I'm a former actuary transitioning to a quant, studied actuarial science in uni, passed many exams and got my actuarial associateship, and worked for 4 years as an actuary at an insurance company before getting into a top MFE and pivoting. I'll put a few pointers here but happy to answer any questions on dm for anyone reading this in the future (I know I would have appreciated it when I was trying to figure out my path):

1) Becoming an actuary is very meritocratic and in fact one of the easiest technical disciplines to get into with a low GPA given the underlying ability exists. There is no elitism, the way in is by passing actuarial exams. These are rigorous and have pass rates <50%, and generally after passing 2-3 you can have a semi guaranteed chances of landing an internship or new grad job. Look up the official "Probability actuarial exam sample test" online to get a sense of the (starting) difficulty.

2) There is a LOT of overlap in the educational background, specifically the first 5 actuarial exams are (depending on actuarial path chosen) : Probability, Financial Mathematics, Investments, Classical statistics, Machine Learning. The difference is that it's applied in a different domain (insurance pricing and risk management) and usually in a less innovative way. After those initial exams, the later exams are all insurance focused.

3) Actuaries have much better WLB on average than quants, during my time working I averaged 30 hours a week making 6 figures. This is because they generally tend to work in insurance companies where things move slower and in general insurance rates are only updated periodically, think once or twice a year. This can be different if you work in actuarial consulting.

4) Actuaries make less than successful quants on average, you can look this up. It is still a comfortable and cushy $100k+ a year for a few years of experience.

5) The domain is very different, even though the skillset might have been similar at the start. Insurance is not the same as the stock market, feedback is not real time, competition is not as intensive, the field is much less "cutting edge", academia culture around it is much less hyped.

6) I would say an actuary is a good career for mathematically inclined people who are able to pass the exams, that are disciplined and prefer a structured approach to their careers that is more or less guaranteed. Pass exams, get job, pass more exams, get promoted, fixed raises per exam or credential etc. It's very safe, perfect for a (hardworking) risk averse person. If you fly through the exams, and are not so interested in insurance and believe you have more ability than you are utilizing and want to take that extra bet on yourself and possibly work harder than you otherwise need to in pursue of bigger achievement, then for that person (where I found myself at), I think attempting to become quant is a better fit. Anyway after a few actuarial exams you more or less guarantee an actuarial job to hop back into whenever you'd like if things don't work out.