5 Best Online ACT Tutoring Services

The American College Test, more commonly known as the ACT, can be a challenging and incredibly stressful test for many students in their senior year. But the right test prep can help students learn the skills they need to manage that stress. Through ACT tutoring, students learn about a lot of different subjects, how to manage their time, use test-taking strategies, and deal with test anxiety.

We’ve compiled a list of the 5 best online ACT prep courses out there, many with a score improvement guarantee, along with extensive reviews of each one. Explore our extensive pros, cons, and bottom-line breakdowns and see why Learner became our top pick for ACT tutoring services. Regardless of which company you choose, we’re confident that one of these platforms will lead you to the best ACT tutors to help your child achieve their goals.

Highlights at a Glance

Top 5 Online ACT Tutoring Services

There are a lot of online ACT tutoring services and ACT prep courses, which makes it hard to choose just one for your child. We’ve narrowed down the dozens of options to the best ACT prep courses to make this process less overwhelming. 

1. Learner

Learner is our favorite online ACT tutoring service for a number of reasons. All it takes are three simple steps to get started with this platform. Students will fill out a short questionnaire online, answering questions about themselves and their ACT goals. Learner will then match each student with the most compatible tutor in the network.

After you have been assigned a tutor, you can schedule your first lesson. All Learner tutors are thoroughly vetted and must meet strict criteria in order to apply. For instance, each Learner tutor must have a bachelor’s degree from a four-year university and several years of teaching experience to apply. 

Video lectures take place in an online classroom with a virtual whiteboard, text, audio, and file sharing. Each custom lesson is recorded so that students can use them as study tools when studying independently for the ACT. Private tutoring prices start at $60 an hour, but if students aren’t happy with their first lesson, they can get their money back in full. 

Pros

• Rigorously vetted tutors
• Customized lesson plans
• Affordable prices for one-on-one value
• Money-back guarantee
• Interactive whiteboard and recorded lessons
• Matching system

Cons

• Tutors are not available 24/7
• Not geared toward on-demand ACT help

Bottom Line: Due to its high-quality tutors, smart matching system, innovative technology, money-back guarantee, and overall value, Learner is our choice for the best ACT prep course.

2. Varsity Tutors

The most stressful time of a high school student’s career is ACT prep season. Juniors and seniors often have AP classes, a lot of homework, and part-time jobs, which makes it hard to find time to study for standardized tests. 

That’s where Varsity Tutors come in. This platform is tailored toward helping students with a busy schedule. Varsity Tutors has an app that works on mobile phones and laptops, allowing students to sign on whenever they have a spare moment, whether between classes or on the bus home from school. 

Varsity Tutors offers various ACT-specific packages, including a 2-week boot camp and either a 4-week or 8-week prep class, all priced at $31 an hour. Students can also take subject-specific math, English, reading, or science courses or opt for private tutoring sessions. If a student wants private tutoring, Varsity Tutors will match them with a tutor who is a good fit. 

Pros

• Many ACT-specific courses offered
• Works on mobile phones
• Customized lesson plans for private tutoring
• Affordable prices

Cons

• The quality of private tutoring differs depending on the tutor
• Pricing is not available upfront
• Not suited for those looking for long-term assistance from a consistent tutor

Bottom Line: Tailored toward high school students with the busiest schedules, Varsity Tutors has an app that works on mobile phones and laptops, allowing students to sign on whenever they have a spare moment. Varsity Tutors offers various ACT-specific packages, including a 2-week boot camp and either a 4-week or 8-week prep class.

3. Wyzant

Wyzant is different from many of the other services in this list because it is more like a search engine for tutors. This platform has over 80,000 tutors in its network, each with different subject-matter expertise, hourly rate, and background. If your child needs help with a certain area of the ACT, like math, you can also choose to work with someone with that subject-matter expertise, like an online calculus tutor.

One of the best parts about using Wyzant is that it’s easy to hone in on an ACT tutor who fits within your budget. Tutor rates range between $10 and $500 an hour, depending on the tutor’s level of education, certifications, and years of experience. Make sure to look at tutors’ reviews and ratings, as previous customers have claimed that the quality of their service highly depended on the tutor they worked with. 

