In today's world, there are many different reasons why individuals are seeking extra money from online side hustle. From the need to supplement their income from an existing career to those who currently do not have a job to support themselves, men and women around the world are looking for online work.
Whether they are dealing with low wages, struggling to afford gas to commute to a job, or trying to pay off debt, some people are desperate to find extra work to afford their necessities while others want to improve their current lifestyle.
Side hustles are great opportunities for everyone – from students to senior citizens. You can choose to make money with one, or work in a variety of areas that provide extra income.
Below, you’ll find a 30 best online side hustles. You can test the waters in many different areas. Based on your skills and personal preferences, you’ll find something that matches perfectly with what you want to do.
1: Start Freelance Ghostwriting for Other Marketers
The online marketplace is a vast network of websites, social networking sites, emails and more. Because of the sheer number of users and topics, there’s ample work for ghostwriters who can create content for marketers.
These people may not have the time (or talent) to create all the content they need, so they love it when someone else steps up and does the work for them. You can write their eBooks, lead magnet reports, email autoresponders, sales copy, press releases, and social media content (to name a few).
To secure work as a freelance ghostwriter, you need to whip up a sample of your writing style for a portfolio. Then, sign up at one of the many freelance platforms to find work, like Fiverr or Upwork.
Set up a profile that talks about your skills with writing content and upload your samples to a portfolio. Begin bidding on projects until you get hired by someone and start getting feedback and ratings.
If you want to, you can also actively network with other marketers and secure ghostwriting gigs from word of mouth. They’re always looking for more writers to handle the heavy content load they have.
2: Start a Social Media Manager Side Hustle
These days, every entrepreneur and brand need to have a presence on various social networking sites and apps, or they’ll get dominated by the competition. The problem is, most don’t have time to create content for it, publish it, engage with consumers, and analyze the results.
That’s where you can step up to serve others for a fee. Become a social media manager who maintains the profiles, pages and groups for brands or vendors on sites like Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, Pinterest, YouTube, Twitter and more.
You will be creating the images, text, and video files, uploading them at strategic times, making sure you engage with anyone who comments or asks a question, and then look at the data to see how many views and actions it received so you can tweak the performance of the account.
3: Put a Graphics Gig Up Online
Just as marketers and brands need written content, they also need a visual representation of their business, ideas, and other elements. If you can create graphics, you stand to make a lot of profits.
The kinds of gigs you’ll be doing will vary, depending on who’s buying it. For example, an online entrepreneur might need a header graphic for their blog, Facebook header, banner ads to sell their info products, etc.
A company might need a logo designed for their website – or the entire site graphics. Self-publishing authors will need eCovers for their digital uploads to sites like Amazon Kindle.
You may also be asked to create things like infographics, where you distill a number of steps or tips into one image. Or they might want you to create a series of social posters they can use to motivate their audience.
4: Become an Online Editor for Authors and Marketers
Some people have no problem writing content themselves, but before they release it into the online world, they want to make sure it’s polished to perfection. If you have a good grasp of the English language and grammar rules, you can serve as an online editor.
Marketers love to use them for the digital info products that they create, as well as the sales letters they publish. And self-publishing authors like to use a content editor to scan through their manuscript before it goes live to their readers.
You can find editing jobs on sites like Upwork. But you can also launch your own freelance editing website where you take clients directly, polish up their work for them, and charge a fee.
5: Start Selling Low Content Products on Etsy and Spotify
Low content products are very popular these days. There are many different reasons why people will purchase a digital download file that they can print out themselves. For example, homeschooling parents will purchase a digital download pack that includes worksheets on a certain subject matter for whatever grade level their child is in.
You also have other types of low content products, such as trackers for things like weight loss, journal pages that are designed with a particular theme in mind, checklists, and even fun things like a Bachelorette party or baby shower for games.
Two of the most popular places to sell low content products are Etsy and Spotify. You can create individual digital download files and upload them separately, and also sell a pack of multiple files in one bundle for a higher price point.
6: Become a Versatile Virtual Assistant
There are many online entrepreneurs and companies who need a virtual assistant to help them get a lot of their drudge work done throughout the day. These are usually paid on an hourly basis, but some may be paid per project.
