A free general assistant is enough for the writing a teacher does alone, and not enough for anything students touch. ChatGPT for Teachers, Claude for Teachers, Gemini and Microsoft Copilot Chat all cost a verified school nothing and handle drafting, planning and brainstorming well. A specialist platform earns its place in five jobs: student-facing AI the teacher can watch, feedback inside student documents, leveled reading texts, a district-managed rollout, and output matched to your curriculum.
What changed this fall: the free assistants grew up
Until this year the argument for a specialist tool was partly privacy paperwork and partly admin controls. Both gaps have narrowed. OpenAI says ChatGPT for Teachers now has a 16-state National Data Privacy Agreement and serves more than 100 K-12 organizations (OpenAI, August 26, 2026). Anthropic opened Claude for Teachers to school and district Enterprise deployments, free for a year to organizations that sign up by June 30, 2027 (Anthropic, August 28, 2026).
One gap has not closed, and it is the one that decides most purchases: students. OpenAI's help page says of ChatGPT for Teachers, "This plan is not for students" (OpenAI help center). Anthropic's announcement describes access for educators and school staff and does not mention students. Our view: the dividing line between a general assistant and a specialist tool is no longer price or privacy paperwork. It is whether a child will type into it.
How we checked these tools
We read each vendor's pricing page, help center or announcement on October 29, 2026, and we link the source next to each claim. Where a page gave no number, we say so. We chose four general assistants and four specialist platforms that appear in the AI Educator directory, which listed 138 tools on the day we checked. We left out tools that do a single narrow job, such as quiz makers and flashcard generators, and Khanmigo gets a one-line verdict below because its current terms could not be confirmed. Nobody paid for a place on this list. Directory ratings are quoted as they stand, with review counts. We did not run classroom trials for this post, so every claim about what a tool does comes from the vendor's own pages and is labeled that way.
Eight tools at a glance
| Tool | Best use | Strengths | Limitations | Price / free tier (checked Oct 29, 2026) | Privacy considerations |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| ChatGPT for Teachers | A teacher's own drafting and planning | Broad: files, data analysis, voice, custom GPTs | Not for students; no usage limits stated | Free for verified U.S. K-12 educators through June 2027 | Not used for training by default (OpenAI); student data privacy agreement referenced |
| Claude for Teachers | District-run teacher access | Standards connections in all 50 states (Anthropic) | Admin must sign up; students not mentioned | Free for a year for organizations signing up by June 30, 2027 | Not used for training (Anthropic); admin accepts a student data privacy agreement |
| Google Gemini | Schools already on Google Workspace | Reaches students through admin controls | Stricter content rules under 18; admin decides access | Included in Workspace for Education editions at no charge | Google says data is not human reviewed or used to train models |
| Microsoft Copilot | Schools on Microsoft 365 | Sits inside accounts the school already manages | Microsoft's page names faculty, staff and higher-education students aged 13+ | Copilot Chat free with A1, A3 or A5 license | Enterprise data protection; Microsoft says data is not used to train foundation models |
| SchoolAI | Student-facing AI the teacher sees | Teacher-built Spaces; student chat visibility on free | Free plan: five Space sessions a year | Free; Pro and Scale sold to schools and districts | Directory record says it collects student data; ask for the agreement |
| Brisk Teaching | Feedback and tools inside Docs and Classroom | 20+ tools in a browser extension, free | Free batch feedback has an upload limit (number not stated) | Free; Premium and Intelligence are custom-priced | Custom data privacy agreements are listed under Premium |
| Diffit | Leveled reading texts | Fast adaptation of any source | Free plan keeps 90 days of history | Free Basic; Diffit for Schools flat-rate by enrollment | Ask the vendor; no agreement terms on the plans page |
| MagicSchool | One managed teacher and student platform | 80+ teacher tools; student rooms on paid tiers | Student tools not on Free; free cap not stated | Free; Plus $8.33 a month billed annually; Enterprise custom | Custom Data Privacy Agreement is Enterprise only |
Four questions that decide it
- Will a student type into it? If yes, a general teacher plan is the wrong tool. Gemini, with an administrator's controls, is the one general assistant here that reaches students.
