But today, you have immediate access to qualified, native French tutors waiting to work with you to reach your language goals.
In this post, we’ll go over the eight best resources to find the perfect French tutor online. The list includes italki, the best overall platform that lets you select exactly the teacher you need.
The others still give you a variety of tutoring options, however, including more flexibility, group classes, various dialects and more.
Besides tutoring resources, we’ll cover tips to maximize your lessons and learn as much as you can from them, so let’s begin!
As of June 2023, there are over 1,000 French tutors on italki alone. And you can sort them with tons of unique filters based on your goals, needs and schedule.
You can choose tutors based on categories (like conversation practice, pronunciation, grammar, exam preparation, etc.). You can also set your preferred hourly rate, country, lesson time and day, and more.
italki has two types of tutors: Professional Teachers and Community Tutors.
Professional teachers have specific qualifications, like a degree in French teaching or a certification.
Community tutors are native French speakers who don’t have formal training but can help you improve your French. They’re usually cheaper, and not all of them speak fluent English.
VerbalPlanet lets you sign up for free, create an online profile and then start your search for an online tutor right away.
The feature that really stands out about VerbalPlanet is that the French language tutors hail from all over the world: Africa, North America, Europe and the Caribbean.
It’s also relatively easy to keep a budget with VerbalPlanet.
You can adapt your profile to filter for tutors that fit your availability and price range. You can also see their ratings from current and previous students.
Lingoda specializes in teaching major European languages like French, German and Spanish.
All the teachers are certified and native speakers.
For €0.99 Euros (about $1.20 USD), you get a student profile and a free trial class. The trial class lets you experience what it would be like to continue learning with your chosen tutor before you’ve invested much money.
Keep in mind that this platform is geared toward the European market, so most native teachers will speak European French.
Language classes are available around the clock, and learning materials are included at no additional cost.
The teachers on this platform come from various French-speaking countries, are native speakers and are also certified.
You can sign up for free using your contact information and language level. Then, they give you a complimentary trial class with a teacher.
If you’re happy with the accelerated learning method, you can then sign up for more sessions.
The accelerated learning method they use has three pillars: Constructivism, participative learning and memorization.
Constructivism allows you to see the general patterns between English and French. In this stage, your tutor helps you develop an intuition for knowing what would and wouldn’t work in French.
Participative learning means that these tutors adapt to your learning style rather than imposing one. Then, they help you memorize words according to that style.
Learning French at Home is another European platform. The tutors here are from France and Switzerland.
This platform doesn’t give you any trial classes, but it does give you real structure regardless of your language level.
Whether you want to improve your conversation skills or need to prepare to take a French assessment test, you can get both on this site.
They also offer the Customized French Writing Programme, which helps you improve your French writing skills—especially useful for university students or those who want to work in a French-speaking region.
Verbling has a database of over 100 native, certified and qualified teachers from around the world.
Once you’ve signed up, you can refine your search with Verbling’s filtering options to find the perfect teacher.
This is great for beginners because you can find a native teacher who also speaks English, just in case you need to during your sessions.
You can also sort tutors for exam preparation, general French, business French, price range or simply reviews of other students who have worked with the same teacher.
Price: Free evaluation session, then receive pricing options and program recommendations
French-Tutor.net is geared solely to the French learning market, so they’re hyper-specialized.
The teachers are also mostly European-based. In addition to flexible and affordable rates, you can sign up for 1:1 sessions or group lessons.
Group sessions are a fantastic way to get motivated and work alongside a friend or colleague. They’re also a budget-friendly option since you can sign up for more classes at a discounted rate.
FluentU takes authentic videos—like music videos, movie trailers, news and inspiring talks—and turns them into personalized language learning lessons.
Learn French through French. It may be a good idea for a beginner to ensure your tutor understands some English, but for intermediate learners and beyond, aim for your lessons to be 100% in French.
Learn the French you want to learn. Bring France, Quebec, Senegal, Belgium or Morocco to your home. Not only do you get to learn, practice and converse with a native speaker, but you can pick where that person is from. Considering the global reach of the French language, you could dabble around with different tutors from different regions to reinforce your comprehension and pick up all that French slang!
Pick up pertinent cultural knowledge. Working one-on-one with a native tutor gives you inside access to cultural knowledge and current events. Just think, you can explore and access a rich source of information about the traditions and views of life held by French speakers with someone who lives and breathes them every day!
Make your language learning live and physically present. Sometimes we get tired of learning alone. It’s normal to feel stretched after all those PDFs, print-outs and online grammar activities if you don’t get a chance to practice what you learn in a live setting. With a tutor, you can schedule that all-so-important live practice.
Reinforce good study habits and get feedback. Meeting with a tutor 1-2 times a week reinforces good study habits. It also gives you timely feedback on your progress with the language. Your tutor will adapt to you and your needs so you can really reinforce weak areas and further strengthen your pronunciation and comprehension.
Learn French on your own schedule. Not everyone can attend language classes from Monday to Friday at 10 a.m. But you can meet with online tutors for at least 30 minutes a week. Perhaps on a laid-back Saturday afternoon or even Sunday morning. The sheer flexibility of this system is enough to accommodate anyone.
How to Learn with an Online French Tutor
Have a 1-hour session every week (minimum) on the same day and hour. Try to meet at least once a week for one hour. You might opt for two 30-minute sessions per week instead. If you can budget for more, go for it and keep it balanced. Try your best to schedule your times at the same hour. This consistency helps you keep on schedule.
Don’t skip class! Make your online lessons consistent, and don’t skip online practice time. When you begin rearranging, canceling and not attending class with your online tutor, you lose motivation, and your dream doesn’t come to fruition. This consistency allows you to structure classes properly with your tutor.
Split your time equally between oral and grammar exercises. Discuss and set grammar and conversation goals with your tutor each week to strike a balance for your individual needs. Ask your tutor to assign you homework. Practice on your own time, make some progress and then come back to your tutor to fill in any blanks, get corrections and have your questions answered. Once that’s done, you’ll be ready to set new goals for the upcoming week.
Listen to your tutor speak and take note of relevant vocabulary. Jot down new words you hear your tutor say and ask them about the meanings if you’re unsure. You can also try repeating what your tutor says to neutralize your accent.
Aim to ask 1-2 questions at the end of each lesson. Tell your tutor you’d like to review key sentences for the last five minutes of every class. For example, constructing new sentences with the terminology you learned. This allows vocabulary to stick and forces you to speak from day one!
There you have it!
Pull out a sheet of paper and jot down your learner profile: language level, strong areas, areas to improve and your goals.
Once you know your budget and tutor requirements, you’ll be ready to start your search for the perfect French tutor online using the resources above.
If you like learning French on your own time and from the comfort of your smart device, then I'd be remiss to not tell you about FluentU.
FluentU has a wide variety of great content, like interviews, documentary excerpts and web series, as you can see here:
FluentU brings native French videos with reach. With interactive captions, you can tap on any word to see an image, definition and useful examples.
For example, if you tap on the word "crois," you'll see this:
Practice and reinforce all the vocabulary you've learned in a given video with learn mode. Swipe left or right to see more examples for the word you’re learning, and play the mini-games found in our dynamic flashcards, like "fill in the blank."
All throughout, FluentU tracks the vocabulary that you’re learning and uses this information to give you a totally personalized experience. It gives you extra practice with difficult words—and reminds you when it’s time to review what you’ve learned.
