Compare the top tutoring and STEM education franchises for 2026 — Mathnasium, Kumon, Sylvan, Code Ninjas — by cost, royalty, Item 19, and operational fit.
Quick answer Across the 2026 FDDs, tutoring franchises open for $73,500 to $340,632. Code Ninjas' small Studio format is the cheapest at $73,500-$109,250, Kumon runs $101,630-$233,780 on a $2,000 franchise fee, Sylvan Learning runs $117,600-$288,400 at an 11% royalty, Mathnasium costs $127,316-$165,846 with a $49,000 franchise fee and a 10% royalty, a Code Ninjas Learning Center runs $174,250-$265,750, and Huntington runs $191,992-$340,632 at 9.5%. Most brands break even in 18-24 months.
Learning loss from 2020–2021 created a multi-year demand wave that didn’t normalize the way most education observers expected. National Assessment of Educational Progress reading and math scores in 2024 showed students were still 6–11 percentile points below 2019 levels, and a meaningful share of parents responded by adding paid tutoring outside school hours.
That demand carried through 2025 and continues into 2026. Mathnasium reported its strongest year of franchise unit openings in over a decade, and Code Ninjas expanded its territory map by more than 80 new locations. The sector is mature enough to have consolidated around a handful of dominant brands but young enough that geography still matters — most metro areas have 1–2 strong incumbents per academic format, and territorial protection in the FDD is meaningful.
For a buyer entering tutoring in 2026, the question isn’t whether the category is viable. It’s which sub-vertical fits the owner’s operational style and capital bracket.
Mathnasium is the dominant standalone math tutoring brand in North America, with 1,047 centers open in the US as of December 31, 2025. The model targets ages 6–18 with a proprietary diagnostic assessment, individualized “learning plans,” and small-group instruction at branded “math learning centers.” Item 7 of the 2026 FDD shows initial investment at $127,316 to $165,846 for a first center and $104,816 to $143,346 for each additional one, with the franchise fee at $49,000 and royalty at 10% of monthly Gross Receipts. The royalty is not the whole picture: from month 24 the royalty floor is the greater of 10% or $1,500, a $650 monthly base royalty starts six months after signing, and the marketing fee is $250 plus 2% of Gross Receipts. Item 19 reports Gross Receipts by quartile for the centers open and operated by the same franchisee for 12 months or longer as of December 31, 2025, which is 1,047 US centers less the 129 that were excluded. Ask your development contact for that quartile table, because the widely circulated $329,000 median is not a figure we can source to the 2026 filing.
The operational footprint is small — a typical Mathnasium center runs 800–1,500 square feet with 4–8 instructor stations. Owners who treat it as a marketing and management role (not a teaching role) tend to outperform owner-operators trying to do everything.
There are competitive math-only brands that surface in buyer research, but most are regional or significantly smaller. Mathnasium remains the default choice when “math tutoring franchise” is the search term.
Code Ninjas teaches kids ages 7–14 to build video games using a proprietary Belt System. The 2026 FDD prices two formats. A Learning Center runs $174,250 to $265,750 on a $45,000 franchise fee and an 8.25% royalty of Net Sales. A smaller Studio Center runs $73,500 to $109,250 on a $35,000 fee, but the royalty jumps to 12.25%, which is the trade you make for the cheaper entry. Both pay a 2.0% marketing contribution plus a $350 per month in-house advertising fee.
The category sits in a uniquely defensible position: parents see coding as a future-proof skill, and most school districts don’t offer it before middle school. The revenue, though, is more modest than the category’s reputation suggests. Item 19 of the 2026 FDD reports $236,651 average and $216,122 median annual Gross Sales across 218 franchised Centers open the full year, with a $730,612 high and a $43,091 low. The top quartile averaged $383,473. Thirteen franchised Centers closed during 2025, all of them open at least 12 months first.
Snapology and theCoderSchool target the same parent demographic with lower capital requirements ($60,000–$150,000 typical range) but smaller average ticket and less operational structure. They’re better fits for buyers wanting to test the STEM-tutoring thesis with less downside.
This tier is where most “tutoring franchise” search traffic actually lands.
| Brand | Initial Investment (2026 FDD) | Royalty | Item 19 revenue | Operational Profile |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Kumon | $101,630 to $233,780 | $38/full-paying student/subject/month post-TLP, $42.75 during | No Item 19 disclosed | Worksheet-driven, instructor-staffed, twice-weekly attendance |
| Sylvan Learning | $117,600 to $288,400 | 11% gross + 5% NAF + 6% local | $588,669 top-quartile median, $130,176 bottom quartile (409 centers) | Storefront center, all-grades + SAT/ACT prep |
| Huntington Learning Center | $191,992 to $340,632 | 9.5% gross + 2% ad fund | $533,106 median, $609,454 average (232 mature centers) | All-grades, premium-priced, strong test-prep focus |
| Tutor Doctor | Not in our FDD library | Not verified | Not verified | In-home delivery, no center buildout |
Sylvan and Huntington are the strongest fits for buyers who want exposure to high school students and standardized test prep. Both also publish the honest version of the category, which is a wide distribution rather than a tidy average: Sylvan’s fourth quartile has a median of $130,176 and a low of $11,035, and Huntington’s 232 mature centers run from $136,567 to $3,093,560. Kumon is the simplest operational model, but two things about it are unusual. Its royalty is per student per subject rather than a percentage, which constrains pricing flexibility. And it makes no financial performance representation at all, so there is no filed revenue number for the brand in any direction. For the fee-by-fee version of that trade-off against the other category leader, see Kumon vs Mathnasium franchise cost.
