There’s quite a few posts out there that tells you how to make money, but most of the things they recommend requires an investment. Like yeah, you can invest in stocks, but you need cash available to do that.
Here, we’ll list other ways you can make money with just your phone. Perfect for stay-at-home moms and dads, some beer (or wine) money for the weekend, or someone who just wants to make extra money! Show me the moneyyyyyy!
Top 10 List
Amazon Mturk
Google Opinion Rewards
Sweatcoin
LifeCoin
Podcoin
Microsoft Rewards
Miles
Fix
AppOptix
Mobile Performance Meter
Paytime
1. Amazon MTurk
Link
Description: The holy grail of easy money. Owned by Amazon, Amazon Mechanical Turk (MTurk) is a place where businesses pay others to do things they can’t do with robots or artificial intelligence yet. These tasks could be anything from reading a sentence to see if it makes sense or answering a survey question. There’s thousands of tasks you can do. It’s easier on the weekdays because the available tasks get scooped up very quickly on the weekends.
Payout: Varies depending on how much you can do, but I would say on average you can make $2,000 a year.
Ninja Verdict: This is the best money-maker on this list by a long shot.
2. Google Opinion Rewards
Link
Description: Google pays you for doing two things: to take quick surveys (usually one or two questions) for up to $1.00 each and to take a picture of your store receipts for 15 cents each.
Payout: Apple users will be paid cash through PayPal and Android users will be paid with Google Play credit.
Ninja Verdict: Easy and quick. Surveys come once a week or so and you can take pictures of your store receipts as much as you want. I made $40+ with this:
3. Sweatcoin
Link
Description: Sweatcoin pays you for walking outside. Earn 1 sweatcoin for every 1,000 steps, up to 5 sweatcoins a day. Each sweatcoin is worth 5 cents. You can also watch ads on the app for an average of another 2.33 sweatcoins a day.
Payout: Paypal and Amazon are the most popular redemption choices, but you can also buy items and subscriptions in the app.
Ninja Verdict: Pretty easy since you are going to walk anyways. If you max out your sweatcoins everyday by taking 5,000 steps and taking a survey, you’ll earn $11 a month or $132 a year.
4. LifeCoin
Link
Description: LifeCoin also pays you for walking. You earn 1 lifecoin for every 1,000 steps, up to 5 lifecoins a day. You can also watch an ad for an additional 1 lifecoin per day. Each lifecoin is worth 2 cents.
Payout: You can redeem your points for a various popular gift cards including eBay, PayPal, Amazon, Apple, Lululemon, and iTunes.
Ninja Verdict: People walk an average of 5,000 steps a day so it’s very doable. Assuming you can too, you’ll earn $36.50 a year for walking or $43.80 a year for walking and watching one ad a day. It doesn’t pay as much as Sweatcoin, but you can run this and Sweatcoin at the same time!
5. Podcoin
Referral Bonus Link (150 Podcoin sign-up bonus)
Description: Podcoin pays you to listen to your favorite podcasts. Earn 1 to 2.5 Podcoins per 10 minutes of podcast streaming, up to 6 hours a day.
Payout: You can redeem Podcoins for Amazon credit.
Ninja Verdict: If you’re a podcast streamer, this is a free way to earn up to $7 a month or $82 a year.
6. Microsoft Rewards
Microsoft Rewards Link | Edge Link
Description: Microsoft pays you to do web searches with Microsoft Bing (yes, you can use other search tool besides Google). They will pay you 5 points per search. You get credit for 20 searches a day using your desktop/mobile web browser and another 4 searches using their Microsoft Edge app. There’s also bonus activities you can do on the app. Each point is worth close to a penny each.
Payout: You can redeem your points for gift cards. A wide variety of them are offered including Walmart.
Ninja Verdict: Their search tool is similar to Google and pays about $100 a year to search through them instead.
7. Miles
Referral Bonus Link (1,500 miles sign-up bonus)
Description: Miles pays you for all your ground transportation (walking, biking, commuting on the train, subway, bus, or taxi). They track it automatically, no logging of your miles required. Each mile is worth 1 to 20 cents, depending on how you redeem them.
Payout: You can redeem them for gift cards from useful brands like Audible, eBags, Home Chef, RayBan, Silvercar, Sunglass Hut, and Vudu.
Ninja Verdict: It’s great, especially if you commute far. You can download the app and pretty much forget about it since they track everything for you. I calculated earnings of about $50 a year. Combine this with the Sweatcoin and Lifecoin walking apps.
8. Fix
Referral Bonus Link (200 point sign-up bonus)
Description: Fix will pay you for linking a music-streaming service (Spotify, Deezer, last.fm). You can earn 1 point per song, up to 50 songs a day. Each point is worth close to a penny each.
Payout: Redeem the points for Ticketmaster, related music items, or other merchandise.
Ninja Verdict: I estimate earnings $10.83 a month or $130 a year if you listen the max everyday. I listen to music in the office and listen to 50 songs in about 3 hours. If you are already listening to music, why not get paid for it?
9. AppOptix
Link
Description: AppOptix is an Android-only app that will pay you for measuring your phone’s performance and battery information. They will pay you 25 points every week. Each point is worth 3.33 cents.
Payout: You can redeem your points for Amazon credit.
Ninja Verdict: Earn about $45 a year for doing something your phone company is measuring anyways.
10. Mobile Performance Meter
Link
Description: Mobile Performance Meters pays you for helping mobile carriers improve service with your service data. The app runs in the background. Receive 5 to 20 “meter” points a day, depending on your phone. Each meter point can be worth up to 1 cent (higher points gives the best value). You have the potential to earn extra meter points for taking surveys.
Payout: You can redeem your points for a Visa gift card, Amazon credit, or many other gift cards.
Ninja Verdict: The pay varies depending on your phone – you’ll get anywhere from $18 to $73 dollars a year.
11. Paytime
Referral Bonus Link (10 ad credit sign-up bonus)
Description: If you have an .edu email address, Paytime will pay your monthly subscriptions to watch ads. They will also make this available to non-students soon, but it’s currently available only to those with an .edu email address. If you have an alumni address, that should also work. Watch 40 ads to earn a free subscription month. This also works on desktops and laptops.
Payout: Subscriptions available include Netflix, Hulu, Amazon Music, Spotify, CBS All Access, Pandora, Deezer, and Pandora.
Ninja Verdict: Useful for college students who are already on tight budgets. Extra beer money every month!
The Bottom Line:
Ok, you got us, that was a Top 11 list, not 10. Sorry for overdoing it, but we wanted you to have more ways to make money for nothing – is that such a bad thing?
What other cool money-making apps are you guys using?
I like Miles the best because I get rewarded from any type of transportation.
Anyone know when new Amazon Mturk offers open up? The good ones seem to be taken super fast.
How much do you earn with Miles if you’re driving instead of taking public transport?
Going to try a few of these get paid to walk apps. I do dog walking on the side so a few extra dollars would be helpful.
I use the Miles app everyday for commute. Not going to rich off of this, but free is free!
Thanks for sharing. I am starting to get the hang of mturk. I stopped doing all the small amount ones and filter it by amount paid. Even though it takes more time, I find it earlier to deal with one big task instead of 100 of the small ones.
Good article, thanks and we want more! Added to FeedBurner.
That’s crazy that if I started using all of these together I could make up to an extra $3,600/yr. I guess things really do add up!
Every bit counts! Power of compounding… or rather, the power of multiple apps 🙂
I signed up for Amazon, but it says I need to be approved?
Yes, it takes a day or two for Amazon to approve your application – happened to me too.