Wyzant offers a Good Fit Guarantee. If you are unsatisfied with your first lesson, this platform will refund the first hour of your session. Wyzant also offers a wealth of free resources on its website, including ACT prep tools that students can use when they are not actively engaged in a tutoring lesson. 

Pros

• Good Fit Guarantee
• Free resources are also available
• Tutors available at various price points

Cons

• It can be time-consuming and overwhelming selecting your own tutor
• Quality of experience differs from tutor to tutor

Bottom Line: Wyzant is like a search engine for tutors. It lets students choose an ACT tutor based on how much they charge per hour. Make sure to look at tutors’ reviews and ratings, as previous customers have claimed that the quality of their service highly depended on the tutor they worked with.

4. Revolution Prep

One of the biggest ways Revolution Prep differs from other tutoring services is that it only hires full-time employees. Before joining Revolution Prep’s network, each staff member must undergo a 150-hour training program. You will work with premier instructors at Revolution Prep, including tutors with PhDs, but this service is on the more expensive end of the spectrum. Private tutoring costs $1,200 for 12 hours, and group test prep costs $400 for 12 hours. This makes one hour of private tutoring $100 per hour. 

Revolution Prep offers classes in standard school subjects, one-on-one or in small groups of up to three students. There are also different AP and regular test packages, with prices varying by subject. If students are looking for the best of both worlds—live lessons and on-demand homework help—they can sign up for the live homework help add-on. For $99 a month, test takers students can ask any last-minute ACT exam questions they might have. 

Pros

• Top-rate instructors
• Private tutoring and on-demand homework help are both offered
• Customized lesson plans

Cons

• Expensive
• Tutors must abide by Revolution Prep methodology, limiting customized lesson potential

Bottom Line: You will work with premier, full-time instructors at Revolution Prep, including tutors with PhDs, but this service is on the more expensive end of the spectrum. Private tutoring costs approximately $100 per hour.

5. The Princeton Review

The Princeton Review has made a name for itself in the world of standardized test preparation. This well-known ACT prep course has been around for over 30 years and has a great track record of helping students improve their ACT scores. With options for in-person, online, private, and group tutoring, this platform is especially good for people who want to ensure their scores go up. 

For instance, The Princeton Review offers the ACT 31+ Course Guarantee class. The Princeton Review guarantees that students who already have at least a 26 or higher on the ACT will get at least a 31 after taking the course. If the student receives less than a 26 on practice tests, The Princeton Review guarantees at least a 5-point increase. The course costs $1,899, but if The Princeton Review does not meet this guarantee, then students will receive a full refund. If you choose not to sign up for a score guarantee course, private tutoring costs $40 per hour. 

Pros

• Offers score guarantee courses
• Tutors are available 24/7
• Offers free courses for students from military families

Cons

• Can be expensive
• Website is difficult to navigate 

Bottom Line: This online ACT prep course has made a name for itself in the world of standardized test prep. With in-person, online, private, and group tutoring options, this platform is especially geared toward those seeking guaranteed score improvement.

How to Find the Best ACT Tutors

Searching for the right online ACT tutor for you comes down to compatibility. Here are some factors to keep in mind before making your final decision:

Use a reputable online tutoring platform

Some online tutoring services, such as The Princeton Review, have a good track record and a high success rate. That’s not to say you need to work with a tutoring company with a big name, but you should certainly find out about a company’s reputation and credibility before opting for its service.

Look into how a tutoring company hires and vets its tutors. Do they check instructors’ backgrounds and make sure they meet strict criteria before letting them join their network? Awareness of a company’s hiring process is important for your child’s safety and guarantees that you invest your time and money in a worthwhile cause. 

