When thinking about ways to make money online, I think it’s easy to look at successful entrepreneurs making thousands of dollars every month and to feel like we have to do the same thing.

However, making a full-time income online isn’t a prerequisite for success. Sometimes, even a bit of extra money on the side can make a massive difference.

In college, I used hustles like phone farming and started this blog to make beermoney, and if you’re ever in a tight spot for cash, every little bit counts.

So, if you’re looking for a fast and effective way to make some additional income to make ends meet, this list of the best micro jobs is for you.

Just note: I don’t recommend using these jobs if you are looking to make money online for an extended period of time. These are lower paying gigs and short tasks designed to be completed quickly, not to sustain yourself for months on end.

Let’s get to it!

Extra Reading – 32 remote job websites you can use if you’re looking for more serious online work.

When it comes to finding micro jobs, Clickworker is one of the most popular platforms around.

Users can signup to work on Clickworker for free and set their own schedule after completing a short assessment to qualify for jobs. Getting high scores and producing quality work will increase the number of jobs you can take on.

Popular jobs on Clickworker include data categorization, proofreading, completing surveys, app testing, and other short tasks that only take a few minutes.

Projects can pay between a few cents to two-digit amounts, and project fees are based on the difficulty of work, processing time, and a few other factors. Payments are made weekly through PayPal or several other payment options.

Amazon Mechanical Turk, or MTurk, is another way to earn some extra money whenever you’re in front of your computer and have some spare time.

Jobs on MTurk are similar to Clickworker. The MTurk marketplace is full of tasks including identifying objects in videos, data de-duplication, transcription work, and search engine evaluation.

MTurk jobs are known as ‘hits,’ which stands for ‘Human Intelligence Tasks,’ and the premise behind Amazon MTurk is to have workers help solve problems that AI isn’t capable of figuring out.

Using systems like MTurk HIT catcher is a great way to increase how much money you make with MTurk, although some people treat this micro job a lot more seriously than simple beermoney.

According to this this Reddit thread, some Amazon MTurk workers have made more than $50,000 from the platform. While this isn’t typical, it does show there’s plenty of opportunity if you put in the time.

U.S. citizens can earn cash or Amazon gift cards for their work on MTurk, while non U.S. citizens can only earn gift cards.

Extra Reading – 19 Ways To Make Money On Amazon.

A long time player in the paid survey game, Survey Junkie is another option to make money with surveys.

I’m not normally a fan of survey websites, but Survey Junkie lets you cash out at just $5, so this is at least one of the more legitimate platforms around.

Signing up for Survey Junkie is free, and the site is completely geared towards surveys unlike many other GPT websites.

Points can be redeemed for a variety of popular gift cards or PayPal cash, and the platform is open to members from Canada, Australia, New Zealand, the U.K. and the United States.

Once you complete your profile, Survey Junkie can match you to a greater number of surveys, so you might have some decent opportunity here if your demographics are of interest.

Signup for Survey Junkie today and start earning spare change in your spare time!

Microworkers is a micro task website that currently has more than 1.4 million workers who have completed more than 42 million tasks.

Popular jobs on Microworkers include categorization, completing surveys, data mining/entry, and ads monitoring on social media platforms like Facebook.

As with Clickworkers, you will be assigned a star rating as you complete tasks, and higher ratings will allow you to access a wider array of jobs.

Microworker pays out through Dwolla, PayPal, and Transpay, but you must earn at least $9 before cashing out. Payments are sent twice a week.

I’ve mentioned Appen before on This Online World, and it’s by far one of the most popular beermoney platforms around.

Appen jobs are pretty similar to other crowdsource-based platforms. However, on Appen, you apply to a specific category of work, which includes rating jobs, language based jobs, or micro tasks.

Appen is legit, and has plenty of strong reviews on websites like Indeed. The pay range is also above traditional micro work, and some Appen jobs pay as high as $14/hour. However, Appen is considered beermoney for most people because it can be hard to fill a 40 hour week with this platform.

Payments are made via PayPal or Payoneer.

Extra Reading – Make $20 Instantly With These Other Ideas!

Lionbridge is a competitor of Appen and offers the same sort of micro task marketplace for people to make extra money.

If you want to try search engine evaluation, website testing, quality rating, or translation/transcription and have had difficulty getting into Appen, Lionbridge is a solid alternative.

Just note, it is technically against TOS to work for Appen and Lionbridge simultaneously. You can sort of get away with it, but it seems fairly random in terms of who is allowed to skirt the rules.

