Kaplan alternatives: the free path, and when to pay anyway
The incumbent across securities, insurance and real estate licensing. Sold both to individuals and, more often, bought for you by the firm sponsoring your registration.
We publish 3,144 free practice questions across 22 exams Kaplan also sells prep for. Below: what Kaplan costs today, what it genuinely does better than us, who should still buy it, and where the free route is enough.
Pricing on this page was read from Kaplan’s own site on . Prices change — check before you buy.
What Kaplan costs
| Product | Price | What the price buys |
|---|---|---|
| SIE study packages | $99 - $229 | Range shown across the three SIE package tiers |
| SIE Premium Instruction, OnDemand | $199 | Classes, QBank, mastery exam, InstructorLink support |
| SIE Premium Instruction, Live Online | $229 | — |
| Real Estate Study Package | $99.00 | Language of Real Estate book + MP3 + 700 flashcards |
What Kaplan does better
- Instructor access. The Premium packages include live or on-demand classes and InstructorLink question support — a person who answers when you are stuck on a specific rule. We have no equivalent.
- Firm acceptance. Broker-dealers and insurance carriers routinely reimburse Kaplan and build onboarding around its study plan, so using it can be the path of least resistance.
- One publisher across a whole career path — SIE, then Series 7, then Series 24 — with the same License Exam Manual and QBank conventions throughout.
Buy Kaplan if
- Your firm is paying. There is no argument for studying free when someone else is buying instructor time.
- You are retaking after a failure and need diagnosis rather than volume — the mastery exams and instructor support are aimed at exactly that.
- You want a structured calendar imposed on you and know you will not build one yourself.
Use the free route if
- You are sitting the SIE and want to know whether the field is for you before spending anything.
- You have the official content outline and need question volume against it, not a curriculum.
- You are topping up a course you already own and just want more reps on the sections you keep missing.
Exams we both cover — free here
3,144 questions across 22 examsEvery link below is a live free practice test with written explanations, no signup and no card. Question counts are read from the database at build time, so they are what the page actually renders.
Decided Kaplan is the right buy? Go straight to kaplanfinancial.com. We earn nothing from that link.
Frequently asked questions
Is there a free alternative to Kaplan for the SIE?
Yes for practice and review, no for instruction. Our SIE practice questions, study guide and cheat sheet are free and built against the same FINRA content outline Kaplan works from, but nothing here replaces Kaplan's live classes or InstructorLink support. If your firm reimburses Kaplan, take the reimbursement.
Does Kaplan cover real estate and insurance too?
Yes. Kaplan Real Estate Education (kapre.com) sells pre-licensing and exam prep for salesperson, broker, appraisal and home inspection, and Kaplan Financial Education sells insurance pre-licensing. Prices differ by state and product, so check the specific product page rather than trusting a blanket figure.
Where these figures come from
Every price on this page was read from a page Kaplan publishes itself, on the date shown. We do not estimate competitor pricing.
Kaplan is a trademark of its owner. This is an independent 2026 comparison published by Every Exam Prep under our editorial policy; we are not affiliated with, endorsed by, or a reseller of Kaplan.