28 Best Apps to Make Money

Need some extra money? Have a smartphone? Now, you can use your smartphone to make money on the go!

In this article, we’ll cover the best apps to make money that add some extra green to your wallet.

Let's face it — we're attached to our mobile devices. According to a recent study, the average person spends nearly 5 hours a day on their phone. 

Did you know that that phone that you use every day can actually put some cash in your pockets? Life happens.

Sometimes you need some extra cash to pay a bill or you’re trying to save up for something you want.

You don't want to take a payroll advance or fall behind on bills and are wondering how to make money today.

Sure, another few dollars earned today wouldn't hurt.

We’ve all been there, but what do you usually do when that happens? Most people search google for something like, “how to make money right now?”

Look no further; this is an exhaustive list of things that anyone can do, today, in order to make money with apps that really pay.

If you're in serious debt, then this list might not be best suited for you – but in case you need to make money fast in one day, it's possible if you're ambitious.

Best Apps to Make Money in 2024

This list of best apps to make money is broken down into the following categories:

1. Money Making Survey Apps
2. Cash Back and Receipt Scanning Apps
3. Apps That Pay You for Simple Tasks
4. Best Apps for Selling Stuff

I reviewed dozens of apps that claim to get you money, but only listed the legitimate money-making apps.

Let's get started.

Need Money Now?

If you actually need money right now, then you can opt for a personal loan. When you need money in a hurry ZippyLoan is where to go.

You apply for a loan through the Zippy Loan site, if approved they send your loan application to one of many loan providers.

You review the loan details and e-sign if you like what you see. No risk in checking what offers you'll get. You can borrow between $100 and $15,000 as soon as tomorrow.

Loans service for up to 60 months.

ZippyLoan connects borrowers to lenders through their network of lenders. They'll find you the lowest interest rate and is one of the best no credit check loan. You can visit ZippyLoan here.

If you wanted to earn extra money then you can use the massive list below:

Money Making Survey Apps

These apps let you take surveys on your mobile device and earn money real:

Swagbucks – $10 Bonus

Swagbucks is another great app to make some extra money in your free time. As a new member, you can earn up to $10 per survey. They are known for giving out fun, top-paying surveys. And you can also get paid to play games and watch TV. It’s similar to Survey Junkie, but there are also a few other ways you can earn money as a member (including a $10 bonus when you use a Swagbucks sign up code).

Other ways you can make money with Swagbucks outside of surveys:

• Cash back program for online shopping (Includes $10 bonus).
• Get paid for searching the web (Includes $10 bonus)
• Watching videos (Includes $10 bonus)

Swagbucks is conveniently offering a $10 bonus just for signing up through this link, so act fast.

MyPoints – $10 Bonus

Have you heard of MyPoints? It’s a cash back app that pays you to shop online. I love it because it lets you earn cash for the shopping you would do anyway.

Join millions of MyPoints Members who have been awarded over $236 Million in gift cards and PayPal cash. Plus, you can earn in a variety of ways like up to 500 points per day watching fun videos and earn up to 300 points per completed survey.

MyPoints' low $10 cash-out is just one task away. When you spend just $20 through the MyPoints site in the first 30 days, you'll get a $10 bonus, which allows you to cash out instantly!

InboxDollars – $5 Bonus

The next thing you can do is sign up for InboxDollars which pays you, in cash, to watch fun videos, play games, take surveys and they'll also give you a $5 free bonus just to give it a try. 

By spending just 5-10 minutes per day on this (either on your lunch break or during TV commercial breaks) you can earn and save an extra $50/month.

You don’t have to convert your points into cash, you can see your earnings on the dashboard. More people should be using this app that pays real money. If you plan on joining, be sure you join using an InboxDollars referral to claim a welcome bonus.

Survey Junkie – $1.25 Bonus

Taking online surveys to make extra money is a no-brainer. You definitely won’t get rich with surveys alone, but you won’t waste much time, and you can make some money the easy way. Here is my favorite (and highest paying) survey site:

Survey Junkie is a free survey app for your phone that pays you to take online surveys, participate in focus groups, and try new products. And, I really mean free all around – free to join and they don’t charge anything to be a member (they will actually pay you in cash via PayPal).

Survey Junkie pays between up to $3 per survey, and many of them take less than 5 minutes to complete. It is one of the highest-paying survey sites that actually works. You can get a free registration bonus for free when you join through this link.

Branded Surveys – $1.00 Bonus

Branded Surveys asks for information about you so that they can match you with fitting surveys. At up to $50 a pop for some surveys, and a free $2 just for signing up, it pays to check in daily to see which ones are available to you.