Pay rates range from $8-$14 per hour depending on the job you’re working on, but hours are also volatile as with Appen.

If you’re looking for a global opportunity to earn some beermoney, iSoftStone is a great option to consider besides companies like Appen or Lionbridge.

iSoftStone is currently hiring ad evaluators, linguists, transcribers, and speech data collection workers from around the world. You can view this list of open positions to learn more.

Pay ranges from $8-$11 per hour and you are able to set your own hours. Bonuses are rarely paid out as well for consistent, high quality work. iSoftStone payments are made via PayPal.

Figure Eight is yet another popular way to make money by completing micro tasks.

A veteran to the industry, Figure Eight has an interesting history. The company used to be called CrowdFlower way back when, and Figure Eight was recently acquired by Appen for $300 million.

Figure Eight jobs are slightly different than Appen. Social media categorization, content moderation, business listing verification, and image tagging are some of the jobs you can expect to encounter.

Tasks on Figure Eight can pay between a few cents to a couple of bucks, so you might be able to make an extra $100 in beermoney every month if you use this platform diligently.

Remotasks is a newer entrant to the work of crowdsourced micro jobs, and they also pay less on average than companies like Appen or Lionbridge.

However, if you can’t make it into other platforms but want to make some extra beermoney, Remotasks might help hold you over until you can find better work.

Popular jobs on Remotasks include image annotation, data collection, identifying spam, moderating content, and transcription.

Payments are made via PayPal, but you will probably earn under $10/hour on this platform so keep that in mind.

Spare 5 is another popular platform with both a website and mobile app (so you can hustle while on the go).

Most Spare 5 tasks focus on “deriving the meaning of, or providing human insight into, audio, video, or image files.” Expect to annotate images, provide keywords/categories, and proofread/complete linguistic tasks.

Spare 5 gigs generally pay a few cents to under a dollar, and payments are made on Friday via PayPal. The minimum payout cashout threshold is $1.

Zeerk brands themselves as a micro job and freelance portal where you can offer or browse gigs ranging from $3 to $200.

In other words, Zeerk is an alternative to Fiverr that focuses on micro tasks. This is the platform where people buy likes, followers, upvotes, social media accounts, and other semi-questionable online transactions.

If you’ve ever tried to make money on Fiverr with these sorts of offerings but find the marketplace is saturated, Zeerk might be less competitive.

ySense is a weird mixture between a survey site and a micro job platform, and there’s truly a little bit of something for everyone on this site.

On ySense, users can make money through surveys, download offers, watching videos, or by completing jobs like the ones posted on Figure Eight.

ySense was formerly known as Clixsense, another popular GPT website, and the platform is under the parent company Prodege, who operate some of the most reputable reward sites in the industry.

Users can cash out with dozens of gift card options or through PayPal, and the lowest rewards are $3. ySense is also available in dozens of countries.

If you think you should get paid for your opinion, Crowdtap is a platform you should check out.

Crowdtap presents users with questions every day, and you can gradually earn points for sharing your opinion. You can redeem points for various rewards like gift cards to Amazon, Walmart, Target, and other major brands.

Most $5 gift cards require 1,000 Crowdtap points to cashout, and trust me, it will take a bit of time to get there.

However, if you want to earn free gift cards over time by taking a few seconds to share your thoughts, this is a great option to turn to.

If you want to get paid for your reviews or for sharing your opinion, Swagbucks is a beermoney classic you can utilize..

I used Swagbucks for ages to earn passive income from my phone farming setup, and I used their survey section once in a while when I was close to cashing out.

Surveys are not my cup of tea, but hey, if you’re looking for free money, here it is!

Swagbucks points can be redeemed for gift cards to major brands or PayPal cash, and the platform is available in most of the Americas, Europe, and Asia.

Just note, the pay here is absolutely terrible. I suggest checking out Reddit Beermoney to figure out what the highest paying survey website is at the time you’re reading this, because Swagbucks really isn’t that lucrative these days.

Out of all the GPT websites around, Grindabuck has always been my favorite.

I’ve been using Grindabuck to earn passive income for the past 2 years, on and off, and have earned close to $130 at this point. Since I’m not a fan of surveys, this has been the perfect setup for me.

However, Grindabuck is also a solid way to earn some beermoney by answering surveys, and the top earners on the site regularly earn a few hundred dollars a month for their time.

Surveys are a grind, but if you can find a platform that works for you, you can definitely make some decent pocket change every month.

Plus, Grindabuck is a decent passive income website if you run their video rewards portal in the background.

