Jason Linder Last updated: 17 Online Opportunities for Spanish Teaching Jobs
Perhaps you’re already teaching Spanish part-time, or your 30-40 hours a week just isn’t enough. Perhaps you want to secure extra sources of income. Or perhaps you’d just like a simple, at-home way to get started sharing your knowledge with others.
You’re in luck—keep reading to find out 17 different sources of online Spanish teaching jobs.
How to Expand Your Spanish Teaching Opportunities
So, you’ve mastered the Spanish language and now you teach it? Not only that, but you’re super-passionate about making a living with your linguistic knowledge?
In today’s booming online marketplaces, you can have the luxury of teaching from the comfort of your own home or from the road while you’re traveling!
Things to consider with online Spanish teaching jobs
While stellar opportunities abound, there are certain caveats. To protect yourself, make sure you read the contracts and agreements in online applications. Many people skip over them because they’re in a rush or they expect them to be relatively obvious.
Only apply if you agree with their unique terms and conditions. For example, many online tutors get dinged or removed from company listings because they exchange contact information with students, when the company stipulates only communicating with students directly on their platform (they don’t want you stealing their students!).
Another caveat is that, for many companies hiring online teachers, you’ll be hired as an independent contractor, meaning that you won’t receive a tax statement at the end of the year. So, you’ll need to sort out your own taxes.
In sum, a key challenge to spreading your teaching wings and flying towards novel online horizons is budgeting your money and time wisely.
Check out reviews (see our Glassdoor recommendations below) and try to connect with Human Resources staff if you have any questions about a specific company.
17 Online Opportunities for Spanish Teaching Jobs
Online Spanish Teaching Job Ideas
1. Teach for learning apps
One of the big dogs in this space of educational mobile applications, Rosetta Stone, is currently hiring at the time of this post’s publication. While they request native speakers to teach their K-12 learners, being native isn’t necessary. I still recommend applying even if you’re not a native Spanish speaker.
One of the caveats is that they expect you to be available 6-10 hours a week during weekdays. For those teachers who have a weekday off from their 9-5 teaching schedule, this could be perfect!
Other educational apps with more flexibility to check out are TakeLessons and Varsity Tutors, which I’ll go into in more detail below.
2. Virtual teacher/tutor
Want the same stable job as a classroom teacher, but with location flexibility?
Public and private schools are increasingly becoming aware of the benefits of individualizing education and catering to unique student needs through technology.
Be prepared to take on all the expected responsibilities of a teacher, such as holding office hours and discussing students’ progress with parents. A number of these positions do require a teaching credential, so be sure to heed the requirements!
3. Educational blog writer
Enjoy writing about language learning tips and your language teaching knowledge?
If you look for paid freelance blogging opportunities, you’ll notice many companies and websites pay between $10 to $100 for articles. Launching your own personal blog can be lucrative as well if you’re patient and invest the time.
Advertising revenue varies greatly depending on your traffic, so you’ll need to spend time building a virtual audience first. Personal blogs can include ads to online marketplaces such as Amazon, which can generate income as internet-surfers browse and click ads in your posts.
If you’re interested in writing, editing, translating, digital marketing or creating YouTube content for a language learning platform, FluentU is a great company to work with!
We hire paid freelancers to work on everything mentioned above and more! All jobs are 100% remote and you’ll get to be part of a supportive and collaborative team.
Check our “Jobs at FluentU” page to see what positions we’re hiring for.
4. Create your own content for educational sites
Yes, your creative language worksheets, e-books or other learning materials can be monetized.
Many companies (such as Varsity Tutors) and schools pay teachers to create problem quiz sets for tutoring platforms and language courses.
The skill here, beyond creating unique, quality material that facilitates learning, is in the marketing. Pay rates depend on demand and can range from $5 to the thousands. Some companies only take between 6.5% to 10% commission and the rest is yours.
One that has recently gained a lot of traction in this space is Udemy, where you can sell and promote your own online courses.
