigger, “once per source” means once per course or quiz: a learner who completes two different courses under an “Any course” trigger earns two certificates, one naming each course, while completing the same course twice issues only one.

Every trigger also carries an Issue again on repeat completion toggle. Turn it on for compliance and recertification scenarios, where each completion is a distinct event: every qualifying completion then issues a fresh certificate with its own credential ID and its own validity period. An annual safety training course is the classic example: the learner recertifies each year and holds a new, current credential each time.

Certificate Display Names

A template’s name is for you. It is what you see in the Templates list and the designer toolbar, and it can be as internal as you like. The display name is what everyone else sees: learners in their My Certificates list, verifiers on the verification page, your staff in the admin Certificates list, and recipients in their email subject line.

By default the two are the same. That works when a template covers one thing. It works less well when one template covers many, which is exactly what an “Any” trigger does: thirty courses all awarding a template named “Course Certificate” gives every learner a certificate called “Course Certificate”, and a list of them tells nobody anything.

The Certificate display name field on the Award tab fixes that. It accepts merge fields, so the name can be built from whatever earned the certificate:

• {{source.course_title}} Certificate produces “Botany 101 Certificate” and “Zoology 201 Certificate” from one template.
• {{source.quiz_title}} - Passed names each certificate after the quiz behind it.
• {{recipient.full_name}}: Safety Certification {{certificate.issue_date}} works too. Any field available to the template can go in the name, including custom meta.

Use Insert merge field beneath the display name to drop a token in at your cursor, the same way you would in a text element. Leave the field blank to keep using the template name.

Recommended Use

Choose an “Any” option on a template with no display name set, and a suggestion appears under the field: it names what the trigger awards for, offers a pattern built from that trigger’s own title field, and gives you a Use this name button to accept it. Pick “Any course” and you are offered {{source.course_title}} Certificate. The suggestion disappears once the field has a name in it, and it never appears for a specific course or quiz, where the template name is already meaningful.

What the Name Applies To

The display name is resolved once, when the certificate is issued, and stored with it like every other merge field. From then on it appears in the My Certificates list, on the certificate’s own page, on the public verification page, in the user profile table, in the admin Certificates list, on the dashboard, in the certificate email’s {subject} token, and in the PDF’s document properties. The PDF file name is based on the credential ID and does not change.

Because the name is stored, renaming a template later never renames certificates already earned from it, and changing the display name pattern only affects certificates issued afterward. If you would like the name printed on the certificate itself, the Display Name merge field puts it on the canvas like any other field.

Certificate Validity

The Certificate validity setting on the Award tab controls how long certificates issued from this template stay valid:

• Never (the default): Certificates never expire.
• After a period: Certificates expire a set number of days, months, or years after their earned date. A “Valid for 2 years” credential earned on June 1 expires two years from June 1.
• On a date: Every certificate from this template expires on one fixed date, regardless of when it was earned. This suits credentials tied to a program year or a standard that sunsets.

Expiry happens automatically: once the date passes, the certificate reports as expired on the verification page and in your admin list. No one has to revoke anything.

What Happens When a Trigger Fires

When a learner completes the qualifying activity, the certificate is issued immediately: merge fields resolve with the recipient and source data, the credential ID is generated, the design is snapshotted, and the certificate email (if enabled) is sent with the PDF attached. The email can use the same merge fields, so its subject can name the course or quiz that was completed. The new certificate appears on the Certificates screen with its source listed, and in the recipient’s My Certificates list.