On-farm visits in Dairy Cattle Management courses provide students the opportunity to utilize all of their senses when describing and evaluating management practices on farms. However, obstacles may exist that prohibit classes from visiting farms. Alternative instructional methods, such as virtual farm tours, must be considered. The objective of this study is to evaluate the use of virtual farm tours as an effective instructional tool in a Dairy Management course. Three farm videos were created and viewed by students throughout the semester. The 35 students enrolled in the course were divided into 8 groups (4 to 5 students/group). Immediately following each video, online technology was used for a question and answer period with the producer. Groups were then asked to evaluate the dairy and provide a written evaluation, including strengths, opportunities, and recommendations for the farm. At the end of the semester, groups did one on-farm evaluation and were asked to complete the same assignment. A survey was developed to better understand student perception of the videos’ impact on the learning process and administered to the class (82.8% response rate). Additionally, group responses for each of the virtual farm assignment questions were compared with those from the on-farm visit and differences evaluated using a paired t-test. Enthusiasm for the course was high with 89.7% of students indicating they were very interested in the content area of the course. The majority of the students agreed or strongly agreed that the virtual tours stimulated interest in the subject matter (63.0%) and allowed them to apply subject matter to real-world settings (72.4%). No overall differences were observed for the strengths and opportunities questions between the 2 scenarios. There was a difference in the scores for the farm recommendation question between 2 of the 3 virtual farm tours (1: 71.9% ± 10.8%; 2: 75.0% ± 6.7%) and the on-farm visit (81.3% ± 7.3%)(P < 0.05). Students felt (69.0%) that virtual tours and live producer interviews were a worthwhile part of the course. Initial data suggest that virtual farm tours are a useful instructional tool in a dairy management course when on-site farm visits are not an option.