TakeLessons is a marketplace that sends you students but takes 30-40% of your earnings. Virgoul lets you keep 100% and gives you scheduling, courses, and community in one place.
TakeLessons has been one of the best-known music lesson marketplaces in the United States since 2006. It works by connecting students with teachers and handling payment processing, but charges a substantial platform commission ranging from 30 to 40 percent of every lesson fee. On a $60 per hour lesson, a TakeLessons teacher keeps approximately $36 to $42 after the platform takes its share. Over a full year of 20 weekly students, this commission can add up to $25,000 or more in fees paid to the platform rather than the teacher.
TakeLessons provides value in the early stage of a teaching career by offering built-in student discovery and a trust layer for new teachers with no existing reputation. Teachers who are starting from zero and have no marketing skills may benefit from this initial traffic at the cost of long-term revenue. However, TakeLessons gives teachers limited control over their own student relationships, and teachers who build their reputation on the platform cannot easily migrate their student base if they leave.
Virgoul takes a fundamentally different approach. Rather than acting as a lead-generation marketplace, Virgoul positions itself as a full music educator infrastructure. Teachers list their profile, set their own rates, run their own bookings, sell courses, and manage their entire teaching business from one dashboard. Virgoul does not take a per-session commission on direct teacher-to-student bookings, which means that a teacher earning $100 per hour keeps $100 per hour. Over a year of full-time teaching, this difference compounds significantly.
Virgoul also offers features TakeLessons does not: a multi-track browser-based recording studio for production-focused teachers, collaboration rooms, gig marketplace access for performing musicians, and a global community infrastructure. This makes Virgoul relevant not just to piano and guitar teachers but to producers, session musicians, and performers who need tools beyond lesson scheduling.
Virgoul gives music teachers a complete platform to run their teaching business without per-lesson fees eating into income. Book students, sell courses, join communities, and access production tools — all from one dashboard. Join Virgoul at virgoul.com.
Join VirgoulNo. TakeLessons takes 30-40% of every lesson fee as a platform commission. Virgoul does not charge a commission on direct teacher-to-student bookings, so teachers keep more per lesson on Virgoul.
Yes. Some teachers use TakeLessons for new student acquisition while building their Virgoul presence for direct long-term student relationships and additional income streams.
TakeLessons provides built-in student discovery which can help beginner teachers get their first bookings faster. Virgoul is better once you have a reputation and want to maximize long-term earnings without paying platform fees.