Depending on who is hiring you, you may be paid for things like answering customer service emails, taking content they have created and publishing it to their blog, sharing their content on social media, and more.
Sometimes, you may be doing some of the technical work like updating their blog plugins or cleaning up their email autoresponder database. You can set your own price as a virtual assistant and work anytime you like, unless they have certain business hours they need you to be available for.
7: Do Some Spring Cleaning and List Items Online
Utilizing the various online marketplaces is a good way to get some quick cash flowing into your account. Do some spring cleaning at your home, and list everything from clothing to fitness equipment, furniture and more for sale.
You can even pick up unwanted items from people locally who just want to get rid of it and then list it for sale online. Use platforms like Facebook Marketplace, Craigslist, and eBay to flip the items for a profit.
8: Offer Video Editing Services
Having versatile content is important for online brands. They can’t simply have text-based content anymore if they want to be competitive and showcase their products and services.
So, they often have someone in their company create video content, but once they hit record, they don’t know how to polish it up from there to make it viable for online publications.
If you know how to edit videos, where you remove any blunders, add intros and exits, as well as inserting any text as an overlay to the video, you may be able to make money as a side hustle offering video editing services.
You can often charge quite a bit of money for every minute you have to edit. The customer will send you the raw file and you will polish it up using a tool like Camtasia or CamStudio and send the finished product back to them so they can upload it to their video channel.
Many times, the customer will allow you to include your information at the end of the video as the editor so that other interested parties can contact you if they need video editing work done, too.
9: Take Pictures to Sell as Stock Photos
If you have good photography skills, you can start a side hustle selling images that you take that you want to license to start photo sites for commercial use. Whenever a brand or online entrepreneur needs to publish content, they often go to a stock photo site to download an image to pair with it.
These are used to break up large blocks of content on their blog, and to use on the covers of eBooks for info products. They also use them in their social networking content so that their post shows up better in the feeds.
You can sign up on sites like Shutterstock and iStockPhoto, to name a couple – and there are many more. Be a contributor who submits images people need for their marketing.
Make sure you abide by their submission guidelines Once you upload your content, it will be available for a global audience to purchase. Whenever your images are downloaded, you will be paid as a contributor.
Make sure you focus on some of the top niche topics, such as fitness, cooking, pets, money, and more. For example, you may want to take a picture of a basket of fresh fruit for the nutrition niche.
10: Tutor Kids in a Subject of Your Choice Online
Many parents struggle to find help for their children whenever they are doing poorly in a subject at school. These days, it's common for moms and dads to look online for a tutor who can work with their child via video and help them bring their grades up to par.
You can sign up for many of the different online tutoring platforms and help kids with subjects like math, science, English, and more. You might get paid per hour or per minute depending on the platform that you are using.
11: Start a Side Hustle as an Affiliate Manager
There are many entrepreneurs who are launching their own digital info products or memberships on a regular basis. One of the tasks they are burdened with is recruiting affiliates to promote their launch.
You can offer your services as an affiliate manager to take a load off of these vendors so that they can focus on getting their product finished and handling all of the technical tasks for the launch.
The strategic task of recruiting affiliates is something where you will be researching who would be the best affiliate to bring onboard based on their track record of promotions. You would then reach out to everyone with details of the product, the launch, and a review copy when you invite them to promote the product.
12: Launch Your Own Online Course
If you have knowledge in one of many different niche topics, you can put together an eBook of your own and launch it on one of the many platforms that allow you to sell digital downloads.
For example, you could write an eBook on how to create a blog, how to train your dog, how to lose weight on a keto diet, how to survive in the wilderness, and a million other different topics.
Then, you can list the info product for sale on a site like ClickBank, Warrior Plus, or JVZoo. If you want to create a video course, you can do that and list it on a site like Udemy.
Instead of just having a single info product, you can launch an entire line of courses that teach people a variety of targeted topics. So instead of just having a course about how to start a blog, you can have other topics like how to build a list, how to use Facebook ads, and more.
13: Become a Social Media Influencer
Social media influencers are making a lot of money these days. If you can create online content on a social networking site that attracts a large audience, then you have potential to get paid as a social influencer by a number of entrepreneurs and brands.
You don't have to have millions of followers or be famous to be a social media influencer. As long as you have a targeted niche topic for your account, you will have people approaching you with deals ranging from free products to a cash payment.
