Italki teachers getting pricey?

[Hnie]

I teach on italki, and the price increase for italki teachers is NOT only due to inflation but also because of the fees charged by the payment platform, currency exchange rates, and italki's own rules. Over the past few years, italki has increased the standard price for professional teachers and tutors, meaning they cannot set prices lower than the standard rate. Many professional teachers on italki also do not use italki's tools to teach, as they prefer more stable platforms like Zoom, which they also have to pay for, and these platforms are not cheap.

 

Furthermore, starting this year (2025), italki increased the fee from 15% to 21% for single lessons, meaning lesson prices will increase as well. There are many cheaper teachers on Preply, but I doubt there will be many qualified teachers there, as I have used this platform before to teach and found that their fee system doesn't compensate teachers for trial classes (the first lesson). The advantage is that the fee reduces as teachers accumulate many teaching hours, which causes many teachers there to focus more on the quantity of lessons they can teach  ( than the quality ) to lower the fee (so they can earn more). A platform with a more teacher-friendly fee is Polytripper, which only takes 5%, allowing teachers to offer more affordable prices for students.

[Purple_]

Considering some people are shocked teachers are asking $15+, I'm almost afraid to post that I've been paying $35/hour! 

 

I'm unsure how quality differs between teachers as this was the first teacher I ended up talking to, but I do believe it's money well spend. 
We've been actively going through my textbooks, combined with small conversational practice. I usually book a session every 2-3 weeks, once I've had time to go through the word list for a specific chapter and study it.

I guess if you're at a higher level it might make sense to have sessions more often, but at my level of Chinese I don't think I would benefit strongly from more frequent (>1/week) sessions. There are only so many words I can stuff in my brain before it just doesn't stick anymore. Although obviously spending more time will always result in /some/ degree of improvement, but eventually the value proposition becomes off imo.

 

I also have in person 1.5h group classes once a week locally which cost me about $18/hour converted, which I believe to be reasonably cheap as well.

In both cases I'm taking up someones time, I don't think I would be willing to teach someone Dutch for less either...

[Jan Finster]

On 1/17/2025 at 2:47 PM, Purple_ said:

Considering some people are shocked teachers are asking $15+, I'm almost afraid to post that I've been paying $35/hour! 

Considering that learning Chinese is a hobby for most people, few people are willing or (quite simply) able to afford a hobby at those prices.  Especially for conversation practice when you need volume, such prices would be unsustainable for most. Also, wages in China are not that high, so if you compare what is fair in the Netherlands to what is fair in China, you are overpaying them. I am also not sure if a 35$/lesson teacher is really that much better than a 15$/lesson teacher. I had fantastic teachers for 15$ (off italki, ie arranged privately). 

[Purple_]

On 1/17/2025 at 9:49 PM, Jan Finster said:

I am also not sure if a 35$/lesson teacher is really that much better than a 15$/lesson teacher. I had fantastic teachers for 15$ (off italki, ie arranged privately). 

 

I guess this is probably the biggest question, I don't really know either. For the 1 or 2 lessons a month I have, I don't feel too pressured to shop around for cheaper teachers as long as I'm confident in my current teacher's skills. 

 

Maybe if I ever feel like taking more frequent lessons I'll shop around, all I know is that when I started this was one of the (give or take) 10 teachers I considered. What sold me is that her introduction video was a lot clearer, with better English than a lot of other teachers. This eased my anxiety a little as someone who back then maybe knew half of HSK-1, with as good as no listening and talking skills.

[matteo]

 

 

On 1/18/2025 at 2:47 AM, Purple_ said:

Considering some people are shocked teachers are asking $15+, I'm almost afraid to post that I've been paying $35/hour! 

 

I'm unsure how quality differs between teachers as this was the first teacher I ended up talking to, but I do believe it's money well spend. 
We've been actively going through my textbooks, combined with small conversational practice. I usually book a session every 2-3 weeks, once I've had time to go through the word list for a specific chapter and study it.