- Does the output have to live inside Google Docs or Classroom? Then the specialist that works in the browser beside the document saves you the copy and paste.
- Will you do this task every week? A tool that stores your texts and settings pays back; a prompt you retype does not.
- Does your district need one signed agreement and one dashboard? Then ask for a district tier, and price it against the free general option your state may already cover.
If all four answers are no, stay with the free assistant.
Where a free general assistant is enough
Use it for anything only you will read before you edit it: a unit outline from your own objectives, a rubric draft, three versions of a parent email, a set of exit-ticket questions, a plain-English summary of a policy memo. None of these needs student names, a roster or a student login. Keep student names and identifiers out of the prompt unless your district has approved the specific plan and its data agreement. Our view is that a teacher who has not yet found a task the free assistant fails at should not pay for anything.
SchoolAI is the best fit for student-facing AI the teacher can watch
SchoolAI is the best fit for a lesson where students talk to AI because the teacher builds the activity, called a Space, and sees what students ask. SchoolAI's July 15, 2026 post says the free plan includes student chat visibility with individual chat drill-down, standards alignment and most "PowerUps" (SchoolAI). The directory rates it 4.92 from 13 reviews (SchoolAI listing).
Watch out for: the free plan allows five Space sessions per year, and each run of a Space counts as one. Teacher visibility into student AI Sidekick conversations is listed under the Scale plan.
Pricing: free tier as above; Pro and Scale are sold only through a school or district purchase, and the post lists no dollar amounts (no public pricing).
Safety: the directory record says SchoolAI collects student data. Ask the vendor for its student data agreement and check what your district requires before students log in.
Choose something else when: you want a whole-school platform. MagicSchool Plus and Brisk Boost also offer student-facing tools, and Gemini works if your district runs on Google Workspace.
Brisk is the best fit for feedback on student writing inside Docs and Classroom
Brisk is the best fit for feedback because it runs as a Chrome and Edge extension next to the student's document, so the teacher never moves text to a chat window. Brisk's plans page lists glow-and-grow feedback, next-steps feedback and rubric-criteria feedback on the free plan (Brisk plans). The directory rates it 4.77 from 35 reviews (Brisk listing).
Watch out for: feedback on student work is a draft. Read every comment before it reaches a child. Batch feedback on the free plan has an upload limit the page does not quantify (unverified). Whether Brisk Boost, the student-facing product, is available on the free plan was unclear on the page; Brisk lists it under Premium.
Pricing: Free for teachers with 20+ tools; Premium for schools and districts and Intelligence for districts are custom-priced (no public pricing).
Safety: Brisk lists custom data privacy agreements under Premium. A free teacher account has no such agreement listed, so avoid student identifiers there.
Choose something else when: the feedback has to be rubric-scored across hundreds of papers; see our guide to grading tools that use your own rubric.
Diffit is the best fit for leveled reading texts you reuse
Diffit is the best fit for adapting one source text to several reading levels because that is all it is built to do, and it keeps what you made. Its free Basic plan gives "quality, classroom-ready content," with download, print and share, and access to content made in the last 90 days (Diffit plans). The directory rates it 4.20 from 5 reviews, among the thinnest evidence in this post (Diffit listing).
Watch out for: the 90-day history means last spring's texts are gone unless you saved them. Check that each leveled version keeps the vocabulary your unit requires.
Pricing: Basic is free; Diffit for Schools is a flat-rate annual subscription tiered by enrollment, and the plans page lists no dollar amounts (no public pricing).
Safety: teacher-side use needs no student data. If students log in, ask Diffit for its student privacy terms first.
Choose something else when: you need a one-off adaptation. A free assistant given your text and a target reading level can do that.
