- Last Updated:
- 5/08/2025
- Tricia Johnson
Thinking about tutoring SAT or ACT test-takers? Smart choice. Whether you’re looking for full-time work or a part-time gig, tutoring test prep is a flexible job with high demand and one of the higher going rates for a tutoring subject.
But don’t just bubble in C with your tutoring career — get the prep you need to make educated decisions. We’ll walk through everything you need to know, from how to find clients to setting competitive prices.
Why Become an SAT Tutor or ACT Tutor?
Test prep is still in high demand despite recent uncertainty around the future of SAT and ACT exams in college admissions. We get it: everyone has strong opinions about standardized testing, and some tutors hesitate to specialize in test prep when 80% of four-year colleges and universities were test-optional in Fall 2025.
So, is test prep tutoring still a good option? The answer is definitely yes. Here are five compelling reasons to be an ACT or SAT tutor:
Many schools are still test-optional after the 2020 pandemic, but 43% of college applicants submitted an SAT or ACT score in 2023, hoping good results would improve their chances. Online SAT tutors access a still-thriving market of students who need help preparing for exams.
2. Your pool of test prep students may be about to grow.
Five Ivy League colleges have reinstated or will reinstate mandatory SAT/ACT requirements in 2025/26 amid arguments that exam scores actually benefit disadvantaged students during admissions. Where the Ivies go, others follow, so this development could further expand the number of test takers.
3. Test prep tutoring is one of the best-paying tutoring subjects.
Because test prep tutoring is time-sensitive and can have high stakes, test prep tutors often charge higher rates than other subjects. If you specialize in test prep and build your skillset, you may be able to expand into other high-earning exams, like the GRE, LSAT, or GMAT (especially if you’ve received high scores on those tests.)
4. It’s a flexible option for full-time, part-time, or gig work.
Tutoring is one of the most popular side hustles for teachers for a reason. Although test prep is on a stricter timeline than most subjects, the broad availability of remote learning makes this job flexible enough to fit most schedules. Many online tutors work as contractors for tutoring platforms or run a private coaching service, allowing them to negotiate hours with students.
5. What you do matters, and the difference you make is measurable.
Studies by the College Board, Princeton Review, and the National Association for College Admission Counselling (NACAC) found that test prep dramatically impacts performance. The Princeton Review found students who used test prep courses scored 100 points higher on their SAT, on average.
It can be tough to measure the impact you make on students in a traditional teaching setting. With ACT and SAT tutoring, you have the rare chance to help students meet a concrete goal that directly impacts their future. Plus, you can advertise precisely how effective you are in making that happen with hard data.
Interested? Let’s lay the groundwork for your first tutoring appointments.
Qualifications & Skills Needed To Be an ACT/ SAT Tutor
Becoming an SAT tutor or ACT tutor is easier than you think. The most crucial qualifications have more to do with your SAT or ACT knowledge and ability to communicate test strategies than degrees or certificates.
Required Skills
Do I Need an SAT Tutor Certification or License to Tutor?
There are no required teaching licenses or certifications to become an ACT tutor or SAT tutor, but some educational platforms may want specific scores or degrees. Regardless of where you work, having some of these items on your resume helps prove you’re qualified:
- A 90th percentile SAT score or a 29+ ACT score: If you tutor through an agency like Tutor.com or Kaplan, you may need a high score to prove you’re qualified. Even if you don’t have to submit a score transcript, students are more likely to trust your advice if it worked for you.
- Evidence of acceptance to college(s) and degree(s): Showing you understand the university admission process signals to students you can help them achieve similar goals.
- ACT and SAT tutor certification: To stand out from the competition or boost your tutoring skills, try an SAT tutor training program with a certification test. Some options for learning how to become a certified SAT tutor online include:
- TPAPT-Certified Tutor: The Association of Test Prep, Admissions, and Private Tutoring (TPAPT) offers a range of SAT and ACT tutor certification courses online costing between $49 and $399. Passing gives you access to a tutoring course syllabus, permission to license TPAPT courses for tutoring sessions, plus client and employer referrals through their network.
- SAT® Bootcamp Tutor: This four-week online course aimed at peer-to-peer tutoring qualifies you to tutor in Schoolhouse’s next SAT® Bootcamp. SAT® Bootcamp is a free learning program, so it’s a good option to practice if you’re new to tutoring or want to build your resume, but it doesn’t lead to a paid position.
- Opportunities for K–12 Educators: If you’re a K–12 teacher looking to prepare students for SAT/ACT success or tutor on the side, the College Board provides educators with self-guided Digital SAT courses and the Princeton Review offers an official ACT certificate of Instructional Mastery.