Cashouts are through PayPal. What do I like about this money-making app? You'll get money just for signing up and they pay you straight cash.

Cash Back and Receipt Scanning Apps

Sign up for these cash back apps and get amazing offers and free coupons from top brands and grocery stores:

Rakuten – $25 Bonus

You'd be silly not to get cash back for items you would have bought anyway. You can do this by shopping online with Rakuten.

Rakuten is my favorite way to make money when I shop online and right now they are offering a $30 sign up bonus when using a Rakuten referral.

Every time I shop online, I start at Rakuten and then I get cash back deposited into my PayPal account. Hello, free money — join now for free here.

Ibotta – $20 Bonus

The app you should know about is Ibotta. This money-making app is available for iOS or Android phones and helps you make money off your grocery receipts.

Earn real cash back shopping online & in-store with Ibotta. The average Ibotta user earns $150 a year on groceries, online purchases, delivery, and more. Register for the free Ibotta browser extension and app today to start saving. Sign up and upload your first receipt to get a $20 welcome bonus.

Dosh – $1 Bonus

Looking for easy to use money making app to claim $1 now? Dosh is the free money-making app that finds you money for shopping, dining out, and booking hotels and travel activities with more than 100,000 merchants and brands nationwide.

This company not only allows you to get cash back on everyday purchases, but no receipt scanning required. Simply download the app or find them in your favorite ways to pay, like Venmo or Jelli. It’s awesome. You can get your $1 bonus after linking your first credit or debit card to the app.

Drop – $1 Bonus

Drop offers next-level rewards — shop at the brands you love, and automatically get rewarded. This cash back app tracks your purchases when you link up your credit card and debit cards to the free app. 

Then, it automatically adds Drop points to your account when you spend at certain merchants you’ve picked from their list. It's simple. When you reach a certain threshold, you can redeem Drop points for gift cards to popular retailers, like Amazon, Dunkin Donuts, Whole Foods, JC Penney, and many more. Drop also helps you by giving you a 1,000 points ($1.00) for signing up.

Shopkick 

Shopkick lets you earn points for shopping, period. You can get points for just walking in the door of some stores (including Walmart, Target, TJMaxx and more), for completing various offers or buying popular products.

Earn rewards and get free gift cards for the shopping you already do. Get exclusive deals and discounts as you collect points by walking into stores, scanning items or receipts: you don’t even need to buy anything to earn your kicks! With Shopkick, you can treat yourself and indulge guilt-free as you shop. Check out the latest Shopkick invite codes to claim a bonus.

Trim

The free bot, Trim, lets you save money with automation and within a few days, I saved an extra $103.53. Simply link you financial accounts and this money making app will go to work. It can find ways to lower you our bills and cancel subscriptions. You will be surprised to see how much your utility bills can be lowered. 

It also analyzes spending habits, and much much more. Trim packs a big punch and you can try it out with a 14-day free trial if you are ready to save.

Paribus

Sign up for Paribus and find out if stores owe you a refund – effortlessly. It's easy to use, sign up (or log in) with the email you use for online shopping receipts. Paribus will scan your inbox for receipts from stores they monitor.

You don’t even have to know about the price drop in order to get your refund. It’s 100% free and will save you a lot of money. I pocketed around $50 in the first few weeks of signing up. Remember, it’s 100% free.

Fetch Rewards – $3 Bonus

Fetch Rewards works directly with hundreds of beloved brands to bring you an entirely new way to go beyond just getting rewards. With Fetch, you feel truly rewarded. Join the Fetch Rewards revolution today.

Visit the app store to get the free app and it will give you free money just for signing up. This is a great way to make money, the easy way, and can add up to a large wad of cash with time. Scan your first receipt in order to earn your $3 Fetch bonus then you can cash out for a Visa gift card or Amazon gift card.

Passive Income Money Making Apps

These apps can help you earn passive income. Imagine making $80 fast overnight without doing a thing — you get the idea. These apps can help:

Acorns – $10 Bonus

Acorns is great investing app to use to start investing in the stock market. In under 5 minutes, get investment accounts for you and your family, plus retirement, checking, ways to earn more money, and grow your knowledge. Just $1, $3, or $5 a month. From acorns, mighty oaks do grow.

Once you connect the app to a debit or credit card, it rounds up your purchases to the nearest dollar and funnels your digital change into an investment account. Sign up to try it risk-free with a $10 sign up bonus.

