The honest answer most tuition centres won’t give you: a typical Singapore household spends thousands a year per child, and the price keeps creeping up. Parents spent S$1.8 billion on private tutoring in 2023 — nearly 30% more than in 2018. Here’s what that money actually buys in 2026, and where the real waste hides.
The Real Numbers Parents Are Paying
Strip away the marketing brochures and the 2026 market looks like this:
- Tuition centres: S$180–S$600 a month per subject
- Primary home tutors: S$35–S$80 an hour
- Secondary home tutors: S$50–S$120 an hour
- JC home tutors: up to S$200 an hour
- AI tutors: S$39–S$154 a month, often per subject
One Tampines parent posted on KiasuParents that her P5 daughter’s centre cost over S$5,000 in a single year once fees, transport, and workbooks pushed at the counter were added up. The grade moved from a C to a C+. One Singapore father said he spends S$7,000 a month on PSLE tuition for his 12-year-old. That isn’t the median — but it’s not as rare as you’d hope.
Why The Sticker Price Isn’t The Real Price
The advertised monthly fee is usually 60–70% of what you’ll actually pay. Watch for:
- Registration and material fees added on top of the headline price
- Workbooks “strongly recommended” at the counter every term
- Transport — 30 minutes each way, twice a week, adds up
- Parent time spent marking assessment books because feedback from the centre arrives a week late
- Annual price increases that long-time customers quietly absorb
And the feedback loop is broken on purpose. You pay monthly, you wait, you pray — and you only find out if it’s working when the exam results land. By then it’s S$3,000 too late.
AI Tutors: The New Price Floor
AI tutors have reset the bottom of the market. The current 2026 spread:
- Tutopiya: ~S$96 a year (race-to-bottom)
- Klara, Tutorly.sg: S$49 a month
- LearnBuddy Solo: S$39 a month — all subjects, P1 to JC2, one child
- LearnBuddy Family: S$59 a month — three children, all subjects
- Geniebook: ~S$154 a month per subject, annual lock-in, 30-day refund window only
The honest comparison: one Geniebook subject for one child runs S$1,852 a year. LearnBuddy Family — three kids, every subject — is S$590 a year. That’s an 8–10x gap, not a rounding difference.
What You Actually Get For Each Tier
The price tells you almost nothing on its own. Look at what’s bundled:
Under S$50 a month: Usually a text-only AI chat. Useful for an older, motivated kid who can type and self-direct. Useless for a P3 who thinks faster than she types.
S$50–S$100 a month: Multi-subject AI with voice, drawing, and a parent dashboard worth opening. This is the new sweet spot for most families.
S$150–S$600 a month: Tuition centres, premium AI like Geniebook, or one-on-one home tutors. You’re paying for either the human in the room or the brand on the receipt — sometimes both.
The free MOE Student Learning Space is worth using too — LEA and ALS cover some Math and Geography units well. It’s a complement, not a full replacement.
How To Decide What’s Worth Paying For
Three honest filters before you sign anything:
- Can you cancel monthly? If the answer is “annual only” or “30-day window,” that’s a contract built to outlast your kid’s interest. Walk.
- Does the parent dashboard show concept-level mastery, or just question counts? “Completed 5 worksheets” is theatre. “Stuck on improper fractions for three weeks” is information.
- Does it work for the kid you actually have? A P3 who can’t type fast won’t get value from a text-only bot. A struggling learner who needs structure won’t survive a Socratic-only tool with no scaffolding.
Tuition is one of the largest discretionary line items in a Singapore household budget. Treat it like a subscription you audit every term — not a fixed cost. The S$5,000 you save on one wrong-fit centre is the family holiday you didn’t think you could afford.