The TEFL Academy review, submitted by Lendak.
My terrible The TEFL Academy (TTA) experience.
I chose to do the TEFL with The TEFL Academy because of all the good reviews online. I couldn’t find any negative reviews! So, I enrolled in their flagship Level 5 TEFL/TESOL course.
The first problem began right after I’d paid for the course. I paid and the money was taken from my bank but I didn’t get the payment received confirmation from TEFL Academy and I didn’t get any access to the course.
The first thing I did, after checking the payment had gone through successfully, was to contact TEFL Academy to let them know I’d paid and to ask if I could start my course because I only had a 3-week window to complete the course.
I tried phoning them but nobody answered so I sent off an email and got an instant bot reply that my email was in the queue. ONE WEEK LATER I finally got through to someone and then ONE WEEK AFTER THAT I finally got access to the course.
When I did get the course access I had to steamroll through the course and luckily the course is quite light on content so I was able to complete it in a couple of days. It took another TWO WEEKS to receive the digital certificate!!!
It was then that I began questioning all of the positive reviews and this lead me to trustedteflreviews.com where I was able to see the truth staring me in the face. So, I left a review on a website where TEFL Academy has about 1,000 positive reviews and my review wasn’t published, even though I showed them my course certificate and proof of payment.
I tried again with another reviews site and they basically said they can’t publish the review because they are worried about being taken to court by The TEFL Academy.
So the moral of this story is not to believe the positive reviews of this program because any negative reviews have been refused publication. Just believe the reviews of this program on trustedteflreviews.com because, as you can see, this reviews website doesn’t suppress freedom-of-speech reviews.
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Mia Williams – Trusted TEFL Reviews
Thank you for your The TEFL Academy review, Lendak.
Yes, Trusted TEFL Reviews publishes all reviews received that have been proven to have been written by a real graduate of the program.
We never delete negative reviews of a program when pressurized to do so – we are pressured a lot.
The TEFL Academy (https://trustedteflreviews.com/category/the-tefl-academy/) is the TEFL/TESOL program that is the most aggressive when it comes to trying to have reviews that they don’t like deleted.
Trusted TEFL Reviews
I also had a poor experience lately with this TEFL Academy company.
I paid and never got access to the course.
Forget about customer support because there was NOBODY replying to my emails and calls.
Pathetic.
In the end, I gave up and my bank clawed back the money for me.
The company did try and keep it though, despite never communicating with me.
The whole experience left me feeling like the victim of a scam.
Avoid!
Have to agree. Can’t explain why this company has so many positive reviews. On some review platforms, they receive 5-10 5-Star reviews in one day. Definitely not normal. Had an awful time with TTA TEFL Academy. I agree you should avoid and choose a different company.
FEI, I cancelled my TTA TEFL Academy course because I found out it isn’t fully accredited. As soon as I got my money back, I enrolled in the tefl online pro 120-hour Professional course and everything was so much better. I know I can teach worldwide with the tefl online pro certificate and the course is a bit cheaper than the one offered by TTA TEFL Academy. This is the course: https://teflonlinepro.com/120-hour-professional/. It’s fully accredited and the course and job support are excellent. For me, a tefl online pro review score of 9/10. For TTA The TEFL Academy, 3/10.
I can attest to how bad the TEFL Academy’s Level 5 online course is because I’ve recently finished it and I so wish I had chosen a different school to study TEFL with.
My advice, other than not to choose the TEFL Academy, is to ignore all of the review websites they promote because it’s clear they write the reviews themselves. You also need to consider whether their course will be recognized where you want to be teaching because when I applied for jobs in South Korea I was told my TEFL Academy certificate wasn’t accepted.
Personally, I would avoid the TEFL Academy 🙁
I did lose money on the course but I then did consider myself fortunate to have later found this reviews website. I chose one of the 5 Best courses in 2024 that Trusted TEFL Reviews recommends. It was SO MUCH BETTER! 🙂
I own a language school, here in Germany. We recently had an applicant interview for a teaching position, a graduate of The TEFL Academy. They couldn’t answer basic teaching methodology questions and their demo lesson was a disaster. We have now placed The TEFL Academy on our blacklist since discovering that they misrepresent their accreditation credentials. We have had a far more positive experience with graduates from CIEE TEFL and TEFL Online Pro, both of which are fully accredited. The TEFL industry really shouldn’t be treated as a TEFL mill and companies such as The TEFL Academy are all shine and no substance.
Thank god for this website, these scammers are so frustrating and deserve karma!!
Terrible experience here too!
I can’t for the life of me understand why The TEFL Academy is still in business when they so clearly screw people over.
I purchased their 168-hour (Level 5) TEFL course which was advertised as “internationally recognised” and included employment and tutor support.
It took me about two days to finish the course (39 hours in total) and there was no customer support at all. Nada.
I’ve been turned down for jobs again and again because the certificate isn’t fully accredited.