Nielsen – $50 per Year

By using the internet as you do every day, Nielsen invites you to make a difference – and you can make money too.  I downloaded this app and make around $50-100 passively… it’s a legit money making app. You don’t really have to do anything other than initially registering your computer or phone.

This company will pay you $50 a year to keep their app on your favorite internet browsing device and they also give away $10,000 each month. So you can possibly make more than $100. Sign up through here for a registration bonus.

BlockFi

BlockFi is one of the few fully regulated crypto service providers, trusted by millions of users worldwide. Buy bitcoin, ethereum, XRP, and other top cryptocurrencies without deposit fees. Seamlessly deposit and withdraw to and from your bank account.

Open your account today and enjoy zero commission as you trade the world’s most popular digital currencies. Unlike other apps, BlockFi allows you to easily create a diversified crypto portfolio with no hidden costs.

Here's how it works:

1) Create an account, you just need to connect your bank account.

2) Watch your crypto investment grow — some analyst say Bitcoin will hit $100k by 2024.

M1 Finance

It’s been said that the average millionaire has seven streams of income. Dividend stocks are usually always in the mix. Dividend stocks are similar to regular shares of stock, but they pay you a small portion of the companies earnings monthly or quarterly. So it’s wise to build a portfolio or dividend paying stocks!

If you want to get hip to dividend investing, check out M1 Finance. What I like about M1 Finance is that they make it really easy to invest in stocks, while still having plenty of features as you get more comfortable with investing. Plus it offers so many other features.

M1 is the future of finance in a sleek, modern app. Rated #1 for sophisticated investors by Investopedia, users can enjoy: free investing, high yield checking, low rate borrowing, automation, and optimization.

Money Making Apps That Pay You for Simple Tasks

These are some of my favorite side hustles that help you earn money for doing simple tasks. If you are able to download an app and put in the work, you'll make some extra money.

DoorDash

DoorDash, a food-delivery service, is looking for people who want to start delivering food to earn extra money and work on their own schedule. You choose the hours you work and get paid cash per order (once you have access to fast pay). Rates will vary by location.

Once you sign up to become a dasher, DoorDash will reach out about an orientation. Complete the orientation, and you’re on your way towards getting paid for every completed delivery plus 100% of tips received.

This is such an easy way to make money by delivering on your free time while making extra cash and funding your personal goals.

To qualify, you must:

• You must be 18 years or older.
• Have access to a car or bicycle.
• Own an iPhone or Android smartphone.
• Driver's license with at least two years of driving experience.
• Valid insurance — name on policy.

Lyft

If you’re free nights and weekends, you can make money driving your fellow citizens around. You can make money by becoming a Lyft driver if you have a car, it’s a perfect way to make a good amount of extra money whenever it’s convenient for you.

A lot of people do this full time, so you can imagine that’s it definitely possible to do this on the side and make 200 dollars every few days and be able to save it. Oh and Lyft pays it’s drivers more than Uber does. And right now, they’ve got a promotion going on where any new driver will instantly get a $1000 bonus after completing their 125th ride.

Instacart

Instacart delivers groceries from local stores in two hours from stores like Whole Foods Market, Target, Costco and Petco. Why should you care? Because this is a lucrative opportunity for you to make extra cash fast.

If you wanted to become an Instacart personal grocery shopper, you'll earn an average of $15 per hour.

Here's how it works:

Sign up as a personal grocery shopper and start to receive grocery orders through an app on your smartphone and then shop and deliver groceries to the customer’s door.

• Start earning quickly, and get paid weekly
• Select hours based on your schedule
• Shop and deliver the customer’s order
• Get to know the city by delivering to new and familiar areas

Click here if you are interested in learning more.

HealthyWage

HealthyWage offers people the opportunity to earn cash for losing weight. Earn cash for losing weight? Sounds too good to be true, but you read it right. The company was founded in 2009, and its HQ is in New York, and part of their mission is to provide ways to have a measurable impact on the growing obesity epidemic in the US.

They do this by legitimately offering cash prizes to make weight loss and fitness more fun and effective. Since HealthyWage was founded they have been featured in literally hundreds of newspapers, magazines, TV shows, blogs, and website.

One of my readers made their own bet and learned that they could make up to $656.13 for only losing 15 pounds! That’s about $35 a pound, and about a cent per calorie cut.

How can you make money with it? You essentially bet on yourself and how much weight you can lose. Since they are promoting ways to be healthy, your winnings depend on how much weight you lose and how much you bet. It's a great way to make money and be healthy at the same time.

