Homeschool curriculum for working parents: Time4Learning vs Miacademy vs Power Homeschool (2026)

The search for a homeschool curriculum that works around a full-time job usually ends at the same three names: Time4Learning, Miacademy and Power Homeschool. All three are online, self-paced and largely graded by software, which is exactly what a working parent needs. Most comparisons line them up on subjects and screen design. This one lines them up on the questions that decide whether the arrangement survives a working week: how much parent time each vendor says it takes, how much of the grading and record keeping happens without you, what a year costs, who accredits what, and whether a state education savings account (ESA) can pay for it. Every price below was read on the vendor's own site on 4 October 2026.

The working-parent comparison table

The table puts the vendor columns beside the institutional ones. "Accreditation" is what each vendor says on its own site, with the accreditor linked so you can check its directory. "ESA" lists only what the vendor itself states; it is a vendor statement, not an eligibility ruling, and your state programme's own marketplace is the authority.

Prices checked 4 October 2026 on each vendor's own site: time4learning.com, miacademy.co, powerhomeschool.org. Miacademy's page carried two sets of annual and lifetime figures on 4 October 2026: the rendered page showed $516 a year, $1,168 and $2,598, while the page's underlying HTML carried $480, $1,120 and $2,520. Confirm at checkout.

Parent time per day: what is published, and what is not

Parent hours per day is the number a working parent most wants and the number vendors least often print. We looked for it on each vendor's own pages rather than in reviews, because a reviewer's estimate is one family's week, not a design figure.

Time4Learning is the only one of the three that publishes it. Its FAQ answers "How much time does a parent need to be involved?" by grade band: parents of K-2 children "may need to dedicate 1-2 hours a day"; for grades 3 to 8 parents "often spend 30 minutes to 1 hour a day"; for high school, 15 to 30 minutes reviewing progress reports. Separately, Time4Learning publishes the student's typical daily online time: 30 to 60 minutes for K-2, 45 to 90 minutes for grades 3 to 5, 60 to 120 minutes for middle school and 90 to 180 minutes for high school. Read together, the vendor's own design is that a younger child needs a parent nearby for most of the lesson time, and an older child needs a daily check-in rather than supervision. These are the vendor's figures, not measurements we took.

Miacademy publishes design, not hours. Its FAQ says that while learning alongside your child is ideal, "we understand that parents have many responsibilities", that younger learners may need guidance the first few times, and that parents should regularly check the Reports tab and reassign work as needed. The parent account adds goal-setting, time-tracking, testing and a weekly email summarising each child's activity. That is a good fit for a parent who checks in after work, but Miacademy does not put a number on it.

Power Homeschool publishes the most direct caveat. On its enrolment page it says its courses "are provided without teacher support" and that parents take responsibility for supervising their children and making sure they put in the necessary effort. Its homepage describes the programme as parent-guided, with parents providing the role of the teacher. In exchange, its tooling is built to make remote supervision practical: a live monitor that flags a concept a student is stuck on, weekly lesson-step goals the parent sets per course, and per-lesson score reports. No hours figure is published on the pages we read.

There is also a legal layer that the software does not change. States differ on what a homeschooling parent must file, teach and assess, from no notice at all in Texas to annual notices, required subjects and assessments in states such as New York. The parent is the legal educator in a homeschool, whichever programme delivers the lessons. For a state-by-state reference, HSLDA's state law map is the most widely used; note that HSLDA is a homeschool advocacy organisation, so read your state's own education department page as well.

Grading and record keeping: how much happens without you

For a working parent, the hidden time cost of homeschooling is not teaching; it is marking work and keeping the records your state may ask for. Here is what each vendor says its system does.

• Time4Learning: "Time4Learning's automated system tracks scores and progress for parents." Teaching guides sit in the Parent Dashboard for parents who want to add enrichment, and the vendor offers templates for transcripts, grades and diplomas that it says "make it easy to match homeschool requirements in all 50 states."
• Miacademy: a built-in gradebook, downloadable reports for grades and attendance, and goal and time tracking. Its FAQ is clear on the limit: "While we are an accredited curriculum, we are not a school." So it cannot issue enrolment letters, records or transcripts; you adapt its grade and attendance reports into your own state-compliant records. It also notes that printable lesson components "may require supervision or grading."
• Power Homeschool: the most automated of the three on paper. Its parent page says the system "automates much of the busy-work associated with grading and keeping records", and lists score reports for every finished lesson, progress reports showing which days a student worked and for how long, and printable report cards with a grade per course and an overall GPA.

A useful way to read this: all three remove most of the marking for online work. The difference is how much of the paper trail is generated for you. Power Homeschool produces a report card and GPA. Time4Learning provides tracking plus templates. Miacademy provides reports you assemble. None of them replaces the records a state may require you to keep yourself.

What a year costs, per child

Monthly prices hide the comparison, so the chart puts each option on a 12-month basis for one child, using only figures read on the vendors' own sites on 4 October 2026. A school year of 10 months would cost less on the monthly plans. IXL and Sonlight are included as reference points: IXL as a low-cost supplement, Sonlight as the high-involvement, one-time-purchase contrast.

Three things move the real number. First, siblings: Time4Learning takes 10% off for a second child and 20% for three to five, while Miacademy's family lifetime plan covers up to four students for $2,598 once. Second, plan length: Miacademy's annual plan is cheaper than 12 monthly payments ($516 against $576). Third, the accredited upgrade: if you later want a school to hold the transcript, Brightspire Virtual School lists $4,300 a year plus a $150 non-refundable enrolment fee for grades 6 to 12, and Acellus Academy lists tuition from $249 a month (Basic) to $499 a month (Premium), or $79 a month with its scholarship option. Our accredited homeschool diploma comparison covers that step in detail.

