How to Start a Tutoring Side Hustle

Anyone can become a tutor. You don’t need any specific credentials or experience—you just need to be able to find students who want to be tutored by you.

However, it obviously makes life a lot easier if you’re proficient in the subject you want to teach. That will lend you extra credibility and make it easier to find students.

There’s a market for tutors in dozens of subjects. Popular ones include:

• English: The demand for English tutors is nearly limitless. As you’d expect, many students of English are second-language (ESL) learners who are based in other countries, so this is a great option if you want to teach online.
• Test preparation: This refers to prep work for standardized tests, such as the SAT or ACT. Test prep is a particularly well-paid tutoring subfield.
• STEM: Many students find these fields challenging. If you have a background in science, math, or something tech-related (such as programming), there are plenty of people who’ll pay extra for your expertise.

Your instinct might be to pick a broad swath of topics to increase your pool of potential students, but we spoke to one experienced tutor who told us that it’s usually better to find a niche—the more specific, the better.

“Anyone considering doing online teaching should specialize,” he told us. “Otherwise it’s too competitive and your rates will be very low.” For example, if you want to become an English tutor, it’s best to hone in on a particular niche, such as teaching business English or helping students prepare for a specific English exam.

Refresh your knowledge before you begin

It’s often a good idea to brush up on the subject you’ll be tutoring, particularly if it’s something you studied a while ago and haven’t touched on since. Academic fields are always changing, as are testing criteria.

For general subjects, find out what books are currently being used for relevant courses and then read them yourself. If you want to become an exam prep tutor, try taking the test yourself to make sure you get a high score. You can use the free resources available at your local library, or you can find lessons online on sites like Coursera and Udemy.

One of the most important decisions you need to make before you start tutoring is who you want to teach. Specifically, think about your preferences in terms of age group and skill level. This decision will determine the best place to advertise your tutoring services and how you go about tutoring.

For example, if you want to tutor middle school students, your advertisement strategy may involve collaborating with teachers or the school counselor. If you’re offering test prep tutoring, you might post fliers at your local library.

In terms of your students’ ability level, it goes without saying that you need to be at a higher level yourself in order to offer valuable tutoring services. If you’re starting your tutoring side hustle as a teen, you’ll want to tutor students who are taking classes that you’ve already passed with flying colors.

If you’re considering tutoring as a side hustle, there are a couple of ways to get started. You can get students by signing up for a tutoring platform or start up your own tutoring business.

Using a platform is easier since you don’t need to source your own students. However, your earning potential will be lower and you’ll have less freedom. Recruiting your own students is often more lucrative than using tutoring sites and apps since you don’t have to sacrifice a cut of your profits or pay any membership fees.

With your own tutoring side business, you can tutor still tutor online in addition to in person. Here’s a rundown of all your options for a tutoring side hustle.

Using online tutoring platforms

Online tutoring platforms do a lot of the hard work for you by connecting you with students. They also often provide the following benefits:

• Premade lesson plans (or lesson-planning tips)
• Teaching materials, such as worksheets
• A virtual classroom where you can conduct your lessons

If you want to sign up to a tutoring platform, there are a lot of options to choose from. For ideas, check out our full list of the best online tutoring job platforms.

Of course, teaching platforms don’t provide all these benefits for free. While you won’t necessarily have to pay any fees, many tutoring apps take a cut of your profits, meaning you’ll earn less tutoring on a platform than you would if you found students by yourself.

Teaching online also allows you to cast a much wider net to find students instead of limiting yourself to people in your area. However, it’s worth noting that some online tutoring platforms have qualification requirements for tutors, like eligibility to work in the US or a teaching certification.

In-person tutoring

Of course, you won’t need any of the above if you only offer in-person tutoring sessions. You just need to pick a place to hold your tutoring sessions.

Some in-person tutors go to their students’ homes and some tutor from their own homes. You can also go to a public place, like a coffee shop or library.

Online tutoring without a platform

You don’t have to sign up for a tutoring app to tutor online. Instead, you can start your own online tutoring business. You’ll need to find your own students, but you’ll be able to set your own rates, keep 100% of your earnings, and call all the shots.

To start an online tutoring business, the first thing you’ll need to do is decide what video conferencing software to use for your lessons. Here are a few good options to consider:

• Zoom
• Google Meet
• Webex
• Lessonspace
• LearnCube
• Miro

It’s also a good idea to use scheduling and accounting software if you plan on doing a lot of tutoring or turning your tutoring side hustle into a full-time job. This will help you keep track of your lessons and streamline the payment process.

Once you’ve decided whether you want to tutor online or offline, you’ll need to think about where you’ll actually be doing your tutoring. For online tutoring, you’ll need a quiet space with a desk where you can set up your computer and webcam, like a home office.

