What’s a Realistic Salary for an English Teacher in Spain?

Imagine landing a job offer from a Madrid academy and having no idea whether the figure is fair, generous, or a lowball. This guide covers the official salary floors for language academies, fully private schools, and the Ministry’s language-assistant programme, how they compare with Spain’s minimum wage, and how pay works on the routes with no official scale.

The Official Pay Floors for English Teachers in Spain

I taught in an academy in my first year in Spain. I signed a contract I barely understood because I did not know a national agreement already set the minimum I could legally be paid. If you know these floors before you negotiate, you are in a much stronger position. All figures below are official figures as of October 2026.

Language Academies Under the National Collective Agreement

Most new arrivals start in a private language academy, the kind of place with a cheerful sign above a shop front in Valencia or Seville. These companies fall under the X Convenio colectivo de Enseñanza y formación no reglada, published in the BOE on 9 July 2025. It applies nationwide to private companies teaching in person, at a distance, blended, or online. If you are hired by an online academy based in Spain, the same agreement covers you.

The minimum annual base salaries for 2026 are:

• Lead teacher, called Profesor/a Titular: €18,459.05
• Assistant teacher, called Profesor/a Auxiliar o Adjunto/a, which includes the online assistant: €15,963.59

For 2027, the lead teacher minimum rises to €19,382.01. These are minimums. Nothing stops an employer from paying more, and good academies in high-demand areas sometimes do. The salary is normally paid in 14 monthly payments, so you get two extra payments during the year. It can be paid in 12 if you and the employer agree.

There is also a monthly “dedicación” supplement of €126.17 in 2026. It is paid 12 times a year to staff working 50% or more of the annual hours. Staff on fewer hours receive less. When you compare an offer with the minimum, check whether this supplement appears on the contract or payslip as well as the base salary.

The full-time reference for teachers is up to 1,446 hours a year, with 34 hours a week as the reference module. You are entitled to one month of paid holiday a year, pro rata if you work part of the year. Many academy contracts are part-time, because evening adult classes and after-school children’s groups do not fill a full week. A part-time contract is not necessarily a bad deal. But you should expect your salary to be proportional to your hours, not the full-time figure.

For a deeper look at how these agreements work, see What Is a ‘Convenio Colectivo’? How It Affects Your Job. Income tax and social security deductions also come off your salary before it reaches your bank account. Spain Salary Expectations: How to Interpret Bruto vs Neto walks through how to read that difference.

Fully Private Schools Teaching the Spanish Curriculum

Some teachers with a recognised degree and the right qualifications move into fully private schools. These are schools with no state-funded levels, teaching the Spanish curriculum. They are covered by the XII Convenio colectivo nacional de centros de enseñanza privada sin ningún nivel concertado, published in the BOE on 26 July 2024.

Total annual pay for a lead teacher in 2026 is:

• €26,971.29 at primary and first-cycle ESO
• €28,298.49 at second-cycle ESO and Bachillerato

Both figures include three extraordinary payments a year. The teaching reference is 27 teaching hours a week, which comes to 1,089 teaching hours a year. Non-teaching and training hours come on top.

This is a clear step up from academy pay, but the entry requirements are much tougher. You usually need your foreign degree officially recognised and to meet the requirements for teaching that stage. Start with Recognition of Foreign Degrees (Homologación) in Spain: Overview. The process takes patience, but it opens doors that stay shut without it.

How These Figures Compare With the Minimum Wage

Spain’s minimum wage, the SMI, is €1,221 a month for 2026, or €40.70 a day, for a full-time working day. It is paid pro rata for shorter hours. The annual comparison figure is not below €17,094.

This puts the academy figures in context. The assistant teacher base salary of €15,963.59 sits below the SMI annual comparison figure of €17,094. The lead teacher base of €18,459.05 sits above it. Under the minimum wage rules, a full-time worker’s total pay is checked against that annual SMI figure, not just the base salary line. If you are on a full-time assistant contract and your total pay looks thin, compare it with the SMI. Then ask HR or a gestor to explain the payslip if something does not add up.

The Auxiliares de Conversación Allowance

The language-assistant programme is how thousands of native speakers first come to Spain. It works well, but treat the money as a modest allowance, not a salary. The programme basics are covered in What Is the Auxiliares de Conversación Program in Spain?. Here I will focus on what you actually receive.

What the Monthly Allowance Looks Like by Region

For the 2026-27 course, the standard monthly allowance is €800. The minimum is 14 hours a week. Some regions go up to 16 hours, with extra pay. The programme runs from 1 November 2026 to 31 May 2027, with 7 monthly payments.

Some regions pay more:

Think about what €800 means in practice. A friend of mine was placed in a village outside Cáceres, where rent was low and that allowance stretched a long way. Another friend was placed near Palma and found the higher €875 allowance vanished into a room in a shared flat. Region choice matters as much as the headline figure. Check local rents before you rank your preferences. Cost of Living in Spain: Monthly Budget Guide for Expats is a sensible starting point.

The programme also covers health insurance. Assistants from outside the EU, or without a European Health Insurance Card, get a health policy taken out by the Ministry or the region. Travel to and from Spain is not covered. You pay your own flights.

