Teaching English online is a lucrative career path for many, and it’s not hard to get started! With so many online teaching platforms to choose from, there is a seemingly endless demand for teachers. In most cases, all you need is a good internet connection and a TEFL or TESOL certificate to get going.

However, a recent ban on online tutoring introduced by the Chinese government in July 2021 turned the online ESL market upside down.

With 300 million English learners located in China, there was a plethora of Chinese online teaching platforms employing mostly North American teachers. After the sudden ban, thousands lost their jobs overnight.

However, fret not. Luckily, there are some great alternatives to Chinese online teaching platforms out there that are not affected by these new regulations.

Here are 20 non-Chinese Online Teaching Platforms to work for in 2022!

China’s Ban on Private ESL Tutoring

In July 2021, the Chinese government announced a new policy banning private ESL tutoring. The policy called “Opinions on Further Reducing the Burden of Homework and Extracurricular Training for Students” was put in place in the summer of 2021 and affects students from grades 1 through 9.

The policy bans tutoring on core subjects such as Chinese, English, and math late at night, on weekends, and during school breaks. The ban also restricts hiring foreigners based outside the country.

How does this ban affect Online ESL Teachers?

The ban was put into place out of the blue, and thousands of online ESL teachers lost online teaching gigs overnight.

Those who didn’t lose their jobs altogether are faced with salary and teaching hour cuts, a reduced student number, and major changes to the teaching schedule.

The Chinese government has already halted any extracurricular classes after 9 PM, and it is also expected that online classes will be banned during weekends, holidays, and school breaks. Online teaching for pre-school children has been banned outright.

Many Chinese ESL companies have switched their teachers to freelance contracts rather than employees. Additionally, these types of companies will now have to register as nonprofit organizations, hence severely affecting the salaries of their teachers.

Why is China limiting private tutoring?

There are two main factors why the Chinese government is now putting brakes on its private tutoring sector.

1. Safeguarding for Children’s Mental Health

• China’s culture and education are extremely competitive.
• A reduction in extracurricular lessons will allow children to have more opportunities to relax and just be children

2. An Incentive to Help Families

• The financial burden caused by additional tutoring will be alleviated for parents.
• High tuition fees and the living costs of living in big cities hinder many Chinese people from having children.
• Thus, restricting private tutoring will hopefully fight a declining birth rate.

Do I need a TEFL/TESOL certificate to teach English Online?

Most online teaching platforms require their teachers to possess an internationally accredited TEFL certificate. For those platforms that do not require it, higher pay rates are offered to certified teachers.

A TEFL or TESOL certificate can be obtained through an accredited course that can be completed either 100% online or in-class. Most people opt for an online TEFL course because it’s incredibly convenient and a lot cheaper compared to an in-class course. It only takes 3-4 months depending on your own study preference to complete an online TEFL course.

Ideally, you want to opt for a TEFL course of at least 100 hours of study. This is the international standard and will also certify you to teach English as a foreign language abroad.

If you want to teach a specific student group, such as children or business professionals, you can also take specialized TEFL courses to add to your portfolio.

For teaching English online, I recommend taking a TEFL course with online specialization, as it goes over all the additional things you need to know to have a successful career in teaching online.

To find out more about the different TEFL course options and to get a 20% discount off of your TEFL/TESOL course, read my guide to the best TEFL courses for teaching English online or abroad.

Online Teaching Platforms that Don’t Require a Degree

Even if you don’t have a four-year bachelor’s degree, there are plenty of platforms to choose from. As you can see below, teaching platforms that do not require a university degree include:

• Cambly
• Engoo
• Ginseng English
• italki
• Latin Hire
• Learnlight
• Open English

• Preply
• Rype
• Skima Talk
• Skyeng
• Superprof
• Verbling

Online Teaching Platforms that Hire Non-Native Speakers

You don’t have to be a native English speaker to work as a teacher online. There are many online teaching platforms that hire non-native speakers, these include:

• Engoo
• Ginseng English
• italki
• Latin Hire
• Learnlight

• Preply
• Rype
• Skyeng
• Superprof
• Verbling

Here are 20 non-Chinese Online Teaching Platforms:

Cambly

Cambly primarily focuses on building English proficiency and confidence through conversation lessons. Students can access lessons either on the computer or a mobile device.

