50 Ways to Earn Extra Money on the Side

Lots of people think that you either have to suck it up with the job you have, find a completely new one, or just settle for the income that you’re currently making. While that may have been true 20 years ago, nowadays it’s easier than ever to have small jobs on the side that can highly increase your cash flow. And the best part is, most of these can be done from your home, in your spare time, or they’re simply something you enjoy and would be doing anyways! Here are 50 great ways to earn some extra money on the side.

First and foremost, you could start a blog. I have managed to pay off 20k in student loans, quit a miserable job and make a six-figure income while working from home. Blogging has literally changed my life! I am now staying home with my babies and working on the side. Blogging has brought in as much as $74,000 a month through advertisements and affiliate networks. There is a lot of money to make from home with a blog. Find out how you can start a blog and make money from home blogging.
You can also become a driver for companies like Uber and Lyft. Not only do you get to pick your own hours for this, but you also don’t have to pay any fees, you just have to meet the requirements for your car. If you live in a big city or near a tourist attraction, then this is a great way to make some extra money.
For those of you with lots of connections or a website with a strong fanbase, then try selling products. They can be homemade products or other company’s products that you support and use. If you use things like Beachbody, 21-day fix, Truvision, or Essential Oils at home, then endorse and sell their product.
This may not be earning money, but it’s a way to save money (which is pretty much making money, right?). Use Ibotta to get rebates back on your grocery trips. You simply just take a picture of your receipt, upload it, and then you’ll get money back! Ebates allows you to also access rebates online, so there are lots of options!
If you like writing, you can also try becoming a freelance writer! This is pretty common nowadays, especially online. You can do freelance writing in print, but blogs and websites are more common. There are websites like Freelancer, Upwork (which acquired Odesk), and Guru that give you access to lots of freelance writing jobs. Or, if you really want, you can start your own blog! That way you’re your own boss and get all the money!
With the focus on social media lately, you can use your Twitter account to make some extra money. All you need is to have sponsored tweets. You can get in contact with companies or find an online program that acts as an intermediary between you and other businesses. Depending on how many followers you have, this can be quite lucrative.
Anyone who has experience with finances can make some extra cash by keeping books for small, local businesses. This is a lot easier nowadays with Quickbooks. If you aren’t already familiar with the program but know your way around finances, then definitely get to know it so you can start making some money. Plus, you’ll be helping local businesses out, which is definitely a plus.
If you like making crafts and want to make some more money from them, consider selling your work on Etsy. You don’t have to pay any monthly fees, although there is a transaction fee and standard commission fee. However, I definitely think that’s worth the price, especially since you get access to all of the Etsy users.
Here’s an idea I hadn’t heard of, but it really seems like a good one. Virtual Assistant is a professional website that screens all sorts of jobs that you can take up and do for companies all around the world. There is a subscription fee, however, so make sure it’s something you’ll actually use and make money from.
There are lots of apps out there that you can download onto your phone or computer that let you earn money just for using your device. Most of them give you $5 or so for signing up and then you earn rewards that add up to points every week. Some of these apps are Placed Panel and Media Insiders Panel.
Some companies out there, when they have a new product or an update to a product, will recruit testers to give them feedback on their product. You can sign up for this position and help them out! Depending on the program, a lot of the time you get the product for free or at a discounted price as well as make some money on the side.
This is an interesting job, but hey, if you like knitting then definitely give it a try! Not only do you get the knitting patterns for free, but you also get store credit. You don’t get paid for this job in actual cash, but if you’re already spending money on knitting supplies then it’s a good deal.
If any of you out there like teaching, then you can try online teaching. It can be anything from music skills to car knowledge. Through sites like Udemy, you can easily monetize the skills and knowledge that you have while sharing them with the world!
If you want to teach but are more focused on academic skills, there’s still a way to do that! Sites like Chegg give you access to all their users and you don’t have to pay a monthly fee or anything like that. You get paid $20 an hour, which is a great rate, but you do have to pass their application process so they know you’re qualified.
There are some awesome apps and programs out there, and I recently found a few that not only help you earn money but also motivate you to lose Weight. Apps like HealthyWage and DietBet are exactly what they sound like: systems you use to place bets or wagers on the amount of weight you plan/hope to lose. If you do, you get money. If not, you lose the money. Now that sounds like a good way to get motivated!
Another way to make some extra money is to become a ghostwriter. Unlike freelancing writing, being a ghostwriter doesn’t get your name out there, at least not publicly. Pretty much, you write for a person or a company and then they use your work as their own. No attention, but you still get paid.
Have you ever used a search engine and then been so confused at how wrong its guess was or how off the results were? Well, big companies like Yahoo and Google will pay people to go into their search engine results and fix things up. This helps give more accurate results and, if you get good at it, you can make up to $700 a month doing it.
Just because you don’t live in Hollywood doesn’t mean you can’t become a star! Lots of people start YouTube channels and become pretty popular. If you can do this and monetize the site, then you can make quite a bit of money from ads, products, etc.
I’m not really sure why this is a thing, but hey, if you can make money by selling your junk mail, then why not? It just goes in the garbage anyway, right? A company called SBK Center conducts market research and takes people’s junk mail in exchange for money and gift cards.
For those of you out there who love taking pictures, then why not try making money off it? Stock footage is pictures that are free for use without copyright problems, but usually people pay a subscription to stock photo websites. If your pictures are good enough, then you can do this to get some extra cash coming your way.
Another option if you’re a photography fan is selling your smartphone photos. Did you know that’s a thing!? There’s a website called Foap where you can upload your picture and the site sells it for $10. When it’s bought, you get $5 from it.
