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Best Sites to Make Money Online for Free
Branded Surveys
$0.50 – $5 on average per survey with bonus points ($1 sign up bonus)
Average survey length is 10-20 minutes and minimum payout is $5
Collect rewards in PayPal, Direct Deposit or gift cards (100+ brands)
Survey Junkie
$1 – $3 per survey + extra ways to earn up to $100 with focus groups
Each survey time varies, but on average it takes 15 minutes to complete
Redeem rewards using PayPal, e-giftcards or bank transfer ($5 min)
How to Make Money Online for Free? 15 Ways
Participate in Online Surveys
(Earning potential: up to $3 per survey)
Participating in online surveys could be the right pick when looking for how to earn money online without investment for students.
Taking surveys for money, you’ll be required to provide your honest opinion about various topics, products, and services.
Since most surveys take just a few minutes to fill out, you can complete them anywhere. For example, when you’re feeling bored in front of a TV, waiting for your order at a restaurant, or even while you’re commuting.
When it comes to earning potential through online surveys, you can expect to get up to $3 per survey. However, some survey sites offer up to $75 per questionnaire.
Do Micro Tasks
(Watch videos and play games for money)
Most survey sites usually also reward you for completing microtasks. Micro tasks are tasks that only take just a couple of minutes to complete.
Examples of micro tasks:
- Watch videos
- Play games
- Accept in-app offers
- Read emails
- Download apps
Be aware that completing micro-tasks pay only a few cents, usually up to $1.
Swagbucks Summary
- 18 ways to earn money and e-gift cards
- $5 sign up bonus
- Up to 10% cashback when shopping online
- $1 minimum e-gift card withdrawal
InboxDollars Summary
- $5 sign up bonus
- Referral program – 30% that referral makes
- Most of the surveys pay $0.50 to $1
- 13 different ways to earn money
Get Cashback
(Get up to 40% cashback)
If you’re looking for how to earn money daily online without investment, getting cashback is a great way.
The cashback websites reward you on every qualifying transaction you make with credit cards through their app.
How much cash you’ll get back into your account depends on which cashback app you’re using and what you’re buying. However, you can expect cashback offers to range from 1% all the way up to 40%.
Rakuten Summary
- High cashback potential of up to 40%
- Earn cashback at over 2500 online stores
- 6 different ways to earn cashback
- Get $10 for free just for signing up
Ibotta Summary
- 2 ways to earn – app or browser extension
- Earn up to 30% cash back on purchases
- Get a $5 bonus by referring friends
- Over 1500 stores you can earn cash back at
Create & Sell an Online Course
(Create an online course once and sell it unlimited times)
Creating and selling online courses is one of the best passive income ideas because you can record it once and sell it unlimited times.
No matter what skill you might have, you can create a course around it.
What’s best, it’s free to create and sell your online course through platforms like Udemy, Teachable, and Skillshare.
Udemy Summary
- Wide target audience of learners
- Earn passive income from your courses
- Get your payments within 1 to 2 days
- Short minimum course duration (30 min)
Teachable Summary
- Low transaction fees from $1 + 10%
- Get paid instantly with Teachable payments
- Offer 3 different payment gateways
- Detailed transaction reports available
Skillshare Summary
- Earn over $100,000 per year as a teacher
- Large target audience of over 12 million
- Short class length of 30-40 minutes
- 2 ways to earn – royalties and referrals
Start Freelancing
(Earning potential: up to $200 per hour)
When looking for how to make money online for free, freelancing can be the best thing to start with. Freelancing not only doesn’t require any investment, but you can do it from the comfort of your home at any time you prefer.
A freelancer is basically a location-independent person who completes projects for clients.
As a freelancer, you’re free to offer any service that you feel skilled in and set your own prices for the services you provide.
Let’s take a look at some of the best freelance jobs you can consider:
| Freelance Job | Average Pay |
| Web Developer | $30 – $180 per hour |
| UX/UI Designer | $25 – $75 per hour |
| Copywriter | $50+ per hour |
| SEO Specialist | $33 per hour |
| Video Editor | $30 – $150 per hour |
| Graphic Designer | $27 per hour |
| Cybersecurity Specialist | $200 per hour |
| Digital Marketer | $50 – $100 per hour |
The best platforms to start freelancing are Fiverr, Upwork, and Freelancer.
Pro tip: Set up your profile on more than one freelancing platform to understand which one works best for you or to maximize your earnings.
Fiverr Summary
- Set your own prices for your services
- Choose from over 500 service categories
- 3 different options for cashing out
- Protection from fradulent chargebacks
Upwork Summary
- Earn up to $34 per hour as a freelancer
- Get 10 free Connects every month
- Get 40 extra Connects when you pass a test
- Time tracker ensures you get paid
Review Websites
(Earn on average $10 per test)
As a website tester, you’ll get paid to check if a website is user-friendly. If you are internet-savvy and speak fluent English, you can start testing and reviewing websites for money.
It’s a no-investment money-making system, requiring you to examine and evaluate different elements of the website. What’s good, you can review websites remotely from home.
It typically takes 5 to 25 minutes to review each website, and you can expect to earn $10 per test you perform.
Teach Online
(Earn up to $50/hour)
If you’re passionate about sharing your knowledge and teaching students, you can become an online tutor and start teaching online for free.
Here’s how to get started and become an online teacher:
- Identify what you’d like to teach. It can be anything from a language to music or even cooking classes.
- Sign up for an online teaching platform. Magic Ears, Peerly, and Cambly, are 3 of the best platforms you can find parents or students who are looking for tutors like you.
- Create a class structure and prepare learning material.
- Get online and teach students via video call.
