In 2026, most UK private tutors charge between £20 and £70 per hour. That is a uselessly wide range, so this guide breaks it down properly: what each level actually costs, what pushes prices up, the hidden extras nobody mentions, and how to pay dramatically less without gambling on quality. Unlike marketplace blogs, we will also name our own prices — because 'it depends' is not an answer a parent can budget with.
UK tutoring rates in 2026: the real numbers
Market figures reflect publicly advertised UK rates in 2026; London and the South East typically sit at the upper end.
KS3 (Years 7–9)
- Typical market rate (per hour)
- £20–£35
- 12-week term (1 hr/week)
- £240–£420
- TutorMint (1-hour lesson)
- from £15
- TutorMint term
- from £180
GCSE
- Typical market rate (per hour)
- £20–£45 (qualified teachers £30+)
- 12-week term (1 hr/week)
- £240–£540
- TutorMint (1-hour lesson)
- from £20
- TutorMint term
- from £240
11+ / entrance exams
- Typical market rate (per hour)
- £25–£60
- 12-week term (1 hr/week)
- £300–£720
- TutorMint (1-hour lesson)
- from £15
- TutorMint term
- from £180
A-Level
- Typical market rate (per hour)
- £25–£70 (examiners often £35+)
- 12-week term (1 hr/week)
- £300–£840
- TutorMint (1-hour lesson)
- from £25
- TutorMint term
- from £300
Market figures reflect publicly advertised UK rates in 2026; London and the South East typically sit at the upper end.
| Level | Typical market rate (per hour) | 12-week term (1 hr/week) | TutorMint (1-hour lesson) | TutorMint term |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| KS3 (Years 7–9) | £20–£35 | £240–£420 | from £15 | from £180 |
| GCSE | £20–£45 (qualified teachers £30+) | £240–£540 | from £20 | from £240 |
| 11+ / entrance exams | £25–£60 | £300–£720 | from £15 | from £180 |
| A-Level | £25–£70 (examiners often £35+) | £300–£840 | from £25 | from £300 |
TutorMint lessons are a full hour, so the per-lesson starting price above is already the hourly rate — no hidden padding to convert. Notice too that the gap between levels is smaller on TutorMint's side of the table than on the market side: a market GCSE tutor can cost double a market KS3 tutor, whereas our per-level pricing moves in small, predictable steps. That matters most for families juggling more than one child or more than one subject, where the market's wide ranges compound fast across a term.
What makes a tutor more expensive?
The £20–£70 range above isn't random — five factors decide where any given tutor lands within it, and it's worth checking each one against a quote before you accept it.
Five factors drive price:
- Qualifications — qualified teachers and current examiners charge the most, since they bring classroom or marking experience a student tutor simply hasn't had time to build yet.
- Level — A-Level and entrance exams cost more than KS3, reflecting the narrower pool of tutors confident teaching to that syllabus depth.
- Format — in-person costs more than online — travel time is built into the rate, and online lessons average roughly 20% cheaper across the market because that overhead disappears entirely.
- Location — London commands a premium even online, since rates are usually set against the tutor's local cost of living rather than the student's.
- Scarcity — 11+ specialists in grammar-school areas raise rates every autumn as test day approaches — booking spring beats booking September, when demand for the same handful of specialists peaks.
The hidden costs nobody advertises
Watch for: registration or 'matching' fees on some agencies; compulsory blocks of 5–10 lessons paid upfront; cancellation policies that charge full price for a sick child; and marketplace commissions that quietly inflate the hourly rate. Before you commit anywhere, ask one question — 'what happens to my money if my child is ill on lesson day?' The answer tells you everything about how the business views families. Our answer: illness reschedules are always free, and if we ever cancel, you are never charged.
None of these costs show up in the headline hourly rate a website advertises, which is exactly why they catch parents out. A registration fee or an upfront block turns an advertised '£25 an hour' into a much larger first payment than expected, and a strict cancellation policy can turn one sick day into a wasted lesson fee. Reading the small print on fees and cancellations before booking is worth as much as comparing the hourly rate itself.
How to pay less without losing quality
- 1Go online rather than in-person
- 2Ask whether the hour you're paying for is genuine teaching time, not admin or padding
- 3Book before peak season (September and January are the price spikes)
- 4Always take a free trial before paying anything — a good tutor is happy to be judged on a real lesson. If a service offers no trial, ask why.
Each of these levers is free to pull and doesn't require trading down on tutor quality — they simply strip out the costs that come from format, timing and guesswork rather than from teaching itself. Before you switch format to save the money, it is worth knowing what the research does and does not find: we set it out in online vs in-person tutoring, including the children for whom in-person is the better buy at any price.
Why is TutorMint cheaper — what's the catch?
Fair question. No catch, two structural reasons: everything runs online on Google Meet, so there is no travel time priced into your bill; and TutorMint is founder-taught rather than a marketplace, so there is no platform commission inflating the rate. You are paying for a genuine hour of teaching, not overheads. The first lesson is free precisely so you can judge the quality before spending a pound. Put simply, our pricing removes exactly the same two cost factors — format and commission — that the section above identifies as the biggest levers on price, rather than being cheap for reasons that would worry us if we were the parent asking.
Ready to find out where your child stands?
Sources
- Publicly advertised UK tutoring rates, TutorMint market research — July 2026
Written by TutorMint Founder
10+ years of classroom and one-to-one teaching experience. Facts checked 1 September 2026.
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