In tutor groups, someone regularly says they charge $80 an hour on Preply and still get new students every month. Others doubt it, and worry that newer tutors raise their rates, expecting the same, and lose students instead. We checked what Preply's own listings show, across the 3,870 tutors TutorDNA read in English, French, Spanish and Math.
The short answer
- $80 an hour is rare. 55 of 3,870 tutors near the top of Preply's search list at $80 or more: 1.4%. In Spanish, only 3 of 958 do.
- Up to about $60, a higher price doesn't go with fewer lessons. In English, French and Spanish, tutors listing at $40 to $59 teach about as many lessons a month as tutors at $20 to $39.
- At $80 and up, the groups are too small to measure reliably. The few signs there are point to established tutors with few new bookings, and that is also what tutors charging that much told us.
How many tutors list at $60 and up
| Subject | Tutors | $60 to $79 | $80 and up | Share at $80 and up |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| English | 953 | 60 | 19 | 2.0% |
| French | 976 | 39 | 16 | 1.6% |
| Math | 983 | 28 | 17 | 1.7% |
| Spanish | 958 | 26 | 3 | 0.3% |
Most tutors list well below that. The median is $30 an hour in English, $26 in French, $25 in Spanish and $15 in Math; the rates by subject page has the full spread.
Does a higher price cost lessons?
Median lessons taught a month, for tutors whose listed price didn't change between two scrapes 53 to 64 days apart:
| Listed price | English | French | Spanish | Math |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Under $20 | too few | 60 | 58 | 29 |
| $20 to $39 | 45 | 58 | 86 | 34 |
| $40 to $59 | 49 | 58 | 85 | too few |
| $60 and up | too few | too few | too few | too few |
Between $20 and $59, the price a tutor lists makes little difference to how many lessons they teach in English, French or Spanish. A tutor at $50 isn't, on these figures, a quieter tutor than one at $30. In Math, tutors at $20 to $39 teach a few more lessons than those under $20.
Above $60, too few tutors were measured in any subject to give a reliable figure; groups of fewer than 30 tutors are left out. Two cautions apply to the whole table: these are tutors near the top of Preply's search, so they are busier than tutors further down, and lessons are counted at the price listed today, while long-time students may still pay an older one.
What we can see at $80 and up
Only counts, because the groups are small:
- English: of the 19 tutors at $80 or more, 1 showed Preply's "Booked N times recently" mark on the day of the scrape, against 9% of tutors at $20 to $39. Of the 6 whose price held for two months, 1 gained active students and 2 lost some.
- French: of the 16 tutors at $80 or more, 1 showed the mark, against 13% of tutors at $20 to $39. Of the 5 whose price held, 2 gained active students and 3 lost some.
- Spanish and Math: 3 and 17 tutors at $80 or more, too few with a measured history to say anything.
That's too little to draw conclusions from, but it fits what tutors at that price told us themselves.
What tutors charging $70 to $90 told us
When we shared these figures in a Facebook group for French-speaking tutors, several who charge $70 to $90 described how it works for them. We've left out their names.
- The price closes the door. One tutor at $90 said her calendar is full and her current students don't pay that rate: the high price is there to slow down new bookings, not to attract them.
- The students were there first. Another, at $84, gets one or two new students a month and couldn't take more, because students she has taught for years fill her week. She now lives in the US, her new students come from there, and next to local private lessons her rate is modest. Being available during US hours, in her view, opens the door to students with bigger budgets.
- Students stay. A third has charged $70 to $75 for almost a year: 90% of her students pay that rate, she gets one or two trials a month, and her students stay about a year. Preply is less than half of her income, and she doesn't follow her ranking.
- And a counterpoint. A qualified teacher with exam-board experience raised her price to $40 and never had a student at that rate. Her conclusion: it depends on the student and the teacher they're looking for.
What this means for your rate
- $80 is a price for a full schedule, not a way to fill one. Tutors who charge it describe long-time students, few trials and a high rate that keeps new bookings down.
- The useful question for most tutors is the band below. Up to about $60, the data shows no drop in lessons in English, French or Spanish. The rate checker on each subject's page shows where your rate sits: English, French, Spanish and Math.
- A listed price isn't always the price paid. A tutor can list $90 while long-time students pay what they agreed years ago, so a high listed rate doesn't mean every lesson earns it.
- Know what $80 leaves you. At Preply's 33% commission for a tutor's first 20 hours, an $80 lesson leaves $53.60; at 18%, after 400 hours, $65.60. The commission calculator does the sums for any rate.
For what specialists charge in each subject, see the niches pages for English, French, Spanish and Math, and the Super Tutor guide for what the badge changes.
How we measured
TutorDNA reads the tutor listings in Preply's public search results every week. This page uses 3,870 tutors: English, Spanish and Math on 6 October 2026, and French on 26 September 2026, each compared with the scrape before it. A listed price is the hourly rate a new student sees, before Preply's commission. Lessons a month come from the change in each tutor's lesson count between the two scrapes, for tutors whose price stayed the same. "Active students" is the count shown on a tutor's card, so a gain or loss is the balance of students who started and stopped. More in the methodology.
The figures are free to reuse under CC BY 4.0, with a credit to TutorDNA and a link to this page.