Start your HealthyWager today and get paid to lose weight.

Uber Eats

If you’re free nights and weekends, you can earn extra money delivering food for fellow citizens around your city. It’s easy to deliver food with Uber Eats – if you have a car, it’s a perfect way to make a good amount of extra cash for paying for college or save up.

A lot of people do this full time, so you can imagine that’s it definitely possible to do this on the side and make extra money by delivering food with Uber, and be on your own schedule.

Deliver for a few hours in the mornings, every night, or just on weekends—it's up to you. You are your own boss and you can choose when and how much you work.

Postmates

It pretty easy to become a delivery driver for Postmates. It’s free to sign up and fast to get started. There are no fees or time commitments, so you take home 100% of what you earn every time you complete a delivery.

As a driver, you'll get paid to deliver things like take out, groceries and even alcohol.

Here’s how to get started:

✔️ Create your account – Enter your name, email, phone number and provide a profile photo and proof of identity.

✔️ Receive welcome kit – Once Postmates verifies you are who you say you are, they will send you a delivery welcome bag in the mail.

✔️ Download the app, go online – Open up the app and start accepting delivery offers and get paid whenever it's convenient for you!

Many reviews online state that you can make up to $25 per hour. You can also see how much you earned after each delivery and exactly how your earnings were calculated. Get free weekly deposits or cash out instantly anytime you want.

VIPKiD

Still wondering, how to make extra money? Well, have you considered teaching English online (pick your own hours too)? All that is required is that you are fluent in English, have a bachelor's degree, and have some tutoring experience. This a great way to earn money from home and already 30,000+ use VIPKID to teach English from home.

You'll make $12-$22 an hour, and Forbes ranked this company #1 on it's 2017 “Top 100 Places Work From Home Companies” Since this is a legitimate way to make extra money, the application process pretty detailed. With an opportunity to make $650 a month, just from one hour out of your day, may be worth looking it. You can learn more about teaching English online on VIPKID's website.

Best Money Making Apps for Selling Stuff

These apps can help you make money for selling stuff:

Airbnb

There is a company out there called Airbnb that can net you over $1,500+ a month just by listing your spare room just a few nights out of the month. Are you interested in seeing what your income potential could be by listing a spare room on Airbnb?

It's easy to use…

1. Sign up for Airbnb (you just need to give them a name and email address).
2. List your spare space in under 5 minutes.
3. You can get paid when somebody books your spare room and you can charge whatever you want when you join through this link.

Remember, it is a free room booking app for your phone. I really mean free all around – free to join and they don’t charge any fees for you to list your spare room. See how much people are making from listings in your area, then make your own!

Getaround

Do you have a car? You can earn $10,000 this year with this one side hustle: Turn your car into a second paycheck with no driving necessary. Start making passive income with Getaround and you’re paid monthly.

Earn $10,000 per year actively sharing your parked car. To share your car on Getaround, your car must:

• Be model year 2010 or newer.
• Have less than 125,000 miles.
• Seat no more than 8 passengers, and be a private passenger vehicle with at least 4 wheels.

Turo

Another well-known company, Turo, which has signed up nearly 5 million users to its website, according to Bloomberg, lets you rent out your car as well.

It's also really simple to do (and free). Listing your car is quick and easy and takes less than 10 minutes to set up. According to a recent Turo review, somebody listed their car for 5 days every month and made $3,496 in a year. 

Sounds pretty good to me. Oh, and they also protect your car against physical damage, so you're fully covered. You can sign up here and start making money with your car.

There Will Always Be Money Making Apps that Pay You

It's true, there are legit apps out there that pay you real money. When you officially make that leap into adulthood, it comes with a long list of responsibilities — financial ones included like paying debt or investing. That’s life, and we all learn to cope and keep moving forward. But every so often, there’s a small hiccup and — be it emotional, physical or otherwise — we run into a wall.

Expenses like car repairs force you to spend rent or utility money. You know you’re going to be short, so you’re pulling crazy overtime to make up the difference. Or, maybe you have to give up some recreational activities to make way for more responsible ones. These things happen, and when they do, it’s nice to have a little cash handy to lighten the stress load.

You could always pawn some of your stuff, true, but no one likes doing that. You could also ask your family for money, but that’s no good, either. And taking out an advance wage or salary loan is an even worse strategy. Why not try out one of these money-making apps instead?

That’s right: There are legitimate money-making apps that can net you some extra funds for whatever, whenever you want and we went through them all in this mega list.