MagicSchool is the best fit for a district that wants one managed platform
MagicSchool is the best fit when a district wants a single set of teacher and student tools under one agreement, because its Enterprise plan adds district alignment, single sign-on, student-information and learning-system integrations, and a dashboard. Its pricing page shows a Free plan with 80+ teacher tools and a Plus plan that adds 50+ student tools and Student Rooms (MagicSchool pricing). The directory rates it 4.74 from 19 reviews (MagicSchool listing).
Watch out for: Free does not include student tools. The page lists unlimited generations only under Plus and gives no free cap, so the free limit is unverified. Common Sense Media included MagicSchool in its assessment of AI teacher assistants (Common Sense Media, August 6, 2025).
Pricing: Free is $0. Plus is $8.33 per user per month billed annually ($99.96 a year) or $12.99 billed monthly. Enterprise is custom (MagicSchool pricing).
Safety: MagicSchool lists FERPA, COPPA, SOC 2, GDPR and Ed Law 2-D compliance on its pricing page; that is the vendor's own claim, not our finding. The page says Plus does not include a Custom Data Privacy Agreement, and Enterprise does.
Choose something else when: one teacher wants one job done. A free assistant or a narrower tool costs less and needs no approval.
Diffit and Brisk are the best fit when output must match your curriculum
A free general assistant has never seen your pacing guide, and the district tiers of these specialist tools exist to fix that. Diffit for Schools lists resources "grounded in your core curriculum" and alignment to standards, skills, MTSS tiers and DOK levels (Diffit plans). Brisk's Intelligence tier says it builds curriculum, pacing and scope and sequence into every tool (Brisk plans).
Watch out for: both are custom-priced and sold to districts, so a single teacher cannot test them on this basis. Ask for a trial on one of your own units before signing.
Pricing: custom for both (no public pricing).
Safety: curriculum uploads are district property; ask where they are stored and whether they are used for training.
Choose something else when: your curriculum is short enough to paste into a prompt. A free assistant given the unit plan gets most of the way.
Jobs where neither kind of tool is the answer
Common Sense Media's assessment recommends that educators not use AI to create IEPs or behavior plans, and it reports that AI-generated individualized education plans and behavior plans can show bias based on students' perceived backgrounds (Common Sense Media, August 6, 2025). That finding applies to general assistants and specialist tools alike. For the paperwork side of that work, see our 504 plan guide and our guide to IEP writing tools.
A worked example: one week of 8th-grade science on plate tectonics
This is a plan, not a report of a classroom result.
- Monday, free assistant. Paste your unit objectives, with no student names, and ask for a five-day sequence and four exit tickets. Edit until it matches your pacing guide.
- Tuesday, Diffit. Paste one article on how scientists track plate movement and produce three reading levels. Save the three versions before the 90-day window closes.
- Wednesday, SchoolAI. Build one Space where students question a "volcanologist" and a "seismologist." This uses one of the five free sessions for the year.
- Thursday, Brisk. Students write a claim-evidence-reasoning paragraph in Google Docs. Generate feedback, read each comment and delete any that misses the standard.
- Friday, free assistant. Draft a short family update on what the class learned, with no student names.
Total specialist spend: nothing, if the district allows the tools. Total decisions for the teacher: which comments to keep.
Quick verdicts on other names readers ask about
Khanmigo's free-for-U.S.-teachers pilot was described as 100% free in a Khan Academy post last modified March 20, 2025, with no end date stated (Khan Academy); we could not confirm today's terms (unverified). Gemini Notebook, the tool Google renamed from NotebookLM, grounds answers only in sources you provide (Google) and suits source-based planning. Claude, ChatGPT and Gemini are all in the directory with ratings of 4.57, 4.35 and 4.59.
The bottom line
Start every teacher on a free general assistant approved by your district, and add a specialist only for the job that assistant cannot do. For most teachers that job is student-facing work or feedback inside student documents. For a district it is the dashboard and the signed agreement. If you are weighing the district decision, read our comparison of the free district platforms next, and see the free-tools roundup for tools that cost nothing. Browse everything in the lesson planning and resource creation category.
Dan Fitzpatrick writes about AI in education at The AI Educator.