Tutor Doctor sits in its own category. There’s no storefront, no class-based delivery, and the owner’s job is to recruit a contractor pool of tutors and dispatch them to homes. Marketing is digital lead-driven. The buyer’s skill set needs to lean operations and recruiting, not real estate and instruction. We do not hold a current Tutor Doctor FDD, so we have left its investment and royalty figures out of the table above rather than repeat numbers we cannot verify; pull the current document from the franchisor before comparing it to anything else here.
Three structural choices drive most of the operational difference between brands.
Storefront tutoring centers (Mathnasium, Code Ninjas, Sylvan, Huntington) command pricing premiums because parents perceive a physical space as serious instruction. The trade-off is the buildout cost, the lease, and the dependency on local foot traffic and brand visibility.
In-home tutoring franchises (Tutor Doctor) eliminate the lease but introduce contractor management as the central operational challenge. The owner recruits, vets, schedules, and quality-controls a fluid tutor pool. Margins can be excellent, but the business is sales-and-operations heavy.
Online-only and hybrid models are now offered by most major franchises as a secondary channel. None of the major academic brands have built a successful franchise model around an online-only delivery format yet — distance-tutoring competitors are mostly direct-to-consumer (Outschool, Wyzant) and operate without territory protection.
For a buyer with limited capital and strong sales instincts, in-home wins. For a buyer with $200,000+ in deployable capital and operations experience, storefront math or coding wins. The middle ground — small storefront tutoring with modest capital — has narrowed as Mathnasium and Code Ninjas consolidate share.
Item 19 disclosures vary in quality across this category, and the biggest variation is whether one exists at all. Mathnasium, Code Ninjas, Sylvan, and Huntington all publish quartile revenue tables. Kumon publishes nothing: its 2026 Item 19 states that it makes no representations about a franchisee’s future financial performance or the past performance of any outlet. If you are evaluating Kumon, the only numbers available to you are the ones existing franchisees give you on validation calls.
The honest read on the brands that do disclose: top-quartile results land in very different places. Huntington’s top quartile averaged $1,115,433 and Sylvan’s averaged $795,074, but Code Ninjas’ top quartile averaged $383,473. The floors are lower than most buyers expect too, with Sylvan’s fourth quartile median at $130,176 and Code Ninjas’ overall low at $43,091. The variation inside a single brand is usually wider than the variation between brands, and it tracks enrollment density, demographics, and owner sales-and-marketing effort.
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Pre-opening commitment is similar across brands — 4–8 weeks of training plus 60–90 days of buildout and pre-launch marketing.
Post-opening is where the brands diverge:
Internal linking opportunity: owners weighing tutoring against other options often start at the broader child education franchise guide, then narrow down to specific brands. Buyers focused on women-owned business ownership often end up here from best franchises for women entrepreneurs. Owners considering semi-absentee setups should pair this article with our semi-absentee vs owner-operator guide. Pre-purchase due diligence should always include the franchise validation process guide.
If you have around $100,000 to $235,000 and want the simplest operating model, Kumon fits the capital bracket, but go in knowing there is no filed revenue disclosure to underwrite against and that the economics turn on enrollment density.
If you have $127,000 to $166,000 and prefer one center with a disclosed quartile table behind it, Mathnasium is still the category default for a reason.
If you have $175,000 to $265,000 and want the most defensible market position, a Code Ninjas Learning Center has near-zero direct franchise competition in coding instruction. Just size the revenue expectation to the filing, which is a $216,122 median, not the $400,000 the category’s reputation implies. The $73,500 Studio format is the cheapest entry in this article, and it carries the highest royalty in it at 12.25%.
If you want the highest disclosed top line and can fund $192,000 to $341,000, Huntington reports the strongest Item 19 in the group at a $533,106 median across 232 mature centers, on a 9.5% royalty plus a 2% ad fund and a $57,000 minimum annual advertising spend.
Whatever bracket you land in, never sign a tutoring FDD without reading Items 3, 19, and 20 carefully. Litigation history, actual revenue distributions, and unit churn tell you everything the franchisor’s pitch deck won’t.
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best tutoring franchises 2026stem education franchisemathnasium franchise costcode ninjas franchisekumon franchisetutoring business franchise
About this analysis The franchise data in this article is drawn from VetMyFranchise's structured analysis of 2,300+ Franchise Disclosure Documents filed with U.S. state regulators. See our data & methodology.
No. Most tutoring franchises specifically attract owners with corporate, sales, or operations backgrounds — not teaching credentials. The franchisor provides the academic methodology, the owner runs the business. Mathnasium, Kumon, and Sylvan all explicitly market to non-educator buyers, though several brands do require state-level center licensure depending on location.
On the 2026 disclosures, the general academic brands post the highest top lines, not the STEM ones. Huntington reports a $533,106 median across 232 mature centers and Sylvan's top quartile averages $795,074, while Code Ninjas reports a $216,122 median across 218 centers. Kumon makes no Item 19 representation at all, so nobody can answer the question for that brand from the filing. Revenue is also not profit, and profitability depends on enrollment density, staffing model, and rent more than on brand alone.
Mathnasium initial investment runs $127,316 to $165,846 for a first center according to its 2026 FDD, including the $49,000 franchise fee, buildout, equipment, and working capital; each additional center runs $104,816 to $143,346. Kumon centers require $101,630 to $233,780 on a $2,000 franchise fee, and the two brands charge very differently, with Mathnasium taking 10% of gross receipts and Kumon taking $38 per full-paying student per subject per month.
Most aren't, in the early years. Tutoring centers depend on the owner driving local enrollment, hiring instructor staff, and managing parent relationships during the first 12–18 months. Owners who shift to semi-absentee typically do so after Year 2 by promoting a center director. Brands that lend themselves more naturally to semi-absentee models include Code Ninjas (because of structured class delivery) and Tutor Doctor (because of the dispatch-based service model).
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