Hourly rate:

£7.65 ($10.20)

Degree required:

No

Lessons provided:

No

Students:

All ages

Min. hours per week:

None

TEFL qualification required:

No

Accepts non-native speakers:

No

Previous teaching experience required?

No

Additional requirements:

None

English Hunt

English Hunt is a South Korean company and one of the earliest players in the online education industry. The company has been offering e-learning and distance English education since 2001 and is the largest provider of Live Video Classes for English language education in South Korea. The company has also recently expanded into Japan and China.

Hourly rate:

£10.50 ($14.50)

Degree required:

Yes

Lessons provided:

Yes

Students:

All ages

Min. hours per week:

10 hours

TEFL qualification required:

Yes

Accepts non-native speakers:

No

Previous teaching experience required?

4 years

Additional requirements:

Must be a US citizen

English Ninjas

With English Ninjas, you can work as little or as much as you want. Connect with students from all over the world and talk about anything from world news to fashion. It’s great for learning more about different cultures and making new friends from around the world.

Hourly rate:

£6.50 ($9.50)

Degree required:

Yes

Lessons provided:

No

Students:

All ages

Min. hours per week:

12 hours

TEFL qualification required:

Preferred

Accepts non-native speakers:

No

Previous teaching experience required?

Preferred

Additional requirements:

None

Engoo

Engoo is another great online teaching platform with students all over the world from Korea, to Turkey, to Brazil. Currently, Engoo has over 11,000 private tutors conducting over 1.2 million lessons per month.

Hourly rate:

£2 – £7.20 ($2.80 – $10)

Degree required:

No

Lessons provided:

Yes

Students:

All ages

Min. hours per week:

None

TEFL qualification required:

Preferred

Accepts non-native speakers:

Yes

Previous teaching experience required?

None

Additional requirements:

None

FluentBe

FluentBe is a global online teaching platform headquartered in Poland. Their language learning model is targeted towards busy people offering lessons at convenient hours, in small groups online.

Hourly rate:

£7.20 – £8.70 ($10 – $12)

Degree required:

Yes

Lessons provided:

Yes

Students:

All ages

Min. hours per week:

None

TEFL qualification required:

Yes

Accepts non-native speakers:

No

Previous teaching experience required?

1 year

Additional requirements:

None

Ginseng English

Ginseng English is not one-on-one tutoring via Skype. On the contrary, teachers working for Ginseng English will teach to groups of students from around the world based on a solid curriculum.

Hourly rate:

£7.50 – £11.25 ($10 – $15)

Degree required:

No

Lessons provided:

No

Students:

Young learners and teenagers

Min. hours per week:

None

TEFL qualification required:

Preferred

Accepts non-native speakers:

Yes

Previous teaching experience required?

Preferred

Additional requirements:

None

italki

italki is one of the best-known online teaching platforms. The Chinese company was founded in 2007 and is headquartered in Hong Kong. Today, italki has more than 3 million users and 5,000 teachers from all around the world. English is the most popular language being taught, followed by Spanish, French, Chinese, and Japanese.

Hourly rate:

Set your own hourly rate

Degree required:

No

Lessons provided:

No

Students:

All ages

Min. hours per week:

None

TEFL qualification required:

Preferred

Accepts non-native speakers:

Yes

Previous teaching experience required?

None

Additional requirements:

None

iTutor

Based out of New York, iTutor holds daily lessons to over 20,000 students through live, personalized online instruction.

Hourly rate:

£3.75 – £16.50 ($5 – $22)

Degree required:

Yes

Lessons provided:

Yes

Students:

All ages

Min. hours per week:

6 hours

TEFL qualification required:

Yes

Accepts non-native speakers:

No

Previous teaching experience required?