Surviving the Paid-in-Arrears Start

This is the part that catches people out. Payments are made in arrears, and the first one can arrive as late as the end of December. You start in November but may not see any money until the end of December. Meanwhile you will probably need to pay a rental deposit, first month’s rent, a phone plan, and transport, all at once.

Bring enough savings to cover at least your first two months of living costs, plus your deposit. If you are American, there is a separate issue: your US filing obligations do not stop when you move. Some assistants use a specialist service such as Taxes for Expats to handle their US return, while others file themselves. Teaching English in Spain as an Auxiliar: US Filing Obligations explains what applies.

Many auxiliares top up their allowance with private classes in the afternoons. That leads us to the routes with no official pay scale.

Routes Without an Official Pay Scale

Outside academies, fully private schools, and the assistant programme, there is no national figure to point to. Pay is set by the employer or client. Here is how each route works, so you can judge an offer when you see one.

Private Classes and In-Company Teaching

Private one-to-one classes are the classic side hustle. You find students through word of mouth, neighbourhood noticeboards, parents at the school gate, or language-exchange groups. You agree a price with each student or family. Rates depend on your experience, the city, whether you travel to the student, and whether you prepare for exams such as Cambridge certificates. Exam preparation is often more valuable to families than general conversation.

In-company teaching means going into offices to teach staff, usually early mornings or lunchtimes. Sometimes you are hired directly by the company. More often you are sent by an academy that holds the contract. If an academy employs you under contract, the national agreement minimums above still apply. If a business hires you directly as an independent provider, you agree the fee with them. Factor in travel time between offices, because a single class across town can eat half a morning.

Neither route is a legal grey area if you do it properly. But earning regularly from private students usually means registering as self-employed, which I cover below.

Online Teaching and International Schools

Online teaching takes several forms. If a Spanish online academy employs you, the national agreement covers you, including the online assistant category. If you sell lessons through a marketplace platform such as iTalki, you set your own lesson price and the platform takes a share. Check the platform’s own pages for its current terms. Building a profile takes time, and income tends to be uneven for the first months while you collect reviews and repeat students. It works best as a complement to local work, or as a portable income if you move cities.

International schools, the British, American, and IB schools around Madrid, Barcelona, and the Costa del Sol, set their own pay. It depends on the school, your teaching qualification, and your experience in that curriculum. These schools usually want a recognised teaching qualification from your home country and classroom experience, not just a TEFL certificate. Ask about pay scales, contract length, and benefits during the interview. A reputable school will answer clearly.

Freelancing as Autónomo

If you teach privately, sell lessons online, or contract directly with companies, you will usually need to register as autónomo. That brings monthly social security contributions, quarterly tax filings, and correct invoicing. It is manageable, but it changes your maths. What a client pays you is not what you keep. Some freelancers handle the admin with a gestor. Others use a digital service such as Xolo, which is built around freelancer invoicing and filings. Compare what each provider includes on its own site before deciding.

Look at your hours before registering. Earning a little on the side from two private students is very different from running a full timetable. The registration steps are covered in Registering as Autónomo for Freelancers in Spain: Work Setup.

Turning These Figures Into a Realistic Plan

Knowing the numbers is half the work. The other half is checking that the job in front of you actually matches them. This is the process I wish I had followed before my first contract:

1. Identify which route the job falls into: academy, fully private school, assistant programme, international school, or freelance.
2. For academy and private school jobs, ask which collective agreement applies and which job category you are in, such as lead teacher or assistant.
3. Compare the offer with the matching minimum. For academies, that is €18,459.05 for a lead teacher or €15,963.59 for an assistant teacher. For fully private schools, it is €26,971.29 or €28,298.49 depending on the stage.
4. Check your hours against the full-time reference. If you are part-time, expect your salary to be proportional to your hours.
5. Confirm the payment structure: 14 payments or 12, and whether the dedicación supplement is included.
6. For full-time contracts, check that total pay is not below the SMI annual comparison figure of €17,094.
7. Read your first payslip line by line. What is ‘Nómina’? Understanding Spanish Payroll Documents decodes each section.
8. If you are an auxiliar, plan your budget around the first payment arriving as late as the end of December.

Choosing Where to Teach

Location shapes what your pay is worth more than almost anything else. The same academy minimum feels very different in a mid-sized city in Castilla y León than in central Barcelona. Smaller cities often have less competition for teachers and lower rents. That can make the official minimums feel far more comfortable. See How to Find English-Teaching Jobs in Spain Outside the Big Cities for practical search strategies.

Building Toward Better Pay

Most teachers I know who stayed long-term moved up over time. They went from assistant to lead teacher, from academy to private school after recognising their degree, or added exam-preparation students to their timetable. Improving your Spanish helps here too. It opens up work with younger learners and makes dealing with schools and parents much easier.

For visas, programmes, and qualification requirements, see Teaching English in Spain: Requirements, Programs, and Visas. You do not need to get everything perfect in year one. Know your floor, protect your savings during the first months, and treat each contract as a step toward the next.

Disclaimer

This article is for general informational purposes only and does not constitute professional advice. Laws, prices and regulations vary by location and change over time. Consult a qualified professional for guidance on your specific situation.

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