If you want to provide in-person tutoring, then you have a few options. You can tutor in a public place (e.g., at a school, library, or coffee shop), at your home, or at the student’s home. Thinking about this in advance will make things go a lot more smoothly when it comes time to schedule your first lesson with a new student.

In addition to thinking about your tutoring space, you need to ensure you have the right materials and resources. What exactly you need will depend on the type of tutoring you’re doing, but the table below will give you a basic idea.

Tools You’ll Need for a Tutoring Side Hustle

You may need special materials, depending on what subject you’re teaching. For example, if you’re tutoring students in math or physics, you’ll need a calculator. If you’re teaching a foreign language, you may want to have a dictionary handy.

If you’re launching your tutoring side hustle through an agency or website, you may be given teaching materials and resources or be given a list of equipment requirements you need to meet.

Not all tutoring side hustles give you full freedom over your earnings as a tutor. If you’re making money tutoring online through a tutoring company, the platform may already have set rates. However, if you’re starting your own tutoring business, you’ll need to decide how much to charge for your tutoring services.

Rates for tutoring can vary massively. As a very general guideline, Indeed claims the average tutor charges $15–$40 per hour. It’s certainly possible to make more than that if you’re particularly in-demand, although in the beginning, you might need to set your rates lower to land clients. Just make sure that whatever rate you choose is actually worth it for you.

In addition to deciding your rates, you also have to decide what payment method you want clients to use (e.g., cash, check, Venmo, or PayPal) and whether you want them to pay for blocks of lessons upfront or to pay as they go.

If you’re starting your own tutoring business (rather than just signing up for a tutoring platform), then it can make things easier if you formally register your tutoring business. You don’t necessarily need a license to start a tutoring business, but getting one offers both legal and financial benefits.

Even if you don’t register your tutoring business, you should keep your business finances separate from your personal finances. This will help you during tax season and also protect your personal assets in the unlikely event that somebody sues your business.

Keeping financial records

In the US, if you earn over $400 from gig work, you have to report the money you make and potentially pay taxes on it. Make sure you put aside a percentage of the money you earn to pay your taxes at the end of the year and keep records of all of your business transactions over the year. Fortunately, there are apps available to help you do this, like Expensify and Emburse.

If you’re striking out alone as a tutor, you’ll have to find students yourself, meaning you’ll have to market yourself. Your best bet is using tried-and-tested marketing strategies tailored to your subject and the types of students you’re tutoring.

This will probably be easy if you’re already a professional teacher or a professor. We spoke to one English teacher, Mark James Edwards, who has been providing one-on-one tutoring sessions for many years and has also taught online university classes.

He recommended word-of-mouth referrals as a way to get students. “Advertise through your existing network. Let your real-life students know if you’re teaching online,” he said.

If you don’t have a network yet, here are other tips to help you spread the word:

• Use freelancer platforms: Upwork, Fiverr, and Freelancer are popular options for advertising tutoring services. Bear in mind that these will take a cut of your earnings.
• Distribute business cards: It’s very simple to design and print business cards on sites like Vistaprint and Canva. You can use these to network with people in person.
• Advertise yourself on social media: You can use Facebook, Twitter, or other social media platforms to advertise that you’re taking on students.
• Find sites that don’t take commission: Some sites will let you create a tutoring profile without charging you anything. KidoServ is a site that connects students and tutors free of charge. You can also try local classified sites like Craigslist.
• Word of mouth: Once you’ve got a couple of students, you can ask them to let their friends, colleagues, or classmates know that you’re available for work.
• Offer free trial lessons, workshops, or seminars: Contact local libraries, schools, and recreation centers to ask whether they’ll let you host free seminars or workshops. This is a great way to gain exposure. You can also entice people to try your services by offering free lessons—even just a 20-minute mini-lesson can work.
• Reach out to local schools or universities: Many schools will let you advertise your tutoring business on campus by putting up flyers. If you’re a test prep tutor, this is one of the best ways to find students.

Not everyone will find tutoring worthwhile, but those who do will get a lot of satisfaction from the role. A tutoring side hustle is best suited to people who have strong communication skills, compassion, and patience and who want to work with children and young adults.

Tutoring is among the best side hustles for teachers and side hustles for teens, and it’s particularly well suited to people who work in caregiving roles, like babysitters and nannies. It’s also a great way to make money in retirement.

Running your own tutoring business is much more labor-intensive than working for a platform, which will handle a lot of this work for you. However, again, your profit potential will be much higher.

Whatever type of tutoring business you set up, as long as you put in the work to find students and make your lessons as useful and engaging as you can, you’re sure to find enough success to make tutoring a worthwhile side hustle or even a stepping stone to a teaching career.