1 year

Additional requirements:

None

LatinHire

LatinHire is a leading e-learning company worldwide. On this platform, you can not only teach English but also other subjects, such as Marketing, Economy, IT, Calculus, Chemistry, Physics, Statistics, Accounting, and more.

Hourly rate:

£5 – £9.50 ($7 – $13)

Degree required:

No

Lessons provided:

Yes

Students:

All ages

Min. hours per week:

5 hours

TEFL qualification required:

Yes

Accepts non-native speakers:

Yes

Previous teaching experience required?

No

Additional requirements:

Elementary level Spanish or Portuguese required

Learnlight

Another great online teaching platform is Learnlight. Their services help students transform their language, intercultural and soft skills training. The platform currently counts more than 500,000 learners across 180 countries.

Hourly rate:

£9 – £10.50 ($12 – $14)

Degree required:

No

Lessons provided:

No

Students:

All ages

Min. hours per week:

10 hours

TEFL qualification required:

Yes

Accepts non-native speakers:

Yes

Previous teaching experience required?

2 years

Additional requirements:

None

Lingoda

Lingoda is one of those teaching platforms offering lessons around the clock, 24/7. This has allowed Lingoda to accumulate a student base of over 80,000 people tutored by over 1,500 professional teachers. You can teach English, German, Spanish or French on the platform.

Hourly rate:

£6 – £9.75 ($8 – $13)

Degree required:

Yes

Lessons provided:

Yes

Students:

Adults

Min. hours per week:

5 hours

TEFL qualification required:

Yes

Accepts non-native speakers:

No

Previous teaching experience required?

2 years

Additional requirements:

None

NIL English

NIL English is a company based in South Korea providing online English classes for Korean students and adults. While lesson material is provided by NIL English, teachers can also bring their own material into the virtual classroom.

Hourly rate:

£7.25 – £14.50 ($10 – $20)

Degree required:

Yes

Lessons provided:

Yes

Students:

All ages

Min. hours per week:

10 hours

TEFL qualification required:

Preferred

Accepts non-native speakers:

No

Previous teaching experience required?

None

Additional requirements:

Must be from North America

Novakid

Novakid is an online teaching platform based in Russia. They hire teachers from all over the world to hold lessons for 4-12 years old children from Russia, Poland, Turkey, Germany, Spain, and other countries.

Hourly rate:

£11.50 ($16)

Degree required:

Yes

Lessons provided:

Yes

Students:

Young Learners

Min. hours per week:

20 hours

TEFL qualification required:

Yes

Accepts non-native speakers:

No

Previous teaching experience required?

1 year

Additional requirements:

None

Open English

If you have language skills in Spanish, you’d be a great fit for Open English. This online teaching platform was founded in Venezuela in 2006 and is now headquartered in Florida, USA. They cater to Spanish-speaking students and have a client base of over 100,000 people in the Spanish-speaking world.

Hourly rate:

£9.75 – £11.25 ($13 – $15)

Degree required:

No

Lessons provided:

Yes

Students:

Teenagers and adults

Min. hours per week:

10 hours

TEFL qualification required:

Yes

Accepts non-native speakers:

No

Previous teaching experience required?

1 year

Additional requirements:

US candidates only, Spanish language skills a plus

Preply

At the moment, Preply is one of the biggest online teaching platforms out there. The company is headquartered in Kyiv, Ukraine and has offices in Barcelona, Spain. As of 2021, Preply has over 140,000 tutors teaching 50 different languages to students in 203 countries worldwide.

Hourly rate:

Set your own hourly rate

Degree required:

No

Lessons provided:

No

Students:

All ages

Min. hours per week:

None

TEFL qualification required:

Preferred

Accepts non-native speakers:

Yes

Previous teaching experience required?

Preferred

Additional requirements:

None

Rype

Rype is an app-based online teaching platform that focuses on improving speaking skills via real-life conversations with native speakers. Besides English, you can also learn and teach many other languages on the app.