5. Create your own content on YouTube
We’ve all heard about the popular YouTube stars making loads of cash—and while it certainly takes time and effort to get there, there’s an opportunity to monetize your own personal teaching and learning videos.
You can create digital video clips for free through your YouTube account, for example, and earn between 8 and 26 cents for every advertisement view by activating an AdSense account on YouTube. While it may sound like a small amount, it can gradually add up.
That said, it’s important to clarify that earnings come not from the video-viewing or clicking itself, but the ad viewing. The more your viewers engage with the ad (the longer they watch it) the more you’ll make. It also depends on your target keywords, so you may want to investigate those. Who’s looking for Spanish lessons online, and how can you appeal to them?
6. Create your own learning apps
The mobile market outpaced desktop and laptop computer use in 2014. 80% of internet users now own smartphones.
There’s surely an increasing demand, and some say apps are the ultimate future of the world. The CEO of Apple, Tim Cook, stated in a 2015 keynote that he believes the future of TV is apps as well, which further expands app possibilities beyond the iPhone and iPad onto the big screen in the living room.
Of course, this option can require a bit more of a time commitment. You’ll need to do your research, as your app will need to stand out among escalating competition. If you’re not tech-savvy, you may also need to find and hire someone to bring your teaching content to life.
If you create an app, depending on the number of people who download it and how much you charge for it, you can make between $5 and $12,000 monthly. Apple’s iOS platform is the most popular, and despite their commission charges, 25% of its app developers make over $5,000 a month!
Companies Currently Hiring Online Teachers
If you aren’t into the options above and just want to straight-up teach Spanish online, here are a few great options involving teaching in the more traditional sense.
Just make sure you have a solid internet connection. Also, building up your student roster starts slow, so be patient!
7. WyzAnt
WyzAnt (WA) can be a great choice since they’ve earned (and pay big bucks for) a top spot on Google when people are searching online for tutors.
It’s grown quite competitive in the last couple of years as the company continues to hire progressively more experienced tutors, who often wind up competing against each other—especially if they’re listed to tutor in the same area!
The downfall is that WA charges teachers a 40% commission on all their earnings during initial classes, although this does go down to 10-25% as you continue teaching and establishing your skills.
8. Varsity Tutors
Varsity Tutors (VT) gives you the option of tutoring online or meeting students in person as close to your home as you would like. While VT tends to pay you more for tutoring in person, online tutoring can be profitable as well.
VT is on top of its payments, depositing into tutors’ accounts automatically twice a week. VT tutors also have the ability to create practice problem sets for their subjects for additional income. Plus, they offer tutors monetary incentives for referring friends to tutor for VT or recommending that outside students take VT lessons.
Another perk is that it offers a top-notch learning platform with a live, editable whiteboard. You’ll find plenty of creative, useful tools that you can use to teach a wide range of students effectively.
The only downfall to VT is that many of the online opportunities get snatched up quickly due to growing competition.
9. TakeLessons
On TakeLessons (TL), you can create a tutor profile in no time. Your listing will immediately start to pop up as potential students browse through the listed teachers.
Here you get to set your own fee (unlike VT) as well as your own availability. You’ll be notified of inquiries from potential students via email.
Keep your eye out for blog opportunities as well, as TL periodically notifies you by email regarding topics it wants tutors to blog on, usually on topics potential students have been recently searching.
TL pays its tutors $50 per 500-800 word post. The downfall, similar to VT, is that it may be difficult to get students if you teach a very commonly taught subject.
10. Verbling
Verbling is unique in its push toward spontaneity.
If you have a block of unscheduled time, you can hop on whenever students book a teacher. For this reason, it’s important to stay on top of your email. The average rate is $15 per hour, and the more expensive tutors charge around $25 an hour. Verbling takes 15% of all commissions, which is quite standard.
Classes were usually done on Google Hangouts (I personally prefer Skype or FaceTime). That may still be possible, but now everything is integrated into one online teaching space, so you don’t need to rely on third-party platforms anymore. Teachers will receive student feedback to help improve their lessons.
One nifty option is to offer a discounted price for a bundle of lessons, or to give potential students the option of a $6 trial lesson.
