VIPKid Review [2024]: Is This Teaching Side Hustle Worth It?

What is VIPKid?

VIPKid is an online teaching platform where teachers give one-on-one online immersive English lessons to children between the ages of 4 and 12. It’s headquartered in Beijing, but it hires teachers from across the U.S. and Canada.

How does VIPKid work?

VIPKid offers 30-minute classes, which include 25 minutes of active teaching. With the extra five minutes, you’re expected to give feedback to students. All courses are one-on-one with students, and teachers are not expected to communicate with parents who have questions — instead, office staff takes care of those communications.

You’ll get all the course materials you need for each class, but you still need to take time to learn the materials and prepare for your courses. This might not take hours for each lesson, but it does add up.

VIPKid also offers the opportunity to earn incentives for things such as referring friends or teaching more courses. With these incentives, it claims you can earn $14 to $22 per hour — but it clearly doesn’t take into account the time you spend preparing for lessons.

As a VIPKid teacher, you’ll have the choice to receive weekly, bi-weekly, or monthly paychecks. Payments can be directly deposited to your bank account or sent to your PayPal account.

How VIPKid class scheduling works

Teachers can set their own schedules, though VIPKid recommends that they make themselves available at least 7 1/2 hours of teaching or 15 total time slots per week. You’ll submit your availability a month in advance and have your schedule confirmed one week in advance.

However, VIPKid does say it can schedule you a class with as little as 24 hours notice. This is a bit of a drawback if you tend to make plans more than a week in advance.

The most popular times for courses are Monday to Friday from 5 a.m. to 8 a.m. Eastern Standard Time (EST) and Saturdays and Sundays from 8 p.m. to 9 a.m. EST.

VIPKid indicates that there’s no limit to the number of hours you can teach. So if you want to earn as much as possible, it’s a good idea to make yourself available at a wide variety of teaching times to maximize your bookings.

Who can teach with VIPKid?

The main requirements for teaching with VIPKid include:

• Having a bachelor’s degree in any subject
• Having two years of teaching, tutoring, coaching or mentoring experience
• Being legally eligible to work in the U.S. or Canada
• Having a functioning microphone, camera, and computer as well as an internet connection with adequate speed

Unfortunately, California residents are not currently eligible to become teachers with VIPKid.

Additionally, you probably won’t be able to cut it as a VIPKid teacher if you live in an area where internet service isn’t great. Remote locations with satellite internet probably don’t have the connection speeds necessary for video chats.

You must be willing to sign a six-month contract, though you have the freedom to set your own hours within those six months.

VIPKid requires all prospective teachers to do a demonstration lesson as part of the hiring process. You’ll be evaluated based on your efficient pace and timing, ability to fulfill lesson objectives, professionalism, and effective teaching practices.

Who is VIPKid a good fit for?

• Teachers looking for extra income
• Part-time seasonal workers
• People testing the waters before teaching abroad

Teaching English with VIPKid can be a great side job for teachers looking for ways to make extra money. If you are comfortable working with kids and presenting information in an engaging way to young learners, this side hustle could be the right fit.

It’s also great for people who love having flexibility in their schedules. There are no set amount of hours you have to work each week, so if you have a seasonal job that’s taking up all your time, you won’t have to kill yourself trying to fit in VIPKid lessons on the side.

Plus, since the most popular class times are in the morning, you could easily fit them in before your full-time job begins.

VIPKid can also be a helpful tool if you’re considering teaching English abroad but want to test the waters first. As someone who has taught English abroad, I never did much teaching beforehand — I just wanted to teach English so I could live in Europe for a year.

However, this backfired for me, because it turns out I hate teaching. Using a service like VIPKid to get some teaching experience before signing a teaching contract across the world could have helped me realize I would be better suited to another career path.

Who should not consider VIPKid

Living outside of the U.S. or Canada or in California will automatically disqualify you for VIPKid.

VIPKid might also not be the best for someone looking for a liveable wage or full-time job. According to VIPKid, you could earn as low as $14 per hour, which won’t be enough to cover most people’s bills. You could likely make more by offering your own online tutoring services — ZipRecruiter estimates the national average hourly salary for online English teachers is $26.

If you’re looking for a fast way to make money, VIPKid isn’t ideal. The company says it can take around a month to get a steady stream of classes, as parents and students begin to try out new teachers. So it’s possible you might not earn a lot of money immediately.

And while the flexible scheduling can be a bonus, it can also be a drawback. There’s no guarantee that you’ll get enough hours to survive on, and the most popular class times are in the early morning or on weekends.

How the VIPKid application process works

There are five stages to the application process to become a VIPKid teacher. These are the steps:

1. Submit an online application with your basic information. This will be used to screen you for position fit, including eligibility requirements like having a bachelor's degree.

2. Do a one-on-one interview or demo lesson. Next, you'll need to prepare and record a demonstration lesson for review by a VIPKid recruiter or join a recruiter for a 30-minute session to display your teaching skills.

3. Complete training. You'll be expected to watch training videos to learn the VIPKid policies for technology and teacher standards. You'll also be introduced to the curriculum.

4. Teach a mock class. Next, you'll work with an existing VIPKid instructor to teach a full-length practice class.

5. Sign a contract. Finally, you'll upload documents such as your tax information, undergo a background check, and sign a six-month renewable teaching contract with the company.

Once you’ve completed the steps to become a VIPKid teacher, you can add your available teaching times to the online portal so students can book courses with you.

Other teaching side hustles to consider

If VIPKid isn't right for you, there are plenty of teacher side hustles for those wanting to make money on the side, including:

• Scoring for Educational Testing Service (ETS): ETS is an organization that administers the TOEFL iBT and TOEIC English language proficiency tests, among others. It often hires raters to do online scoring. In my experience scoring TOEIC and TOEFL exams, I made $15 per hour with access to 4- and 8-hour shifts. You do need to have teaching experience to apply.
• Selling lesson plans on Teachers Pay Teachers (TPT): If you’re a lesson-planning wizard, you can sell these resources to other teachers. TPT says Basic Sellers receive 55% of the sale price, while Premium Sellers earn 80% of their sales.
• Online tutoring: There are plenty of sites out there, like PrepNow, Varsity Tutor, and Tutor.com, that let you tutor students in your subjects of expertise. You might also look for online tutoring gigs at your local university or community college.

FAQs

Bottom line

VIPKid could be a great side hustle for people interested in helping young children learn English. You'll need to be able to work evening and weekend hours to maximize your earnings, though, and you’ll need to prepare for courses so you can teach your students effectively.

If this doesn’t sound like the best option, check out our picks for the best side hustles to find one that works for you.