14: Become a Notary Public Online
You can become a notary public who does work online. You do have to apply to become a notary, and pay the state fees, but once you are accepted, you can begin promoting your services online.
As an online notary, someone will upload their files in PDF form to you and you will have them prove their identity. This can be done via picture or video, depending on how you want to operate.
Usually, a video call will be necessary so they can witness your signature on the paperwork. Once the process is done, the other person will download their notarized files and you’ll get paid.
15: Take Your Thrift Finds Online to Sell
Thrifting has become a very popular pastime for many individuals. These people go to places like Goodwill and look for items that normally shouldn't be sold for that little. you can become a thrifter and take your finds online to sell or flip to interested individuals.
Shop at places like Goodwill or the Salvation Army. Even garage sales or estate sales can provide good products for you to flip online. You can use platforms like the Facebook marketplace, eBay, and other sites or apps to sell these items for profit.
Some of the most popular things you can flip are luxury handbags, clothing, electronics, or vintage items that are now hard to find. Make sure you do some research before spending any money on a thrift store find so that you know how much potential there is to sell it for a profit.
16: See If You Can Flip Domains for Profits
Just as you can flip tangible items, you can also flip domains for income. You have two different ways you can achieve this goal. The first is to register domains that are currently not owned by anyone else, and then sell those to someone else.
You can either sell the domain unused or build the site up so that it has a high ranking in the search engine results pages before you flip it so that it sells for more. You can also purchase domains that have expired and flip those to interested parties as well.
17: Start Selling Private Label Rights
Private label rights (PLR) are a good side hustle because you can work at your own pace, create content that others will buy, and sell the same bundle to multiple individuals instead of just having a single client as a ghostwriter.
You can create all kinds of content to sell as PLR, including articles, reports, full eBooks, email autoresponders, product reviews, and social media posts. You can also create them in multimedia formats, including text, images, video, and audio files.
The great thing about PLR is that you only have to do the work once and then you get to profit from your efforts for years to come. This is a great way to use your side hustle as a passive profit system.
18: Launch Your Own Podcast for Ad Revenue
If you don't want to write the content, and you have no desire to be on camera, then you might want to consider creating a podcast on a popular topic that people will tune into. You can publish a podcast that will not cost you anything on sites like Anchor.fm.
In fact, not only does it not cost you anything, but you can get paid for allowing ads to run on your episodes. The average earnings for advertisements are approximately $20 to $25 for a 30 to 60 seconds spot.
Your podcast doesn't have to be anything fancy. You don't need any special equipment. If you have a good smartphone, you can even record directly onto that and upload to the platform to begin earning.
19: Start Earning from Creator Funds on Social Networks
There are many different sites that pay creators a stipend from what's known as a creator fund. These are usually found on social media networks such as TikTok, YouTube and Instagram, to name a few.
What you have to focus on is the creation of good content that generates a buzz within your niche topic. You want to prove that you can get a good deal of traffic to your content and that it clearly engages people to either like, share, comment or subscribe to your channel.
This is not something that will happen overnight, but if you start creating content consistently, you may find yourself being offered a share of the creator funds in a very short time.
20: Launch Your Own Affiliate Niche Blog
Some people don't want to work for another person, such as a client as a freelance ghostwriter. Instead, you can purchase a domain for as little as $0.99 and to pay for hosting that's under $10 a month if you want to start an affiliate niche blog.
You want to pick a topic that you are passionate about, so you won't mind creating content frequently for it. Your affiliate niche blog can position you as a leading expert on that topic, but you will also be giving product recommendations to your audience.
You can find both digital and tangible products to promote to your readers in niches like survival, pets, anti-aging, health, fitness, and more. You can look for products to promote on sites like ClickBank, Warrior Plus, JVZoo, Commission Junction, Share-a-Sale, Amazon and more.
21: Invest in Stock to Open an eCommerce Store
You may want to open your own eCommerce store. While you can do this on your own platform, you can also create your own store on a site as big as Amazon. There are basically three steps to profiting from your own online store.
First, you need to find a product that is in high demand so that you know it will sell. Next, you want to find a way to buy that product in bulk at a discount such as a wholesaler price.