Okay, maybe you’re getting sick of these photography ideas, but here’s another great one! Try picking up real estate photography! 90% of homebuyers look online at houses before they commit, so it’s vital for realtors to have professional and attractive pictures of their property. Get into this business, and you’ll have extra cash coming in all the time.
Here’s a pretty obvious way to make money, but try selling your things on Amazon or other similar sites. Some sites let you sell your old and gently used items, although not all of them. So after you pick what products you want to sell, then choose the vendor that best suits your needs.
If you have a closet full of old clothes that you never wear, why not just sell them? You can actually even rent out your clothes to other people, did you know that? It’s a pretty good deal!
For those of you who love reading or are students, then selling books can probably become a pretty great way to make some extra money. Not only does this allow you to dejunk, but you get paid to dejunk!
Teaching is a great pastime, but sometimes we feel like we aren’t qualified. However, if you speak English, then you can teach that! You can usually find English teaching jobs both online and locally. Sometimes you have to start off as a volunteer, but you can usually get a paid job pretty quickly.
I know this sounds weird, but there are actually places that will buy your trash from you. Anything from wine bottles to old magazines can get you some extra money. They do this because they want to know more about consumer habits. Good luck!
Anyone with phone and technology experience can become an Apple iPhone Technician. The best part about this job is that you can work from home, helping people out from your couch! Now that sounds like a pretty good deal to me.
Nowadays, there are tons of ways to make money with the things you already have. For example, you can get involved in Airbnb and use your own home as a money-making tool. Whether it’s a spare bedroom or your whole home when you’re out on vacation, this is a pretty nice way to get some extra cash!
One of my favorite sites is Fiverr. It lets you sell your skills to other Internet users. There are a wide variety of skills that are offered, and you can also post skills that you need, but it’s still a pretty useful site.
Become an Amazon Mechanical Turk and get paid to help solve people’s problems. If you have access to a computer and some basic technology skills, then you can become an Amazon Turk. The key to this is just picking the tasks you can do and not worry so much about the ones that you’ll enjoy.
Believe it or not, you can actually get money for watching TV. Well, not watching TV directly, but RewardsTV will pay you to answer trivia questions about the most recent TV shows. This won’t flood your bank account, but you can make about 15 to 20 extra dollars a month.
Another great way to make money from your writing is by making an e-book. There are lots of people out there that go through self-publishing venues and online publishers in order to get their books out to the world.
This job can be pretty repetitive, but it can pay pretty well if you get good at it. Being a transcriptionist can pay up to $25 an hour. Not too shabby. If you don’t mind doing the same kind of work over and over again, then this is a great option.
Another way you can use your creativity to make some money is by helping companies name themselves. Sites like SquadHelp give you the change to help businesses come up with names and names for their products. You can win up to $200 per contest and there’s (usually) no limit to the number of contests you enter.
Somewhat along those same lines is coming up with company slogans. Taglines, advertising slogans, and jingles are just some of the options. If you really enjoy writing and have a creative mind, then you can even do greeting cards!
If you love spending time on the Internet then become a website consultant! Businesses will pay people to give them feedback on their websites and fix them up (if possible). It doesn’t require a lot of time and you can usually do it whenever you’re free.
If you find yourself with lots of little pockets of free time then try signing up for online polling sites like Ipsos Online. You can do this while you’re watching TV, so it’s not even that much work or effort.
Along with writing online content, if you’re talented with words, you can pick up a few freelance editing jobs. This is especially great if you love poring over documents and articles to make sure they look good.
There are lots of “get paid to” sites where you can sign up and do random tasks for people. On these GPT Sites, it’s usually administrative or data analysis, but you can still make good money.
You can switch to a new search engine that gives you points for every time you use it. Can you believe it!? You can surf the web and make money. Sites like Swagbucks and Bing are a good place to start.
If writing, consulting, editing, or any of these other ideas aren’t your cup of tea, don’t worry, there’s still lots of things you can do for some extra cash! For example, you can actually watch videos online through InboxDollars.
Here’s one of those weird ways to make money, but hey, it still works. The Nielsen Consumer Panel wants to know what’s in your fridge, and they’ll pay you to let you know. Once you sign up, they send you a scanner and you just scan all the food in your fridge.
Lots of pizza places, like Papa John’s and Pizza Hut, will hire you to be a “mystery shopper” for them. Part of the requirements are that you time the delivery, rate the customer service, rate the quality of pizza, etc. You can actually get free food for this and even make some money.
Companies and businesses will pay you to use their website and test it for flaws or glitches. You’ll just browse around the website and make sure all the buttons work, the links are connected, it’s not too confusing, etc.
If you love music, art, comedy, or something else then maybe you can get a side job out of it! Get your feelers out there and see if you can perform at restaurants and local venues. You may have to perform free at first, but you can definitely work your way up to some sweet paying gigs.
Depending on where you live, yard work may be a very viable and profitable business. For places where warm weather lets the lawns grow for a long portion of the year, if you picked up even 10 lawns a week, you could earn $250 dollars a week or more than $1000 a month.
Everybody likes a good party, so why not make a side job out of working them? If you can learn a skill like face painting or making balloon animals, then you could make up to $13,000 a year. That’s a pretty big check!
Okay, I know this is a little weird, but if you love animals then you should become a pet masseuse! Yeah, that’s a real thing. If you don’t want to massage the animals, then sign up to be an animal sitter. You get to spend time with your furry friends without having to keep them long term.
If you have any websites or online profiles then make sure those babies are monetized! You can get ads, endorse products, or even become an affiliate marketer. If you have a blog then use that, if you have a YouTube account then enable ads. You’d be surprised at how much more money you can make from your websites if you do some of these things!