How do I start teaching English online without joining an agency?

Going independent means you control your rates, curriculum, and schedule — but you also handle marketing, billing, and no-shows yourself. The minimum setup looks like this:

1. Pick a niche. Kids vs. adults, conversation vs. exam prep, absolute beginners vs. intermediate. A narrower niche is easier to market.
2. Set up your kit. Quiet space with neutral background, decent USB mic, webcam at eye level, good front lighting, a stable connection (wired Ethernet beats Wi-Fi for reliability), and a virtual classroom tool.
3. Set up invoicing and payments. Stripe is the cleanest option if you live in a Stripe-supported country — professional invoices, automatic receipts, and parents pay in their local currency. Where Stripe isn't available, Koala Go's built-in invoicing system accepts payments from any country (including WeChat in China) and pays out to PayPal or Wise. Decide between pay-per-lesson and monthly packages — packages have far higher retention.
4. Decide your rate (see "How much should I charge").
5. Get your first 2-3 students from your network before paying for ads. Free trial lessons convert better than discounts.
6. Collect testimonials and a short before/after video early. They compound for years.

You can run an independent online ESL business with under $200 in setup costs. The hard part is not the tooling — it's consistent marketing while you build a reputation.