English: the goal matters more than the level

«I want to improve my English» is the most common request and the least useful. Half a dozen different tasks hide behind it, and a tutor who is excellent at one may be no use at all for another.

Before choosing a person, settle the goal with yourself. These are the ones that come up most.

School and school exams

A clear task with a clear test at the end. You need someone who knows not only the language but the requirements: what is actually asked, what loses marks, how to finish in the time given.

An international exam

Quite different work. Here the format matters most of all: someone can speak freely and still score low because they did not understand what a particular task wanted from them. Ask outright whether the tutor has prepared people for the exam you need.

Work

English for negotiations, letters and calls is a narrow and very specific language. A general course is mostly time spent here: what you need is someone who will go through your real letters and your real meetings with you.

Moving, and living somewhere new

The most underrated task of all. People who passed their exams beautifully spend months unable to make a phone call to a clinic. The barrier is not grammar but daily life: the speed of speech, the accents, the turns of phrase that never appear in textbooks.

Someone who has already moved usually needs not a course but company — a person to talk themselves out with, and to go through what they did not catch that week.

Native speaker or not

The answer depends on where you are now. A beginner often finds it easier with someone who shares their first language: explaining how the tenses differ is easier from inside a grammar you both know than through gestures.

But once the foundation is there and what stands in the way is stiffness, a native speaker is irreplaceable — they hear what sounds unnatural and will not let you hide behind familiar phrases.

Neither is a mark of quality in itself. Being able to explain and being able to speak are different skills, and they do not always come together.

How to read the reviews here

The reviews on the site are thank-yous, so look in them not for a verdict but for a match with your own task. «She was speaking within two months» and «he passed the exam with a high score» are different tutors doing different work.

See who is teaching English: English tutors with reviews.