Accreditation, and why it is not the curriculum's job

Accreditation is a review of a school by an outside body, and its practical effect is on transcripts and diplomas. A homeschool curriculum is a set of lessons, so the question "is it accredited?" often has a confusing answer. Time4Learning puts it plainly in its own FAQ: it "is not accredited because it functions as a curriculum provider rather than a school", and it adds that accreditation is not a requirement for homeschooling in any U.S. state. In a homeschool, you, the parent, issue the diploma.

Each vendor resolves this differently, and the table's accreditation row is where the three diverge most:

• Time4Learning points families who want an accredited school to Brightspire Virtual School, which it describes as "a Cognia-accredited private school for grades 6-12" with certified teachers, tutors and mentors. On its own page, Brightspire explains the difference: with Time4Learning, "the parent serves as the teacher of record." Cognia is a global non-profit school accreditor.
• Miacademy says it has been approved for supplementary accreditation by the Accrediting Commission for Schools, Western Association of Schools and Colleges (ACS WASC), in a category for Supplementary Education Programs that do not offer degrees. It is explicit that this does not make it a school.
• Power Homeschool is not accredited and says so indirectly: families who want an accredited online school can enrol at Acellus Academy instead. Acellus Academy states it has held WASC accreditation since the 2017-18 school year.

Paying with an ESA: what the vendor says, and what you still have to check

Education savings accounts now fund homeschool purchases in several states, and the three vendors handle this very differently on their own pages.

Time4Learning's FAQ lists it as an approved vendor for ESA programmes in Wyoming, Arkansas, Arizona, Florida, Idaho, New Hampshire, North Carolina, South Carolina, Texas, Utah and West Virginia, and its ESA page explains purchasing through ClassWallet, Odyssey, Step Up For Students and Student First Technologies. Miacademy's state-funding page, dated 1 September 2026, lists the programmes it says it qualifies for, including the Arizona ESA, Arkansas EFA, Florida's Step Up scholarships, Louisiana GATOR, North Carolina ESA+, New Hampshire EFA, South Carolina ESTF, Texas TEFA and Utah Fits All, and notes that Tennessee funds can be used for afterschool programming only. Power Homeschool did not state ESA acceptance on the pages we read.

Two programme facts from the official sources matter here. Texas Education Freedom Accounts, administered by the Texas Comptroller with Odyssey, set a $2,000 tier for homeschooled students for 2026-27, against $10,474 for a private school student; curricula, online courses and tutoring are allowed expense classes, and technology purchases are capped at 10% of the annual amount. Iowa's Students First ESA, by contrast, does not cover homeschool at all; it funds accredited nonpublic school tuition. A vendor's ESA list never tells you whether your child is eligible; your programme's marketplace does. This section is general information, not legal advice.

Alternatives, and the high-involvement contrast

A full curriculum is not the only shape that works around a job. Some working parents pair a lighter core with a practice platform; others choose the opposite of independent work on purpose. These are the alternatives we priced on the vendors' own sites on 4 October 2026.

IXL is the most common add-on for families who want more practice without a second curriculum. Its own homeschool page describes it as something that "complements your core lessons", and that is the honest place for it: it tracks progress, but it is not designed to be the programme of record. Reading Eggs and Night Zookeeper serve younger children; both sell family plans, and both lean on a parent dashboard rather than parent teaching time. Neither vendor makes an accreditation claim on the pages we read.

Sonlight is included as the deliberate contrast. Its Instructor's Guides plan a 36-week year in advance, which removes lesson planning, but the method is a parent reading aloud and discussing books with the child. Sonlight's own description is "open-and-go", not hands-off. For a parent with predictable evenings who wants to teach rather than supervise, that is the point; for a parent who needs the child working while the parent is on a call, it is the wrong shape. Sonlight's FAQ says it can be purchased through ESA programmes, with the state list on its own ESA page.

Who each one is for

How we built this page

We started from the curricula segment of our K-12 vendor map and opened each vendor's own pricing, FAQ and parent pages on 4 October 2026, in a browser where a page only rendered with JavaScript. We did not carry over any figure from search results, review sites or other comparison articles. Where a vendor publishes a parent-time figure, we quote it and label it as the vendor's; where it does not, we say "not published" rather than estimate one. Accreditation is taken from each vendor's own pages, and each accreditor is linked to its own website. ESA statements are the vendors' own; programme facts come from the Texas Comptroller's and Iowa Department of Education's official pages. No vendor on this page paid to be included, and this page contains no affiliate links.

If you are funding education at several ages at once, our guides to employer tuition reimbursement and free online courses cover the adult side of the same budget, and our college credit for homeschool high schoolers comparison covers the high school years.

Primary sources read for this page (4 October 2026)

• Vendor pricing and plan pages: Time4Learning homepage and grade listings, Time4Learning FAQ, Brightspire Virtual School, Miacademy pricing, Miacademy FAQ, Power Homeschool enrolment and pricing, Power Homeschool parent experience, Acellus Academy tuition.
• Alternatives: IXL family pricing, Reading Eggs pricing, Night Zookeeper homeschool, Night Zookeeper programme terms, Sonlight All-Subjects Package B+C, Sonlight Instructor's Guides.
• ESA pages: Time4Learning ESA page, Miacademy state funding page, Texas Education Freedom Accounts (Texas Comptroller of Public Accounts), Iowa Students First ESA (Iowa Department of Education).
• Accreditors: Cognia, ACS WASC. Homeschool law reference: HSLDA state law map (an advocacy organisation).

Outcomes vary by child. This page compares published prices, formats and credentials only; it makes no prediction about any child's results.