Preply vs italki, in short: Preply's commission is 100% of the trial lesson with each new student, then 33% to 18% of every lesson depending on the total hours you have taught on the platform; italki takes nothing on the trial, then 15 to 21% of a one-to-one lesson and 30% of a group class. The sum that matters fits on one line: rate × lessons per month × commission rate × 12. At €30 a lesson, 20 lessons a month, on the 28% tier, that is €2,016 a year paid to the platform, for students you see every week.
The question isn't "is that too much?" but "from when does it stop paying for itself?". Run the numbers with your own rate and currency: Preply and italki commission calculator.
Every rate in this article comes from Preply's and italki's help pages, checked on 15 October 2026; the source and date of each page are in the footnotes. Both platforms pay your earnings in US dollars12.
Preply's fee schedule isn't a hidden trap: it is the published price of a service. What remains is what that service does for you, and when.
How Preply's commission works (trial lesson included)
Three mechanics to understand before you decide anything:
- The trial lesson at 100%. The first lesson with each new student is taken in full3. That is Preply's acquisition fee: the platform gets paid for the introduction.
- The sliding scale. On the lessons that follow, the rate depends on the total hours you have taught on the platform, trial lessons included and across all your students4: 33% up to 20 hours, 28% above 20 and up to 50 hours, 25% up to 200 hours, 22% up to 400 hours, then 18% above 400 hours. The rate falls with your total volume, not per student.
- The combined effect. In your first hours, the 100% trial pushes the effective rate well above the published one. Take the calculator's default case: €25 a lesson, 40 lessons a month of which 10% are trial lessons, a new tutor, single lessons on italki. The tutor keeps €603 a month on Preply, €811 on italki and €1,000 without a marketplace5. On Preply, that tutor hands over 39.7% of what students pay: more than 39%, for a published rate of 33%.
The logic to remember: Preply earns a lot up front (the trial, the first tiers) and less and less as you build up hours. It is a model designed to reward volume, and so to keep you on the platform, not to help you leave it.
Preply vs italki: the commissions in 2026
Both platforms take a commission on every lesson, but not in the same way: Preply by the hours you have already taught, italki by the type of lesson the student buys.
| Platform | Trial lesson | Commission on other lessons | Paid out | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Preply | 100% | 33% up to 20 hours taught, 28% up to 50 hours, 25% up to 200 hours, 22% up to 400 hours, 18% above, by total hours taught (trials included) | in US dollars | Preply help centre4 |
| italki | 0% | single lesson 21%, 5-lesson package 19%, 10-lesson package 17%, 15- or 20-lesson package 15%; group class 30% | in US dollars | italki help centre6 |
What you really pay, per year (the maths)
Take a tutor at €30 a lesson who teaches 20 lessons a month on Preply, with no trial lessons that month: €600 of gross revenue a month. Here is what she pays, depending on the tier her hours already taught put her in:
| Hours already taught on Preply | Rate | Commission / month | Commission / year |
|---|---|---|---|
| up to 20 h (new tutor) | 33% | 600 × 0.33 = €198 | €2,376 |
| more than 20 h, up to 50 h | 28% | 600 × 0.28 = €168 | €2,016 |
| more than 50 h, up to 200 h | 25% | 600 × 0.25 = €150 | €1,800 |
| more than 200 h, up to 400 h | 22% | 600 × 0.22 = €132 | €1,584 |
| more than 400 h | 18% | 600 × 0.18 = €108 | €1,296 |
On the 28% tier, this tutor pays €168 a month, or €2,016 a year, for the introduction alone, once the student is already loyal. To find this figure in the calculator: €30 a lesson, 20 lessons a month, 0% trial lessons and between 21 and 50 hours already taught; it shows €5,184 a year on Preply against €7,200 without a marketplace5. Like the calculator, this table keeps the same tier all year: in practice, 240 one-hour lessons a year move you into the next tier along the way.
The trial-lesson effect. The 100% take on the trial pushes up the effective rate of your first hours. For a new tutor (33% tier) who gives a 1-hour trial and then 9 paid hours to the same student: the trial (€30) goes entirely to Preply, then 9 × €30 = €270 gross, taken at 33% = €89.10. Total paid: 30 + 89.10 = €119.10 out of €300 gross, an effective rate of 39.7% over the first ten hours. The tutor keeps €180.90. In the calculator: €30 a lesson, 10 lessons, 10% trial lessons, 0 hours already taught.
On the other side, teaching direct. Without a marketplace, the tutor no longer pays a commission, but taking payment has a cost: her payment provider's fees, which depend on her rate and on her students' cards. The calculator has a field for them. Left at 0%, it compares the commission with nothing at all, which flatters going direct: put your real fees in.