I guess if you're at a higher level it might make sense to have sessions more often, but at my level of Chinese I don't think I would benefit strongly from more frequent (>1/week) sessions. There are only so many words I can stuff in my brain before it just doesn't stick anymore. Although obviously spending more time will always result in /some/ degree of improvement, but eventually the value proposition becomes off imo.

 

I also have in person 1.5h group classes once a week locally which cost me about $18/hour converted, which I believe to be reasonably cheap as well.

In both cases I'm taking up someones time, I don't think I would be willing to teach someone Dutch for less either...

 

1) 35 USD (or euros) might be reasonable in the Netherlands but they are a significant sum by the time you convert them to a weaker currency. 

Also I'm not sure how many people in southern europe would be able to so casually spend 35EUR for an hour of chinese lesson. Unfortunately thanks to the global marked they have little choice now. 

 

2) in my experience one hour a week of lesson/conversation is the barest of the bare minimums if you want to still be able to ask where's the bathroom on your next trip to China

 

[Purple_]

On 1/18/2025 at 9:49 AM, matteo said:

Also I'm not sure how many people in southern europe would be able to so casually spend 35EUR for an hour of chinese lesson.

 

I'm in no way suggesting it's for everyone! There are still various sub-$15 teachers on iTalki, and like Jan said no idea how big the difference in quality actually is. 

 

On 1/18/2025 at 9:49 AM, matteo said:

in my experience one hour a week of lesson/conversation is the barest of the bare minimums if you want to still be able to ask where's the bathroom on your next trip to China

 

There are various ways to study, having conversations is just one of them!

It's not like I'm sitting still in those weeks in between

 

I do my SRS cards every day, and my brain usually just ends up generating a bunch of Chinese sentences during the day as well as a nice little bonus. This maybe is just my ADHD, but it does mean that I'm actively training language centers with the knowledge I at that moment have.

1:1's with a teacher are mostly just for me to solidify knowledge, being able to ask questions and practice actual pronunciation. (Big difference between what you hear in your brain, versus actually using your vocal cords and receiving feedback on it)

 

I guess everyone's study methods differ, and that's ok

[abcdefg]

 

On 1/17/2025 at 7:47 AM, Purple_ said:

I usually book a session every 2-3 weeks, once I've had time to go through the word list for a specific chapter and study it...I guess if you're at a higher level it might make sense to have sessions more often, but at my level of Chinese I don't think I would benefit strongly from more frequent (>1/week) sessions.

 

@Purple_ - I would respectfully suggest that you closely examine this conclusion as to timing. If you are at "HSK 1+" as you say, this pace might be too leisurely to allow you to reach a level of useable speech any time this decade. I'm not sure what your language goals are, so perhaps this reasoning doesn't really apply. During the early years of my own Chinese learning journey, I was always in a hurry to learn more and more, eager to use the language more and more, hungry for opportunity, hungry for proficiency. Eventually, I was able to move to China and completely immerse myself in the language and culture, having "lessons" and "sessions" virtually non-stop, 24-7.  

 

But if you just dip one toe in the shallow end of the pool, your experience will differ and your results will differ. Perhaps that's all you want; that's fine; I don't mean to sound judgmental; everyone has different reasons for learning such a powerful thing as a new language. 

[anonymoose]

Expanding on what @abcdefg said, I see language learning like trying to fill a bathtub with a leaky plug. The only way you will be able to fill it up is if you pour water into the bathtub faster than water is draining out. In other words, you will always have a tendency to forget what you have learned. If your rate of learning is slower than your rate of forgetting, then you will never make any progress. Of course everyone's bathtub is leaking at a different rate, but it sounds like it would be difficult to make meaningful progress at only 1 hour per week.

[abcdefg]

On 1/18/2025 at 4:09 PM, anonymoose said:

I see language learning like trying to fill a bathtub with a leaky plug.

 

My plug gets more and more leaky with every passing year.