How to make money online
There are many ways to make money online. This page lists of legitimate and effective methods to help you make money, either for supplemental income or as a full-time job. We made this list as complete as possible with services used by all types of people, regardless of how good they are with computers.
Setting up a PayPal account helps to expedite the payment process when utilizing the services listed on this page. Some of these services may even require you to have a PayPal account.
Some online services may not be available in every country for various reasons, including legal and payment option restrictions.
Fraud and scam alert
When trying to make money online, be cautious of scammers and other fraudulent services. Keep the warnings below in mind:
- Do not pay any significant initial or up-front fee, deposit, or down payment. For example, a company or individual claiming special computer hardware or marketing material is needed.
- Avoid services asking to cash checks or money orders to your bank account after giving them your bank details.
- If the company is not on this list, look them up on the BBB.
- Be cautious when asked for personal information, such as e-mail, phone numbers, social security, etc.
- Realize that making money online requires actual work and effort.
- Always keep the motto "If it sounds to be good to be true, it probably is" in the back of your mind.
Arts and crafts
Etsy is fantastic for artists or anyone who enjoys making unique handmade goods. It is also a great place to sell vintage goods. This vibrant community has over 15 million buyers who visit every day. Anyone can create an online shop and make it available to these visitors.
ArtFire is a site where users can set up a virtual store and sell to millions of people on the Internet. Also, if you're an Etsy member, you can import your Etsy data into ArtFire to sell your goods on both sites.
Fiverr and PeoplePerHour
Fiverr is another site that allows anyone to create pages listing services they're willing to provide for at least $5.00. Jobs include any of the following.
- Doing a voice-over.
- Creating an animation.
- Giving a review.
- Offering advice.
- Anything others may find helpful.
Although five dollars may not sound like a lot, it's a good source of extra income if you can complete several tasks. You can also charge more for more complex tasks.
Another similar site is PeoplePerHour, which lists jobs that take a few hours to complete for a set price.
Kickstarter and Patreon
Kickstarter is a page for anyone with an idea or project without startup capital. The site allows anyone to create a page explaining their idea and how much they need to fund their project. People who like the idea or cause can then donate money to get it going.
Patreon is a great website for Internet users to support artists financially. Patrons can contribute repeatedly or make a one-time donation for a single piece of work. Artists supported on Patreon include YouTube content creators, musicians, cartoonists, educators, scientists, comedians, dancers, and photographers.
Freelancing projects
Several online services allow anyone from around the world to work at home (freelance / virtual assistant) for other individuals or companies. Jobs can be anything from writing reviews, designing logos, programming, proofreading, data entry, accounting, payroll, translating, and more. All these services allow you to list your qualifications, set your pay rate, or browse available job listings. Freelancer, Guru, and Upwork are examples of contractor and freelancing-related services.
There are several resource hubs on the Internet that pay skilled writers to compose content about various subjects. These sites then pay royalties to the writers based on how frequently their pages are visited. An example of such a site is HubPages.
E-books and other virtual goods
Selling e-books and virtual goods is a popular way to make money online. While creating an e-book can often take weeks or months, it can be sold in unlimited quantities without requiring inventory or infrastructure. A great online service for any aspiring author is Lulu. This service allows anyone to write a book or guide on any topic and publish it electronically. The author can also publish a hard copy for book reviewers and other publishers. Other sites that help sell and distribute e-books and other virtual goods include ClickBank, E-Junkie, and Sellfy.
Photography and audio
If you enjoy taking pictures, creating illustrations, or producing video or audio, some sites pay you for the rights to sell your work to their visitors. One of the most extensive online services is iStockphoto, which gives you up to a 45% royalty rate for every picture or work of art they sell. Other sites include Adobe Stock, Depositphotos, Dreamstime, and Shutterstock.
If music is more your scene, audiojungle lets you upload loops, music, and sound effects to their site and make royalties from how much music you sell.
Online auctions
Online auction sites like Amazon Seller, eBay, and Craigslist, are another great way to generate income online. Finding and selling things around your house or visiting your local pawn shops and buying small items to resell at auction is a way to make money. If you are unsure what to sell or what is in demand, search eBay or other auction sites and sort by highest-selling item.
User testing
Every company needs to test its products and services with users. Anyone can become a tester and get paid for testing products on services like User Testing.
Website, blog, or online store
Creating a website or blog is a great way to make money on the Internet. A successful site can even become a full-time job. However, creating a successful site or blog takes lots of work and learning and is not something that starts making money immediately. Before any site or blog can start making serious money, it must get lots of visitors.
If designing a website or blog sounds too hard, but you have products you want to sell, using a service to create an online store may be your best option. Again, once a store is created, you need lots of traffic or a unique product to attract buyers.
JumpSeller, Freewebstore, and Shopify are some online services that allow you to create an online store.
Buying and selling domains
Having an easy-to-remember short .com domain name is important to having a place on the Internet. Companies and individuals looking for good domains may pay hundreds, thousands, and sometimes millions for the right domain. Being someone looking for a way to make money on the Internet, you can look for good domains, buy domains in auctions, and sell those domains at a profit. Owning a domain only costs around $10 a year, and if you can find someone interested, they may be willing to buy it from you at a significant profit. See the following link for finding, buying, and auctioning domains.
YouTube
Many people make money by showing advertisements and mentioning sponsors on YouTube videos they create. However, believing you can post a few videos and start making millions every year, like YouTube celebrity Felix Kjellberg (PewDiePie), is unrealistic. Most people on YouTube only generate supplemental income, not enough to support a family or business.
Broadcast yourself playing video games
Yes, it's true; if you have the equipment, are entertaining, good at gaming, and are dedicated, you can also make money from playing computer games. Thousands of people stream themselves playing popular computer games and get money from subscriptions, donations, and sponsors. Today, two popular places to stream yourself gaming are Twitch and YouTube.
Become an online tutor, or teach online
Are you good at a particular topic taught in schools or a complicated subject? You can tutor and teach others through online videos with services such as Udemy and Tutor.
Design and sell T-shirts
Designing a T-shirt is fun and a rewarding way to make some money on the Internet. Several services allow you to design and make T-shirts to be sold to anyone on the Internet.
Spreadshirt and CafePress are examples of websites to create user-customized, on-demand apparel.
Take surveys, answer polls, and watch videos
Many sites pay visitors to take online surveys, answer polls, and watch videos. However, some do not pay, require special software, or have strings attached. Below are the most successful sites we've found for doing this work that often pays a few cents for every completed task.
Amazon Mechanical Turk
The Amazon.com Mechanical Turk service lets you complete easy HITs (human intelligence tasks) and get paid for the work. Often these tasks are so simple that anybody could complete them, such as identifying colors in an image, finding keywords in a sentence, comparing text, or completing a survey. Because they're easy to complete, many tasks don't pay a lot, but completing many can generate supplemental income.
Review on websites
Sites like Analysia pay people to help them review customer websites and provide feedback on what is and isn't working.
Bitcoin and cryptocurrency mining
Your computer can make money by itself by mining cryptocurrency, such as bitcoin. However, you spend more on the electricity required to run the computer than you earn from the currency in most cases.
Monetize your car
Vehicle-for-hire services, such as Uber, Lyft, and Amazon Flex, enable you to make money in your spare time with your car to transport people and goods. Signing up for one of these services gives you the flexibility to define your schedule using an app on your mobile device.
Some services, like Turo, allow you to rent out your car and charge a daily fee for the rental.
Bug bounties
If you're good with computers or finding problems with computers, consider bug bounties. Finding a serious bug with a website or computer product can reward hundreds or even hundreds of thousands of dollars.