The article analyzes the features of education in Russia as a prerequisite of sustainable development under the COVID-19 pandemic, in particular, using the distant learning technologies. The empirical basis of the research is the results of polling of 79 professors and 325 students. Both the professors and students emphasized such negative consequences of the distant format introduction in spring 2020 as the increased methodological and academic load and the increased time for preparation. Both parties of the educational process mark the advantages of the distant learning: Saving money for transport and eating out, saving time for getting to and from university, possibility to use various formats of educational resources. 51% of the professors marked a decrease in the quality of students' preparation in the distant regime; 35% of the students noted a worsened quality of educational services. Most of the professors (81%) and 33% of the students spoke for the combined format of traditional learning and mastering some part of the material with distant technologies. To a large extent, this is due to one of the qualitative differences of distant education from the traditional one-insufficient time and forms of personal communication between the participants of the educational process. © Published under licence by IOP Publishing Ltd.