Note that some online tutoring platforms may require you to have relevant qualifications and certificates. For example, you might need a TEFL or TESOL certification to teach the English language.
Magic Ears Summary
- Work from the comfort of your home
- Constant support and assistance available
- No cancellation penalty
- No doctor’s note is required for a sick leave
Test Products
(Receive free products to test from various brands)
Brands always like to know consumers’ reactions to the new products they’ve developed. Such consumer insights are vital for product development. In case there is a negative review, they rectify it before the products are sent to the stores.
It could be one of the legit ways to make money online without investment. All you need to do is sign up for a product testing platform like BzzAgent, Influenster, Product Testing USA, and more.
Once your profile is approved, the company will send you products to test. In most cases, you’ll keep the products sent to you. Some platforms will also reward you with cash when you complete the survey about the product you’ve tested.
BzzAgent Summary
- Free products from L’Oreal, GIllete, Nestle, P&G and more
- You get to keep the product you test
- You’ll not be penalized for a negative review
- Pays $10 per user referred
Start a Blog
(Unlimited earning potential)
Blogging is an excellent solution to how to make money online for free. If you’re an expert on any niche and can express your thoughts clearly, you can start a blog. However, you must understand that blogging is a tricky job. It needs constant effort and motivation for it to reward you.
As your writing and SEO skills improve, your blog will eventually draw more traffic, and you can start monetizing it.
3 main ways to monetize your blog:
- Promote affiliate products and get a commission of up to 30% for each sale made through your blog
- Cooperate with businesses directly and create sponsored content
- Integrate Google AdSense and earn money when your blog readers engage with Google ad banner
Starting a blog is one of the best ways to make money from home
While setting up your custom website may cost you money, you can start a blog for free on Medium. You can also use Wix, WordPress.org, LinkedIn, Blogger, and Weebly to start a blog for free.
Sell Print On Demand Products
(Earning potential: around 15-20% profit per product)
Selling print-on-demand products is a great way to make money online for free for beginners.
Print-on-demand (also known as POD) is a business model where you sell products with custom prints. However, you’re only showing mockups of your products on your website (or social media) and only print the actual product after the customer pays for it.
This way, you don’t have to produce hundreds of products in advance and hold them in your storage, hoping they’ll sell.
Some of the most popular products you can sell on-demand include:
- T-shirts, sweaters, and hoodies
- Caps
- Socks
- Tote bags
- Phone cases
- Coffee mugs
- Planners and notebooks
- Other stationery items
Printify is one of the best platforms that can help you turn your print-on-demand business into reality.
Once you’ve come up with an idea of what to sell, you can list your products on Zazzle for free. You can also sell your stuff through social media.
Zazzle Summary
- 3 different ways to earn with Zazzle
- Earn up to $200 per day as a Designer
- Decide on your own royalty fee (up to 99%)
- No fees to join and unlimited uploads
Create a YouTube Channel
(Unlimited earning potential)
Opening a YouTube channel is a great way when you’re looking for how to earn money online without investment for students. Practically, you can start a YouTube channel on any niche from interior cooking, decoration, teaching to DIY installation.
At first, it’s better if you start creating content around a single niche. Once you grow a solid and loyal audience, you may shift to other niches.
Starting a YouTube Channel is almost similar to blogging. You can earn by:
- Becoming a YouTube Partner and making money when your viewers interact with ads
- Selling merchandise
- Selling affiliate products
- Creating sponsored content
Write an eBook
(Earn royalties of up to 70% each month)
Whether you’re a beginner or a seasoned writer who has a knack for writing, you can write an e-book and sell it yourself.
When it comes to publishing your e-book, Amazon Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP) is one of the best options. It allows you to self-publish your book in under 72 hours without having to wait for any bureaucratic publishing to approve your writing first.
Amazon KDP alternatives you can consider to self-publish your e-book include:
Make Money from Facebook and Instagram
(Unlimited earning potential)
Facebook and Instagram are 2 of the major social media platforms. But did you know that there are a number of ways you could make money off of these platforms?
Here’s how you can make money on Facebook and Instagram:
- Sell or flip products
- Sell services
- Promote affiliate products or services
- Become a social media influencer and partner with businesses in your niche
- Work as a social media manager
- Organize paid online events on Facebook
- Assist social media influencers as a virtual assistant (VA)
What’s best, you don’t necessarily need tens of thousands of followers to start making money on Facebook and Instagram. In fact, you don’t need any Facebook followers, and you can still make money with under 10,000 followers on Instagram.
Sell Photos
(Sell any kind of photos, including your selfies)
Regardless of what type of photography you enjoy, you can sell your photos online – even your selfies.
What’s good, selling your photos can make a great source of passive income. Once you upload them for sale, there’s no limit in how many times it can sell.
Some of the best stock image sites through which you can sell your photos include:
Make & Sell Your Crafts on Etsy
(Leverage the power of 45.7 million active buyers on Etsy)
Making and selling your crafts is a fun way to make money online for free. The internet has brought the entire world to you. It only requires talent and dedication to making crafts.
Crafts you can make to sell:
- Beaded bracelets
- Mosaic picture frames
- Flower crowns
- DIY Bath Bombs
- Homemade scented candles
- Plush toys
- Windchimes
- Fabric key chains
- Decorated coffee mugs
- Digital products
- Natural cosmetics
And, there is no end to it!
Etsy is a go-to marketplace for selling and buying crafts online. So make sure to leverage 45.7 million active buyers of the platform.
Alternatively, you can also list your crafts on eBay and Facebook Marketplace.
Etsy Summary
- Easy to set up & maintain your store
- Market to a large audience – 45+ million active Etsy buyers
- Built-in analytics to analyze your performance & make data-driven decisions
- No shop fees