Check tutor credentials

With some tutoring sites, like Wyzant, you are tasked with selecting your own tutor from a vast network. If you are in charge of choosing the tutors, you should make sure that you do your own background checks on each candidate. Look into each tutor’s background, education, years of teaching experience, and ACT expertise. If you want someone to help your child improve in the ACT math section, ensure that your math tutor has both a strong math background and experience teaching test-taking tips and tricks. 

Read reviews and ratings

The information included in a tutor’s profile is important, but it is not the only information you should consider when making your decision. The tutor was likely responsible for creating their own profile, which means this information will portray an ideal image of them. To validate this information, look at the tutor’s reviews and ratings. Customers will provide this information and convey a more candid portrayal of the tutor, including their success rate, personality, and tutoring style. 

Ask for recommendations

Finding an online tutor who you can trust can be difficult. One of the best ways to find someone both qualified and trustworthy is through a referral or recommendation. Put the word out in various networks about online ACT tutors, including among your co-workers, friends, family, and neighbors. Chances are some of your fellow parents will have worked with a top-notch ACT tutor in the past and will be able to tell you detailed information about this experience. 

Conduct an interview

Once you’ve narrowed your list of potential ACT tutors to a few, ask them if they’d be willing to do a short virtual interview. This is your opportunity to ask the tutor any final questions about their methods and approach and also get a feel for their personality and teaching style. This is also a great time for you to give the ACT information about your child and what they are looking to get out of this tutoring experience. Be upfront about your child’s goals: are they simply looking to improve in the ACT math section, or are they trying to achieve a specific score?

How We Chose the Best Online ACT Tutoring Services

There are abundant ACT tutoring services available online, so how did we land on these top 5? Here is the methodology we followed to create this carefully curated list:

Quality of tutors

One of the most important aspects of any online tutoring service is the tutors themselves. We focused on selecting tutoring services that rigorously vet their tutors and have strict qualifications in place that all tutors must meet. In some cases, like with Varsity Tutors and Wyzant, not all tutors have bachelor’s degrees or several years of teaching experience. However, we also wanted to select services that offered budget-friendly tutoring services. 

Customized learning plans

When it comes to the ACT, every student has their strengths and weaknesses. Some students struggle with the math section, whereas others suffer from crippling test-taking anxiety. While most ACT prep courses made group classes the norm, they are not always the best use of a high school student’s time, which is why we selected tutoring services that offer customized lesson plans. With personalized sessions, instructors can spend time focusing on the areas the individual student needs the most help with, whether that’s building confidence or brushing up on key science concepts. 

Availability and flexibility

Between AP classes, after-school activities, homework, and part-time jobs, it can be difficult for high school students to find time to study for the ACT. ACT prep is often relegated to evenings and weekends. Therefore, we selected tutoring services that were available at irregular hours. With some companies, tutors are available 24/7. We also wanted to provide a mix of companies that offered private tutoring, group classes, pre-recorded lessons, and on-demand homework help to cater to all students.  

Communication and feedback

An important part of ACT preparation is receiving regular feedback. Not only does this build test-taking confidence, but it also allows them to constantly be aware of which areas they need to focus on the most. It’s also important for parents and guardians to know how their children are doing in school, so they can step in and help when they need to. Therefore, we selected tutoring sessions with systems in place to track student progress and regularly communicate feedback to students and parents. 

Technology and resources

One of the reasons that online tutoring is so popular today is because of innovative technology. Tutoring companies have found ways to create state-of-the-art virtual classrooms with interactive whiteboards, audio, video, and file sharing.

Some online tutoring companies, like Learner, even provide recordings of lessons for students to use as study tools. Other companies, like Wyzant, provide free ACT resources, like flashcards and practice tests, for students to use during their free time. We selected tutoring companies that utilized the most groundbreaking technology in their classrooms. 

Benefits of Online ACT Tutoring

There are many advantages that private online ACT tutoring has over in-person tutoring and large group lessons. Here are some of the ways your child can benefit from working with an online tutoring service:

Convenience

One of the most significant downsides of in-person tutoring is needing to commute to and from a destination, whether it’s the tutor’s home or a tutoring center. Even if your commute is only 20–30 minutes long, this can almost double your time commitment to tutoring each week. Online tutoring completely eliminates the hassle of commuting. Students can sign on from their bedroom while traveling or while in a hotel at an away game. 