Note: Grindabuck is currently avaialble in Canada, the United States, Germany, Australia, and the U.K.

Extra Reading – Grindabuck Review – How I Earn Passive Income With Grindabuck.

If you aren’t a fan of the aforementioned survey websites, Opinion Outpost is one final offer you can turn to for some fast cash.

There’s nothing unique about Opinion Outpost, and it seems pretty hit or miss for many people in the Reddit beermoney community. It’s either a solid earner each month, or people seem to get disqualified incredibly easily.

Note, you must live in the United States to participate in Opinion Outpost and have a PayPal.

Again, survey websites don’t pay a lot!!! You’re probably better off with another micro task website like MTurk.

But, if you want to make some money in your spare time and don’t mind surveys, you can give Opinion Outpost a try.

If you want to get paid for taking part in research studies to help scientific research efforts from hundreds of universities or research labs, Prolific is the site for you.

Prolific has a mixture of long-term and short-term studies, so you can start earning on the site in just a few minutes if you’re looking for short tasks that pay.

Prolific pays a minimum of $6.50 per hour and pays through PayPal. Prolific also operates in over a dozen countries, but certain studies may have age or gender restrictions.

This site has been a long time favorite of Reddit Beermoney, but again, you’ll have to test it for yourself to see if it works.

Prolific is a pretty solid job for college students since you can participate in online research studies as well as paid research groups taking place on your campus.

If surveys or general micro jobs aren’t your thing, you can still make some extra money through website testing.

Companies like TryMyUI connect quality assurance testers with businesses looking to perfect their website or app. Testers are paid $10 per test, and sessions generally take 20 minutes.

TryMyUI is currently hiring global testers, but you must be fluent in English and have a microphone/screen recording software. TryMyUI also pays through PayPal every Friday.

User Testing, like TryMyUI, pay their website testers $10 for completing a website or app testing session.

Testers are required to record their thoughts/screen as they navigate a testing environment, but most sessions take 10-20 minutes. Rarely, testers may qualify for a live test session with a client, which pay up to $60.

User Testing is fairly global, and payments are made 7 days after a testing session via PayPal.

While user testing platforms like TryMyUI or UserTesting are great for beermoney, platforms like TestingTime tend to pay slightly more for your time.

TestingTime offers longer, more in-depth testing sessions that pay upwards of €50 per hour. While finding steady work isn’t easy on TestingTime, this is definitely a solid platform to add to your list of micro gigs.

You must be fluent in English to work for TestingTime, and you will need Skype and a working microphone. Payments are made every 5-10 days via PayPal following a test.

I actually mentioned Fancy Hands in my post on gig economy apps, and it’s one of the most popular platforms out there for finding work as a virtual assistant.

Popular virtual assistant tasks on Fancy Hands include making phone calls on someone’s behalf, scheduling appointments, making travel arrangements, and data entry.

Fancy Hand tasks pay $3 to $7 to start, but you can earn more as you work with the same client or if you are promoted to a managerial position and manage other virtual assistants.

Being a virtual assistant is probably one of the higher paying micro task jobs possible, and you can also scale your income higher than a lot of these websites if you find the right businesses to work for.

You must have an audio headset to work for Fancy Hands. Payments are also made biweekly through Dwolla.

If you want to take part in online or in-person research studies that are high-paying, Respondent.io is certainly worth signing up for.

Respondent offers a variety of surveys and research panels, with an average hourly pay of $140 according to their website. Many surveys are just 10-30 minutes long, but even so, Respondent is undoubtedly one of the higher paying micro jobs around.

Getting started with Respondent is easy. Simply make a profile, fill in some basic demographic information, and get matched to research studies. If you live in a major city, you should find there is plenty of opportunity.

Note, based on what researchers are studying, you may not qualify for every survey. This fact makes Respondent a nice micro job website to find occasional, high paying work. However, I would not rely on this site for steady work.

Final Thoughts

At the end of the day, you can always turn to the power of the internet if you are in need of some quick cash.

Personally, I don’t recommend using micro jobs as a way to sustain yourself. I also don’t recommend these platforms for a long-term solution unless your only goal is to make some beermoney every month.

If you are genuinely looking to make some significant money online, you can consider a variety of location independent jobs that pay higher hourly wages or other side hustles within the gig economy.

However, I don’t want to knock the whole world of micro task work too much; some of these platforms really helped me throughout college, and if you’re ever in a pinch, you can cash out fairly quickly by using these platforms.

Happy hustling!