Finally, you will sell the item at a marked-up price point online so that you end up generating a profit. Check out programs such as Amazon FBA system that allows you to have Amazon store your inventory and ship your products out to buyers.
22: Become an Audio Narrator
There are thousands of self-published authors on sites like Amazon and Barnes Noble’s Nook now. These individuals don’t just want to sell digital or print books because there’s a lot of money to be made in offering an audiobook version of their product as well.
But most don’t have time to narrate their own books, so they hire voice actors to create the audiobook version. If you’re good at acting and have a pleasant voice, you can make a lot of money with a narrator side hustle.
Create a quiet home studio to record in and create a portfolio of samples using a variety of characters and situations as well as a range of emotions. Make sure they know what genre you feel most adept at reading.
You can find jobs for narrators on sites like Voices, Upwork, and ACX to name a few. Each site will have different rules and steps. You can usually choose whether you want to be paid in a flat fee or as a percentage of the earnings of the audiobook.
23: Create and Sell a Smartphone App
Digital download apps are very popular, and many people are using easy technology to create and sell apps of their own, or create them for other marketers who don’t know how to do this.
You can create apps for gaming, business, photography, education, fitness and more. You can even create an app that aggregates the news stories from all over the world and presents them to the user in one place.
24: Sign Up as a Twitch Streamer
If you like to game or even cook, you can make money creating a Twitch stream where users are able to tune into you in a live setting and contribute to your online money making efforts.
Not only can you receive partnerships from official brands, but you can also make money selling your own merchandise, selling subscriptions to your Twitch stream, and from donations people make because they appreciate your channel.
25: Profit from a Self-Publishing Author Career
There are many men and women who have launched their own career as an author online with zero startup money. You can write your own book (either fiction or nonfiction) and publish it on sites like Amazon at no upfront cost.
This platform will take a percentage of the sale as their payment. You just need to write to market and create a cover that is in line with others in that genre or niche and you can start seeing sales come in quickly.
26: Teach English Online to Foreigners
Because many can’t travel, even during non-pandemic times, they often turn to English teachers online to help them learn the language. This is a different atmosphere than just learning from a book or audio course because there’s real, human interaction.
The students can learn common phrases and sentences as well as slang terms most likely used in conversation with others. There are many platforms that hire English teachers for foreign learners, and they pay anywhere from $10-25 per hour.
27: Get Paid to Test Things
Whenever people create something, they often need an outside set of eyes and the user experience that is not part of the company to let them know whether or not things are working as planned.
You can sign up to become an official tester of products on a platform like UserTesting.com. This site will have you take a practice test in order to be a contributor. Once you pass the test and are accepted, you will then be able to browse all the opportunities and answer questions to see if you match with the vendor’s needs. If and when they hire you, you will test whatever element of their business they need help with and get paid for your participation.
28: Start Selling Print on Demand Products Online
Print on demand products are an easy way to increase your earnings as a side hustle. You can design things that other companies will create for you and send out to your customers as orders come in.
For example, if you want to design t-shirts or images or quotes that will go on coffee mugs, you can set this up on a shop of your own and allow people to go to your store and order whatever size they want and have it shipped to them from the company.
29: Sign Up for Paid Focus Groups
Market research companies need many men and women to answer questions to their surveys on behalf of corporations and brands who need consumer input. You can sign up for many different paid focus groups and get paid per project or per hour.
Sometimes, they may be looking for a certain demographic, such as people of a certain gender, race, geographic location, or income level. They may want only parents to respond or people who are of a specific political affiliation.
You don’t want to sign up for any platforms where you are expected to pay anything. Legitimate platforms will pay you once you’re prequalified for a focus group and have participated in their session.
30: See What Dropshipping Opportunities Exist
You might want to get into dropshipping as your side hustle or choice. This can be done in many different niches. You’ll create a store for customers to order from. After they order, you forward the order and money for the product to the main supplier, keeping a portion of the profits for yourself.
The supplier will ship the product directly to the customer. This is similar to how Amazon’s FBA program works, only you don’t have to source the products and send them to Amazon.
It’s a bit like affiliate marketing, but the customer will pay you and you then pay the company. You can get into dropshipping in niches like health, kitchen gadgets, home improvement, weddings, photography, gaming and more.
