ACT® Prep on a Budget: What's Actually Worth Paying For
Read time: 6 min · Last updated: June 20, 2026
Test prep spending can spiral quickly. A prep course here, a tutor there, a stack of books — and it's easy to spend $2,000–$3,000 before anyone has taken a practice test. Test prep companies won't ever dissuade you from not spending money with them. But most of that spending is unnecessary because it lacks qualification in terms of your son or daughter doing everything they can to learn everything they can by themselves.
When it comes to ACT® scores, here's what actually moves the needle and what doesn't. What's actually worth spending money on and what isn't.
What's Free and Good
Official practice tests. The ACT® releases free full-length practice tests made by the same people who make the real exam. These are the single most valuable prep resource that exists — more accurate than any third-party test, completely free, and directly useful. A student who takes two or three of these under timed conditions has better preparation data than one who buys a $50 prep book and does no full tests. Start here before spending anything.
The content guides on this site. Every topic on the ACT® Math, English, Reading, and Science sections is covered in the free guides here. This is the prep course component — systematic content coverage — at no cost. A student who works through the relevant topic pages has covered the same ground a commercial course covers, without the price tag.
Khan Academy. For students with foundational gaps in algebra or grammar, Khan Academy covers those fundamentals well and for free. It's not ACT®-specific, but it builds the base that ACT® prep builds on top of.
Your local library. Most prep books — including the official ACT® Red Book, which is the best book available — can be borrowed for free. Before buying any book, check your local library.
What's Worth the Small Cost
The official ACT® Red Book. If your library doesn't have it and you need more practice tests, this is the one book worth buying. It's made by the ACT® company, the tests are accurate, the explanations are thoughtful, and nothing on the market is more reliable. It costs around $30 new — less used — and contains practice tests no free source replicates well.
Princeton Review prep books. Second only to the official books in accuracy and quality of explanation. If you need section-specific practice beyond what the official materials provide, these are worth the library trip or the modest cost spent.
What's Usually Not Worth It
Commercial prep courses. Kaplan, Princeton Review, and similar programs cost $1,500–$3,000 and deliver a fixed curriculum that doesn't adapt to your child's specific gaps. The free content on this site plus official practice tests covers the same ground.
Most third-party prep apps. There are dozens of ACT® prep apps with monthly subscription fees. Most offer practice questions of varying quality. The free official tests are more accurate and more useful. Subscriptions for the ACT are not worth the cost.
Prep books that aren't the Red Book or Princeton Review. Many ACT® prep books are mediocre or worse despite good Amazon reviews. Buying the wrong one isn't just a waste of money — bad advice actively costs points. A lot of the top-listed ACT books for the enhanced book look AI generated.
Where Spending Money Makes the Most Sense
If the budget allows for one paid resource beyond the official materials, targeted tutoring produces the highest return — specifically, a small number of sessions after the student has done meaningful self-study and has a score report in hand.
At that point the problem is defined. The score report shows exactly where points are being lost. A few targeted sessions addressing those specific gaps are more efficient than months of undirected preparation. Three sessions with a specialist who knows where to focus will move the score more than a $1,500 prep course that covers everything.
If the budget is genuinely tight, the optimal sequence is: free official practice test to establish a baseline → free content guides to study the relevant topics → second free official test to measure progress → targeted tutoring only if the score hasn't reached the goal and the gap is identifiable. Many students get where they need to go without ever spending on paid tutoring.
The Bottom Line
The most expensive ACT® prep isn't necessarily the most effective. The free official practice tests and the content available on this site cover the majority of what any student needs. Money is best spent on the official Red Book if more practice tests are needed, and on a small number of targeted tutoring sessions if self-study has stalled.
Spending $2,000 on a prep course and $1,500 on a tutor is a common pattern. It's rarely the best use of the money. But it's the exact pattern I see so many parents fall into. They want to do a $2000 course because it's, say, 40 hours. And they just want some score improvement, and decide to do a course “just in case.”
I used to teach a group course for Varsity Tutors. They would charge the ~30 students like $1,000 or so, pay me $200/hour, and pocket the $22,000 difference. All of the students reported receiving good value for their money with me in the group course. But that was only with me fighting every step of the way to give them individualized instruction. That's when I learned that group prep courses were a cash grab I could never honestly take part in. And that's why I don't offer online group classes. (In school is much different since the students already know each other - they feel comfortable speaking up and have relatively equal education levels).
One more thing worth knowing: if budget is a genuine barrier and your child has the motivation to do the work, I do take on a small number of scholarship students. If you're in that situation, go the /free-tutoring for more information.