11. Preply
Preply is a European company hiring freelance teachers (not only to teach languages, although its primary focus is languages). It’s growing in popularity and determined to grow its presence in the United States.
Unlike VT and TL which have their own teaching platforms, you teach via your own chosen third-party app, such as Skype.
The main advantage is that you can quickly apply to teach, set your own rates, choose your schedule and use your own teaching materials! Preply functions similar to an auction like eBay, so there’s stiff competition among teachers. You need to make your profile stand out accordingly! What’s unique about your classes and teaching style?
12. Lingoda
Lingoda is another European company that pays its tutors 8.5 euros an hour. While there have been a few harsh reviews related to low pay rates, it can be a great place to get your feet wet.
It’s a more laid-back and loosely structured place to teach. Lingoda’s number one perk is that you’re likely to attract students from all over the world, as opposed to only the United States. This, however, can be a downfall too, because you may get pressured to teach during odd hours due to time differences across regions.
Job Resources
If you’re not looking at teaching or tutoring with a specific company, you can explore even more wide-ranging opportunities.
So, what’s out there for support in finding online teaching jobs, you ask?
13. Indeed
Indeed has come a long way since it was founded in 2004. It’s one of the largest job sites yet, boasting over 200 million monthly visitors.
It also has a friendly interface that saves your CV so you can easily send it to employers, and so they can contact you effortlessly as well. That said, many employers post their vacant positions through external links to their own site outside of Indeed, which makes things a little less seamless.
Still, it’s worth a look! Be sure to include “remote,” “virtual” or “online” in your search terms.
14. Glassdoor
Glassdoor is great for gaining an inside view of a company, its management and its pay rates without talking to or personally knowing any of its current or past employees. Through this “glass door,” you can learn a lot of what you would want to know before accepting or pursuing a job with any company.
One of the downfalls is that not all companies hiring online language teachers have a strong Glassdoor presence yet, with the exception of WA, VT and TL. Nevertheless, it can’t hurt to check! Glassdoor is likely to continue to grow and progressively cover more industries in the upcoming years.
15. Upwork
Upwork is a marketplace for all types of freelancers, not only Spanish teachers. There’s a wide range of freelance work available here, and employers are constantly looking for everything from mobile programmers and graphic designers to, of course, online language teachers.
Of course, this site comes with its pros and cons.
The main pro is that you’re going to be able to quickly find and sort through online Spanish teaching jobs, and there are usually quite a few out there. One con is that many employers and students looking for teachers may not know to check the Upwork marketplace—but that could soon change, what with this site’s growing popularity.
16. Craigslist
Yup, I said it!
Okay, some tech pundits believe Craigslist (CL) is progressively becoming obsolete due to the boom of more vogue apps with more attractive interfaces. However, this site has great name recognition and tons of people still flock there to seek out services.
There are still many hungry learners hunting around on CL for deals on language tutors and teachers.
This is especially true for those interested in working directly with a tutor instead of through a middleman contracting company like the ones listed above. This is a huge plus for teachers, as you won’t have to lose any earnings on commissions.
Posting your own teaching ad costs a little money, but it’s free to respond to other people’s ads. If you opt to post an ad of your own, you’ll need to actively update your ad once a week to once every 45 days, depending on where you live.
17. Fiverr
Fiverr is an online advertiser where you can promote your personal teaching and language services. While there have been a few negative reviews suggesting the possibility of being scammed, don’t discard it yet!
Those reviews come from a few frustrated users of Fiverr services, not those listing their own services for sale. This site has become a go-to place for services advertised for $5 and up, especially teaching languages, and many of these are straightforward teaching gigs. Once you learn the interface, there’s potential to earn big bucks.
I hope these resources prove useful to expand your career into novel online horizons!
Jason Linder, MA, is a doctoral student and intensely passionate Spanish tutor and blog writer. In his free time, he enjoys telenovelas, traveling around Latin America, meditation, yoga, exercise, reading and writing. Learn more about his free Spanish learning resources and tutoring.
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