How to Land Your First Clients
If you think finding clients is one of the most daunting parts of becoming an SAT tutor, you’re not alone. Read any tutor forum about the challenges of being a tutor, and you’ll see finding clients come up regularly. The good news is ACT and SAT tutors are in demand — you just need to refine your marketing.
We have an article bursting with tips and examples to build your tutor advertising strategy, but here are a few ways to locate students who want your help:
1. Explore Tutoring Platforms
If you don’t have many connections in education or with high school parents, a tutoring platform is an easy way to put your services in front of an audience looking for tutoring. Contracting with Tutor.com, Wyzant, VIPKid, and other top online tutoring jobs allows you to create a profile, showcase your skills, and advertise the sessions you offer.
Pro tip: Educational companies may have a proprietary teaching style, program, or technological platform they want you to use, hours they want you to hit, or set pricing. The tradeoff for less freedom in when, where, and how you teach is a built-in audience.
2. Create a Professional Online Presence
If you’d rather go the private tutoring route as a small business, promoting your virtual sessions online is a must.
When looking for a product or service, Gen Z’s top sources of information are Google searches (48%) and social media (44%) (P.S. things aren’t much different for their millennial parents.) That means you need to go where your clients are — especially when they’re looking for your service. Try these digital marketing strategies to bring in more students:
- Create a professional website
- Create a tutoring social media channel
- Use relevant social media groups and message boards
- Place social media and paid search ads
3. Leverage Local Ads
Remember traditional marketing and local ads in your promotion. A well-placed flyer at a local school or community center gym around testing season reminds students and their parents that help is available. If your flyer has a scannable QR code that takes the viewer to your professional website or social media channel, even better!
4. Networking
Your best source of business, especially for local and in-person tutoring, will likely be word of mouth. Start with your existing network, including teachers, school administrators, and parents among your friends and family. Chances are high that someone knows of a school looking for a tutoring vendor or a student who needs testing help.
How to Land Your First Clients
Generally, tutoring prices range from $15 to $150 per hour, and the average cost for an SAT tutor is about $30/hour. How much you should charge for your tutoring service depends on a few factors:
💰 Your qualifications: An experienced test prep tutor with an average student score in a high percentile can charge more than a new tutor who can’t point to results. Likewise, an advanced degree in a math, science, or reading/writing field; recent high SAT/ACT scores; or acceptance to prestigious universities might make higher rates possible.
💰 Your location: Tutors headquartered in major metropolitan areas usually charge more due to the higher cost of living, transportation, and materials. $75+ per hour isn’t unusual for a tutor in a big city.
💰 Group or individual sessions: You can charge more for one-on-one tutoring due to greater personalization, but don’t forget about group sessions. A lower per-student cost reaches budget-conscious learners and gives a higher return on investment.
💰 Online vs. in-person: Tutors typically charge less for online sessions, as meeting in person involves transportation costs or supplying a meeting location.
💰 Tutoring packages: Offer service packages at different prices. For example, a
self-study package with live online practice tests and as-needed support would cost less than extensive teaching sessions covering every test section.
Research the rates of competing test prep tutors in your area and adjust your rates up or down based on the factors above. If you need help deciding how much to charge, check out our handy tutor pricing guide.
Best Teaching Strategies for SAT/ACT Prep
Test prep involves more than drilling in the exact questions students might see. The goal of the SAT and ACT is to test their critical thinking skills as much as knowledge and memory, so a large part of your curriculum should focus on how to think like the test, including:
Question structure and critical reading
The SAT and ACT sometimes signal to test takers what kind of answer they want based on how they ask the question. It may also try to trip up test takers who don’t read the directions. Help students learn the language and logic of the test to score higher.
Multiple choice best practices
Neither test cares how you get to the correct answer — only that you do. Discuss strategies like “guess and check” or eliminating wrong answers to find the right one.
Techniques for when you don’t know an answer
Is it better to guess or leave questions blank? Should a student stay on a question until they get an answer, or skip it and come back? Crucial knowledge like rights-only SAT and ACT scoring and strategies to maximize scores can mean the difference between college admission and rejection.
Time management tips
Walk students through the test sections, how much time they have for each, and how to use time efficiently through skimming and other strategies.
Once you’ve worked with your student to understand the test and set an achievable score goal, it’s time to jump into subject-matter tutoring. Read up on tips for structuring your tutoring sessions and make sure to hit these key subjects:
- Question types: Practice recognizing the common categories of reading and writing questions and math questions asked on the SAT. For the ACT, common English, math, and science question types should be on your agenda.
