Most advice on this subject is written by people selling you something, including this, so here is the disclosure first: TutorBoost is a tutoring marketplace and would like you to teach here. That gives us a reason to be accurate rather than encouraging, because a tutor who moves on bad advice and loses their income does not become a customer.
First, do the arithmetic properly
Preply's commission depends on how many hours you have taught there in total. The schedule, from their own help centre:
Swipe table sideways to see all columns →
| Completed hours | Commission | You keep |
|---|---|---|
| 0 to 20 | 33% | 67% |
| 21 to 50 | 28% | 72% |
| 51 to 200 | 25% | 75% |
| 201 to 400 | 22% | 78% |
| 400+ | 18% | 82% |
| Any trial with a new student | 100% | nothing |
That last row is the one that decides most of these questions, and it is worth reading twice. Every trial lesson with a new student is charged at 100%, so you teach it and are paid nothing for it.
Where you sit on that table changes the answer completely. A tutor 500 hours in is paying 18%, and the difference between that and anywhere else is small enough that moving for the rate alone is not worth the disruption. A tutor in their first year is paying 25% to 33% and taking unpaid trials, which is a different situation entirely.
So work out your real number before anything else: your commission tier, plus the trials you gave away last month.
What their terms actually restrict
Read your own agreement rather than a summary, but the shape is consistent across marketplaces and it is narrower than most tutors assume.
What is genuinely restricted: taking a student you met on the platform off-platform to avoid commission, and exchanging contact details for that purpose. This is the rule with teeth, it is enforced through message monitoring, and breaking it can cost you your account and any balance in it.
What is not restricted: existing anywhere else. You can hold a profile on another marketplace, run your own site, and teach students who find you there. Nobody has agreed to work exclusively for a marketplace by signing up to one, and no marketplace claims otherwise.
The distinction is about how a particular student was acquired, not about where you are allowed to be.
The sequence that works
Build the second presence before you need it. Set up elsewhere while your existing income is intact. A tutor who leaves first and lists second spends the gap earning nothing, and desperation is a bad state to price from.
Do not move your existing students. This is the part people get wrong, and it is both the rule and the sensible strategy. Students you were introduced to on a platform are that platform's to keep. Poaching them is what gets accounts closed, and it puts your balance at risk over a handful of lessons.
Fill the new calendar with new students. Your second platform earns its place by producing bookings you did not already have. If it does not, you have learned something important before you gave anything up.
Move the hours, not the people. As new bookings arrive elsewhere, reduce the availability you offer on the old platform. Your roster migrates naturally over a couple of months, without anyone being asked to follow you anywhere.
Keep your own records throughout. Not contact details taken from a platform, which is the thing you must not do, but your own: what you taught, what worked, testimonials students volunteer, and your own site or profile links. Those are portable and yours.
What actually transfers, and what does not
Does not transfer: your review count, your ranking, your response-time score, your hours toward a lower commission tier. All of it is platform-specific and all of it resets. The hours especially: 400 hours on one marketplace is worth zero on another, which is precisely why a decaying commission is as much a retention mechanism as a discount.
Does transfer: your actual ability, your materials, your speciality, and your understanding of which students you teach well. Those are most of the value.
Expect the first month somewhere new to be slower than the platform you left. You are starting from no reviews again.
When not to move
- You are near or past 400 hours and paying 18%. The rate difference is a point or two, and a point or two does not pay for restarting your reviews.
- Your calendar is full. A better rate on lessons you already have is real money, but it is smaller than the risk of losing bookings while you rebuild.
- You would be tempted to take students with you. If that is the plan, do not start. It is the one thing that can cost you the account and the balance at once.
When it is worth it
- You are in the 25% to 33% band with no realistic path to 400 hours soon.
- You give away several unpaid trials a month and few of them convert.
- You want a second source of bookings rather than a replacement, which is the lowest-risk version of this and the one most tutors should actually do.
What TutorBoost charges, for comparison
A flat rate on every ordinary lesson, which does not change with hours taught, so it is the same in your first month as in your fifth year. Trials are charged at half rather than in full, which means an introductory lesson is paid rather than free.
Two honest caveats. Our rate is much better than Preply's opening band and only marginally better than their 18% floor. And we are early, so our student side is smaller: a better rate on a lesson you do not get is worth nothing. Judge us on whether bookings arrive.
See [what we charge, line by line](/compare/preply) with every Preply figure sourced and dated.