Hourly rate:

£6.50 – £8 ($9 – $11)

Degree required:

No

Lessons provided:

No

Students:

All ages

Min. hours per week:

15 hours

TEFL qualification required:

Preferred

Accepts non-native speakers:

Yes

Previous teaching experience required?

1 year

Additional requirements:

None

Skima Talk

Skima Talk is an online teaching platform exclusively focusing on English learning. They help connect English teachers with eager students from all over the world to deliver one-on-one English lessons online. They also plan to expand to other languages and skills in the near future.

Hourly rate:

£7.50 – £11.25 ($10 – $15)

Degree required:

No

Lessons provided:

No

Students:

Adults

Min. hours per week:

None

TEFL qualification required:

Preferred

Accepts non-native speakers:

No

Previous teaching experience required?

Preferred

Additional requirements:

None

Skyeng

Another online teaching platform hailing from Russia, Skyeng is the largest online English school in Eastern Europe. The company currently has  89,900 active students and 8,600 teachers. Teachers on the platform conduct one-to-one English lessons to students from Russia and Eastern Europe.

Hourly rate:

£2.20 – £14.50 ($3 – $20)

Degree required:

No

Lessons provided:

Yes

Students:

All ages

Min. hours per week:

15 hours

TEFL qualification required:

Yes

Accepts non-native speakers:

Yes

Previous teaching experience required?

None

Additional requirements:

None

Superprof

Founded in Biarritz, France, in 2013, Superprof has quickly grown to one of the largest online teaching platforms in Europe. Today, their community has an incredible 17,392,875 tutors from all over the world teaching 35 million students in 39 countries and 18 languages.

Hourly rate:

Set your own hourly rate

Degree required:

No

Lessons provided:

No

Students:

All ages

Min. hours per week:

None

TEFL qualification required:

Preferred

Accepts non-native speakers:

Yes

Previous teaching experience required?

None

Additional requirements:

None

Verbling

Based out of San Francisco, California, Verbling is an online teaching platform that connects individuals with language teachers via video chat. The company launched its language learning app in 2017. Among their biggest clients are Volkswagen Group and Inditex. Today, they have more than 2,000 teachers offering classes in 43 languages.

Hourly rate:

£11.25 – £18.75 ($15 – $25)

Degree required:

No

Lessons provided:

No

Students:

All ages

Min. hours per week:

None

TEFL qualification required:

Preferred

Accepts non-native speakers:

Yes

Previous teaching experience required?

Yes

Additional requirements:

None

Helpful Teaching Resources for New Teachers

Planning lessons and creating a curriculum that makes sense and flows is challenging – especially for new teachers. The following resources will help you with this daunting task and also save you time!

Teaching English as a Foreign Language For Dummies

Don’t underestimate this book of the “for dummies” series! It’s a great book to get started in teaching English as a foreign language. You’ll learn how to put an EFL course program together from scratch, lead your students in skills classes – from reading to listening, deliver grammar lessons in a logical and intuitive way, and finally how to cope with different age groups and capabilities. In short, this book is your one-stop guide to a career that will take you places! Buy this book.

39 ESL Warm-Ups: For Teenagers and Adults

This book saves you a ton of time when planning lessons and helps to get your classes started off with an interesting, engaging activity that catches the students’ attention. You have 39 fun and engaging activities at your fingertips with this book, which you can use at the beginning of your class to get your students warmed up for English or you can also use them at the end of your lesson when you have a bit of extra time – or sandwich them in between to loosen up the mood! Buy this book.

The ESL / ELL Teacher’s Survival Guide

This book includes ready-to-use strategies, tools, and activities for teaching English language learners of all levels. You’ll also learn how to properly set up an ESL-friendly classroom, motivate and interact with students, communicate with parents of English learners, and navigate the challenges inherent in teaching ESL students. Buy this book.

You might also like these articles:

Get your Free Seoul City Check List

This downloadable check list for Seoul contains insider information on what to see, do, eat and where to shop and party in Seoul, South Korea.

Love it? Pin it and save it for later!

Check out more Korea content: