Tutor Salary (2026), outlook and how to become one

Tutors earn a median of $43,350 a year (BLS OEWS, May 2025), 15% below the $50,980 median for all US occupations. That works out at $20.84/hr. The middle half earn between $35,000 and $54,860. The top 10% earn $75,990 or more.

The median hourly wage for tutors is $20.84 (BLS OEWS, May 2025). On a full-year basis the $43,350 annual median works out to about $3,610 a month before tax.

BLS does not publish a starting salary. The nearest measure is the low end of the pay range: the lowest-paid 10% of tutors earn less than $29,430 a year and the bottom quarter less than $35,000 (BLS OEWS, May 2025). New workers often start near that end, but where a particular job starts depends on the employer, the state and the credentials you bring, so read these as the bottom of the range rather than a guaranteed entry wage.

Rarely. Even the 90th percentile is $75,990, so fewer than 10% of tutors earn $100,000 or more (BLS OEWS, May 2025). No state's median reaches $100,000; the highest is Wyoming at $82,290.

The highest state medians for Tutors are Wyoming ($82,290), Rhode Island ($77,850), Massachusetts ($60,900) (BLS OEWS, May 2025).

BLS does not split tutors' pay by specialty or employer, but its range shows how far the top end runs: the highest-paid 10% earn more than $75,990, against a median of $43,350 (BLS OEWS, May 2025). Location moves pay the most in the published data: the best-paying states are Wyoming ($82,290), Rhode Island ($77,850), Massachusetts ($60,900).

Not necessarily. BLS lists "some college, no degree" as the typical entry-level education for Tutors. In O*NET's survey of people already doing the job, 40.9% hold bachelor's degree.

No. BLS projects employment to fall 0.2% over 2025–2035, a loss of 500 jobs (BLS EP, 2025–2035). BLS still projects about 34,200 openings a year, mostly from workers retiring or moving to other work.

Tutors instruct students individually or in small groups to support formal class instruction or improve academic performance. A core O*NET task: provide feedback to students, using positive reinforcement techniques to encourage, motivate, or build confidence in students. Employers most often ask for Office suite software, Presentation software, Spreadsheet software.

Most work fewer than 40. In O*NET's survey of people in the job, 0% of tutors usually work more than 40 hours a week, 9% work exactly 40 and 91% work fewer. 68% say their schedule is regular and 18% irregular, and 14% work seasonally. Source: O*NET 31.0 Database, Work Context.

O*NET scores Tutors highest on the Social, Conventional and Artistic interest areas, so the work mixes teaching, helping and working directly with other people with organising, following procedures and working precisely with data. On NueCareer's MBTI-to-interest mapping the closest types are ENFJ, ESFJ, ESFP. Personality is a fit signal, not a gate. The free NueCareer quiz scores your own profile against all 1,731 careers in the bank.

No minimum. Tutors typically need some college education in the subjects they want to teach, but some tutors, such as those still in high school, may have no college coursework and instead a strong background in a specific subject. Depending on the position, tutors may receive training on the job.

Not a state license. No state licenses tutors. The nearest thing to a hard requirement is set by the employer or platform rather than by law: test preparation tutors usually need to have scored highly themselves on the standardized tests they help students prepare for, and student tutors in college may need a minimum grade point average or high grades in the subjects they tutor. A state teaching certification is treated as a preference by some employers, never as a condition of entry.

Women make up 73.5% of tutors, against 47.1% of all employed people: a female-dominated occupation. 20.6% are 55 or older, close to the 23.2% across all jobs. The median worker is 29.9 years old (all workers: 42.1). Source: BLS Current Population Survey, 2025 annual averages.