Run the numbers with your own rate and currency in the Preply and italki commission calculator: it compares Preply, italki and teaching without a marketplace, from the rates each platform publishes in its own help centre.
When the platform stops paying for itself
Here is the honest part: at low volume, Preply is a good deal. When you are starting out, the platform solves your number-one problem (finding students), and 33% of a student you would never have met beats 100% of a student who doesn't exist. Paying for acquisition is rational.
Let's be precise about what the commission buys, so as not to caricature it. Preply says it spends a large part of it on bringing students to the platform, on its virtual classroom, on training and on support, and the trial lesson taken at 100% funds a free replacement lesson when the student isn't satisfied. italki collects the student's payment and pays it out to you in dollars with no withdrawal fee of its own. Both find you students you would otherwise have to find yourself, and collect the money for you. Teaching direct, all of that falls on your shoulders, or on tools you choose. So the real comparison isn't "commission" against "zero cost", but the commission against the time and the tools it takes to replace it.
The tipping point comes when finding students stops being the bottleneck. A rule of thumb, not a statistic: a tutor with 15 to 20 regular students, who come back on their own week after week, is no longer paying for acquisition: they are paying a percentage on a loyalty they built themselves. At that stage, each point of commission mostly pays for taking payment.
So the signal isn't a rate, it's a ratio: what share of your income comes from students the platform keeps bringing you, against those who would stay anyway? When the second group dominates, the maths has already tipped.
Going direct in 90 days, without burning bridges
Leaving a platform doesn't mean slamming the door overnight, or approaching students in breach of the terms of use you agreed to. A transition that protects your reputation as much as your income:
- Keep the platform for finding students while you build your direct business. It stays your acquisition channel until you have another one.
- Build your direct offer for new students, not for the ones you met on Preply. Reread your platform's terms of use before you offer anything off the platform to a student it introduced you to. The aim isn't to "take back" a list, but to build a clean channel.
- Give students a reason to stay direct. A student doesn't follow a tutor off a platform to save them a commission: they follow because the experience is better. A credible direct offer is a real layer between lessons: a way to assign work and see what was done, as shown in getting students to practise between lessons.
Allow a quarter, not a weekend. A 90-day transition plan, to adapt to your situation: in the first month, you open your direct channel (a page, booking, payments) without changing anything on the platform; in the second, you send your new contacts there (the ones who come from your network or your content, not from Preply); in the third, direct brings in enough for the platform to become a back-up channel. At no point do you approach a student you met on the platform: that is the line not to cross.
Whether you stay on a platform or teach direct, Teacher and Me takes care of the time between lessons: a short exercise path sent after the lesson, and you see where the student got stuck. Free, no paid plan. It doesn't find students or take payments.
Sources
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Preply, "How to withdraw your earnings", https://help.preply.com/en/articles/15083120-how-to-withdraw-your-earnings (page dated 2 September 2026): balance held in US dollars. Checked on 15 October 2026. ↩ back
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italki, "How do I get paid and what's the withdrawal fee?", https://support.italki.com/hc/en-us/articles/210002367-How-do-I-get-paid-and-what-s-the-withdrawal-fee (page updated 8 October 2026): withdrawals in US dollars. Checked on 15 October 2026. ↩ back
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Preply, "Preply commission model", https://help.preply.com/en/articles/4171383-preply-commission-model (page dated 19 September 2024), and "When and how you get paid for lessons", https://help.preply.com/en/articles/4171348-when-and-how-you-get-paid-for-lessons (page dated 10 September 2026): 100% of the trial lesson with a new student. Checked on 15 October 2026. ↩ back
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Preply, "Preply commission model", https://help.preply.com/en/articles/4171383-preply-commission-model (page dated 19 September 2024): 18% to 33% depending on the total hours taught on the platform, trial lessons included. Tiers read from the table published as an image on that page, transcribed by hand on 15 October 2026. Checked on 15 October 2026. ↩ back ↩ back
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Teacher and Me's calculations with the commission calculator, at the rates above, with no payment-processing fees when teaching direct. Default case: €25 a lesson, 40 lessons a month, 10% trial lessons, 0 hours already taught on Preply, single lessons on italki. ↩ back ↩ back
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italki, "How does italki charge a commission?", https://support.italki.com/hc/en-us/articles/206352068-How-does-italki-charge-a-commission (page updated 7 October 2026): trial lesson 0%, single lesson 21%, 5-lesson package 19%, 10-lesson package 17%, 15- and 20-lesson packages 15%, group class 30%. Checked on 15 October 2026. ↩ back