- Weak exam topics: Maximize time with students by practicing in their weakest areas. Find out whether their goal colleges superscore (meaning whether they count only the highest section score over multiple test attempts) to save time. If your student already has a high math score and their school superscores, focus on reading and writing skills.
- Question distribution: Consider the question topic distribution for each test. For example, 35% of SAT math questions will be about algebra, and only 15% cover trigonometry and geometry. Ensure students spend their studying time where it will make the most impact.
- Practice questions and exams: Gather comprehensive materials like the College Board’s official SAT Practice Tests and Bluebook app, or digital test prep questions from Khan Academy or PrepScholar. You can also consult an official SAT prep book or ACT Prep Guide — just ensure you’re working from the latest edition.
Business and Legal Considerations of SAT Tutoring
Before your first session, cover the legal and risk management aspects of private teaching:
- Register your business: Even if you don’t consider your tutoring a business, the government might. This Small Business Administration registration guide includes helpful info about who needs to register.
- Get tutor insurance: Whether you’re a private tutoring business with a large staff or an independent tutor, working in education exposes you to serious risks. Tutor Insurance from Insurance Canopy is designed to protect you against the most common risks tutors face, from dissatisfied parents to expensive contract disputes.
- Don’t forget about taxes: Self-employed ACT and SAT tutors, like contractors for tutoring companies or freelance instructors, must factor taxes into their budgets. Use this self-employment tax calculator to plan for smooth sailing during tax season.
- Consider a tutoring contract: Tutoring means constantly negotiating pricing and scheduling. Putting your initial agreement in writing is a smart way to clarify what you offer while reducing your legal risk if a client isn’t happy with their results. Use a tutoring contract template or consult a lawyer to create a personalized contract.
Next Steps: How to Scale an SAT Tutoring Service
As you build your pool of success stories and earn referrals, you may end up with more students than you can handle. Would you ever consider scaling your one-person operation into a private tutoring business? Even as you’re learning how to become an SAT tutor and setting up your services, think about your plan for accommodating growth with these strategies:
- Hire tutors with trainable skills: Look for qualified subject-matter experts, but don’t neglect the soft skills that make a great tutor. You can teach a tutor your steps to success — training patience, passion, or flexibility is harder.
- Standardize processes: Break down your tutoring method into teachable takeaways. A tutoring system helps your staff replicate the experience your clients expect, regardless of who leads the session.
- Transition from tutor to manager: We’d all like to think we’re irreplaceable. However, it’s okay to hand off your tutoring responsibilities and shift into a management and strategy role as your business grows.
- Set up systems for growth: Create referral programs to turn happy students into brand ambassadors and keep up with SMART goal setting and tracking, competitor strategy, and new markets.
The Final Review: Is Being an SAT/ACT Tutor Worth It?
Pencils down — it’s decision time. Thankfully, this is one of the easiest choices you’ll ever make. Test prep empowers students to bridge the gap between where they are and where they want to be. Whether you’re looking for a side gig or ready to build a business, becoming an SAT tutor or ACT tutor is a rewarding way to make a difference in students’ futures.
Ready to get started? Study up on starting a home tutoring business.
FAQs About How to Become an ACT Tutor or SAT Tutor
Should I work for a tutoring company or start my own business?
Whether working for a tutoring company or starting your own private tutoring business is right for you depends on what you’re looking for.
- A tutoring company makes it easier to get started. Tutoring companies offer pre-existing course infrastructure, remote learning tools, and a client pool already looking for tutoring. They may even provide curriculum or pricing and scheduling guidelines.
- A private tutoring business offers greater flexibility. You can teach how, when, where, and what you choose without adhering to company guidelines. It also means you’re on your own to run your business, find clients, and create curriculum, session packages, and pricing.
What SAT score do I need to become a tutor?
Some tutoring companies ask for a specific score to get hired as an SAT tutor, but there is no universal, must-have score. To stay competitive and confidently present yourself as an authority on the SAT, a 90th percentile or higher SAT score is a solid goal for a test-prep tutor.
How do you get certified as an SAT tutor?
If you want an SAT tutor certification, find online classes through professional tutor associations like TPAPT or training programs like Schoolhouse’s free SATⓇ Bootcamp program. While the College Board (the creator and administrator of the SAT) doesn’t provide an official certification course, they offer online SAT courses for K–12 educators.
Do I have to tutor both SAT and ACT?
Some students take both the SAT and the ACT to increase their chances (this is less popular and less recommended than in years past), but they rarely study both at once. Adding to your test prep menu can bring in more clients, but plenty of tutors focus on one test. If you offer both, try creating resources to help students decide which fits their goals, schools, and strengths.