One employer literally LOL when I presented my The TEFL Academy certificate to him at the start of my job interview.
The course wasn’t cheap either!
I agree with Joshua that they are scammers.
It’s just such a shame that I found out after foolishly giving them my money.
Thanks Jade for the TEFL Online Pro recommendation. I think I’m going to enroll with them too. The course price is half what The TEFL Academy charge and they are fully accredited so it’s a no-brainer for me.
At least I won’t be laughed at in a job interview again.
It was so embarrassing!
I count my lucky stars that I read this review (and the articles on Trusted TEFL Reviews warning about the TEFL Academy).
I was in touch with a woman going by the name Megan Broccoli, who almost convinced me to enroll in the TEFL Academy Level 5 course.
She was selling it hard and I know why now. She is an affiliate marketer for the TEFL Academy.
The amount of lies that woman told me should have put her to shame.
I agree with Jade. TEFL Online Pro’s 120-Hour TEFL/TESOl course is far better than TTA The TEFL Academy. Cheaper too. And awesome support. The TEFL Online Pro certificate is accepted worldwide, unlike TTA the TEFL Academy’s. If you need to choose between the two, go with https://teflonlinepro.com/. I’ve hear that OISE University of Toronto TEFL are excellent too.
Is TEFL Academy recognized? Not for the best jobs and at the best schools. They claim they are recognized worldwide-this isn’t true. I found it a frustrating experience being turned down job after job application because no interviewer knew what a ‘Level 5’ TEFL certificate is.
You need a 120-hour TEFL certificate, and preferably from a fully accredited program. The TEFL Academy’s certificates are useless.
I’m currently searching for teaching work in Asia, with my TTA The TEFL Academy Level 5 certificate. Despite all the marketing and promises by this company, I have yet to even make it through the interview stage. Not one single school even knows what “Level 5” is. I know I’m parroting Sarah’s comments here, but schools just look for “120-Hour TEFL” on your certificate. I did some initial research and their Level 5 TEFL certificate is only recognized in the United Kingdom, Ireland and Malta. You would think with their steep course price tag that they would at least be recognized outside of certain countries in Europe. It’s gotten so bad that I’m strongly considering taking another TEFL program’s 120-Hour TEFL course because that’s what schools are looking for on your resume. I also agree with other comments that TTA The TEFL Academy reviews on other review platforms appear mostly self-written by TTA The TEFL Academy staff members. I could be wrong, but I’m actually here in Vietnam and no-one has even heard of TTA The TEFL Academy. They are definitely not the world’s #1 or the world’s favorite TEFL Provider, as they boldly claim on their school website. Instead, I’m going with my gut now and I will choose from one of the 5 Best online TEFL programs – programs listed on Trusted TEFL Reviews. As soon as I raised this serious issue with TTA The TEFL Academy, they ghosted me and blocked me from writing to them. It’s a poorly-managed company that is, for want of a better word, scamming their students. My advice: go with someone else. Am currently looking at enrolling with TEFL Online Pro. Their verified customer reviews speak for themselves: https://trustedteflreviews.com/category/tefl-online-pro-reviews-in-2025/.
We noticed this post and wanted to add our thoughts. Firstly, we would like to thank the commenters who have recommended our program — thank you!
The TEFL Academy’s current owners took over the company in 2001. Shortly afterward, we found ourselves the target of their aggressive hostility toward business competitors. It began with one of their affiliate marketers posting misinformation about TEFL Online Pro on Reddit and on her personal blog.
Various falsehoods appeared online about us, but we were able to challenge each of them because we knew they hadn’t been written by any of our graduates.
The TEFL Academy changed tactics last year when one of their new affiliate marketers took one of our courses and immediately claimed afterward that our international TEFL/TESOL certificates are “useless.” This would have been a clever, albeit morally wrong, tactic by the TEFL Academy, because we couldn’t simply state that she wasn’t one of our students — that is, if we hadn’t already known that she was a TEFL Academy affiliate marketer.
She mirrored the actions of the previous affiliate marketer by posting on Reddit and on her personal blog. A year later, the same affiliate marketer, at the behest of the TEFL Academy, continues to publish misinformation about TEFL Online Pro online.
There are many companies offering international TEFL/TESOL certification, and we encourage you to choose the one that best suits your needs. What the TEFL industry doesn’t need is a company such as the TEFL Academy attacking its competitors through proxies while claiming to offer the world’s best online TEFL/TESOL courses.
If you want to teach English online or abroad, you are required to have a 120-hour TEFL/TESOL certificate.
Kind regards,
Paul Murphy | Operations Manager | TEFL Online Pro
info@teflonlinepro.com | https://teflonlinepro.com/enroll/
The Teachers’ Choice Award winner in 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023, 2024, and 2025
Our verified customer reviews: https://trustedteflreviews.com/category/tefl-online-pro-reviews-in-2025/