Personalization

In an ACT group class, tutors must follow a curriculum that will help most people. While this will occasionally benefit your child, this setup has its disadvantages. The instructor may teach the class at a pace that is too fast for your child or cover content that your child is already familiar with. Everything about private tutoring sessions is made to fit the needs of the one student, from the pace to the content to the way the lesson is taught. Students can ask as many questions as they want without feeling like they are monopolizing a lesson. 

Access to a wider range of tutors

With online tutoring, geography isn’t a factor. Finding a private ACT tutor in your area that checks all of your boxes can be difficult. Even if they meet all of your criteria, their schedule may not align with your child’s, or their hourly rate may be slightly outside your budget. When you opt for online tutoring, your options increase tenfold, and you never have to settle for second best. 

More affordable

Online tutoring is typically more affordable than in-person tutoring for numerous reasons. If an in-person tutor teaches from a home office, they might factor overhead fees such as rent, utilities, and resources into their hourly rates. On the other hand, if a tutor commutes to and from their students, this also costs time and money, which a tutor may also factor into their hourly rates. Also, there is usually less demand for online tutors and less competition, so their rates are usually lower. 

Technology integration

For a long time, people considered online tutoring to be an alternative to in-person tutoring. In this day and age, many people consider online tutoring to be an equally effective and more convenient tutoring option, thanks to technology. Online tutoring services use interactive whiteboards, screen sharing, video, and audio to make it feel like the student is in a classroom. Some tutoring services even record their lessons, allowing students to use these lessons as ACT study tools. 

Why Choose Learner

After our deep dive into the ACT tutoring industry and the top services to choose from, Learner stands out for its exceptional tutor quality and value. Learner matches the best ACT tutors to your student based on their unique needs, personality, and learning style.

Instructors look at a student’s strengths and weaknesses in each subject to determine where the student has the most trouble. From there, the private tutor will tailor their one-on-one ACT prep courses to a curriculum custom-built for the student, reviewing ACT course materials, taking practice tests, getting feedback, and learning ACT test-taking strategies, such as time management and accuracy improvement. 

Through consistent test preparation, personalized support, and encouragement from Learner, it’s clear test takers can walk into test day with confidence, helping them tackle the test and achieve their dream score.

Frequently Asked Questions

Even after reading our guide to the top 5 tutoring platforms, you may have some lingering questions. Here are answers to some of the most common queries:

What are online ACT tutoring services?

Online ACT tutoring services usually consist of one-on-one sessions with a qualified tutor who knows about both the ACT test and what standardized testing is like. Tutors can help students make personalized study plans based on their strengths and weaknesses and teach them how to approach the different parts of the ACT. 

Who should use online ACT test prep?

An ACT tutor can help students who want to improve their ACT score and need help with specific subject areas, like math or science. ACT tutors can also teach students test-taking strategies and help them build up their confidence before test day. 

How much do online ACT tutoring services cost?

The price of an online ACT tutoring service can change based on a number of factors, such as the tutor’s level of experience, the amount of time needed to prepare, and how intense the tutoring sessions are. On average, the cost of online ACT tutoring services can range from $50 to $150 per hour. 

What should you look for in an online ACT tutoring service?

There are several factors you should consider when selecting an ACT tutoring service, including the quality of the tutors as well as the cost and availability of the tutors. You should also consider what type of assistance you seek: private one-on-one lessons or one-off homework help. 

What are the pros of using online ACT tutoring services?

Not only are online tutoring services more affordable and convenient, but they also give you access to tutors from all over the country. Due to innovative technology, most people no longer consider in-person tutoring to be more beneficial than online tutoring. 

What are the cons of using online ACT tutoring services?

Some students struggle to stay engaged in virtual tutoring sessions. If your child has a learning disability or is easily distracted, you may want to consider whether they would benefit more from working with a tutor face-to-face.