101 Best Side Hustle Ideas to Make $500+ in Your Spare Time

Every side hustle starts with an idea!
I put together this monster list of side hustle ideas to help get your creative juices flowing.
No more excuses :)
Even better, most of these side hustles don’t require a huge initial investment or even any special skills. And while not all qualify as “business ideas,” each has the potential to earn you money in your spare time.
These are worth anywhere from $50 to $50,000 a month — it all depends on your execution.





















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1. Food or Grocery Delivery Service
With services like Instacart , you can earn money delivering groceries and take-out orders in your town.
I sat down with one full-service Instacart shopper who made $10,000 in his first 6 months !
And you don’t have to worry about keeping your car spotless for passengers, like you would with Uber.
2. Rental Properties
Real estate investing is one of the oldest and most popular side hustles in the books … but houses are expensive!
Thankfully, new platforms like Arrived make it easy to invest in income-generating properties—with as little as $100.

The company pools money to buy rental properties, manages them, and then distributes the cash flow every month.
I also liked Austin Miller’s creative approach to building his rental portfolio, which was up to 17 properties worth $1.2 million when we spoke.
The kicker? They were all acquired “free”—without any of his own money .
3. Customer Interviews
Many companies use customer interviews to get feedback on new products.
User Interviews and Respondent.io are a pair of cool services that facilitate those interviews online and over the phone.

The best part? The average compensation is $50-150 an hour!
Here are some other companies that facilitate focus groups and paid research studies .
4. Online Surveys
These won’t make you rich, but can be an easy way to supplement your income and you can do them in your downtime (waiting in line, watching TV, etc.).
If you love this stuff, check out:










Swagbucks – Earn up to $35 a survey with this mega-popular app, and get a $10 bonus  just for signing up!
Survey Junkie – Earn up to $40 a month and cash out beginning at just $5.
InboxDollars  – Get a  $5 bonus just for signing up!
Branded Surveys – One of the best-rated survey sites with millions paid out.
Pinecone Research  – Earn $3 for each 15-20 minute survey. They'll send you a $3 check after your first one.
American Consumer Opinion – Join millions of free members and earn up to $50 per survey.
YouGov  - Long-running survey panel, with data often cited in the media.











5. Flipping Items for Profit
My favorite eBay seller is Rob, the “Flea Market Flipper ,” who built a 6-figure business buying low and selling high. He and his wife Melissa consistently earn thousands of dollars a month, flipping items part-time!

They put together this free training on how to get started and make your first sales in as little as 2 weeks.










Pros: Low startup costs



Simple business model



Can multiply money quickly










Cons: Can be time-consuming to source inventory



Difficult to store and ship bulky items













Join the Free Workshop!


































Suggested Playlist: Flipping Profits
Buying low and selling high is the fastest way to multiply money. Here's how to get it done.
Add to Spotify










6. Build a Helpful Website
Write content on a topic you care about and build an audience in your niche.
For example:

Scott earns 6-figures a year from his bird-watching blog
Shelley earns $50k a month from her travel blogs
Katie earns $6k a month from her gray hair blog

Want to start a blog of your own? Check out my free 6-part video course on how to start your own site.










Pros: Low startup costs



Great long-term earning power



Can sell the business down the road










Cons: Slow to see results



Lots of skills to learn













Start your site!











Free Blogging Playlist











7. Affiliate Marketing
Refer website visitors to buy products online and earn a small commission on each sale. This is actually how I’ve made the bulk of my living over the last 10+ years, so it definitely works!
One effective affiliate marketing model is to create “comparison” content that helps readers make a buying decision. Following this strategy, a couple podcast guests reported earning $20,000 a month within the first year of launching their site .
Here’s a step-by-step guide to building your first affiliate website .























Suggested Playlist: Affiliate Marketing
Make money online by sharing relevant products and services with your audience. Here's a killer playlist packed with actionable advice from the pros.
Add to Spotify










8. Reselling Furniture Returns
Reselling furniture returns is a unique low-risk side hustle .
How it works is you join Sharetown as a local “reverse logistics” rep. Sharetown partners with direct-to-consumer mattress and furniture brands to handle their return requests. When customers decide they don’t want to keep the item, you’ll get dispatched to go pick it up.

After that, you’ll clean it up, photograph it, and list it for resale on sites like Facebook Marketplace.
The Sharetown reps I’ve connected with target $150-250 per flip — and the kicker is you don’t have to pay Sharetown for the inventory until the item sells.
Check out my full Sharetown review to learn more.










Pros: Low startup costs



Great earning power



No hunting for inventory










Cons: Requires a truck or SUV



Bulky items to store



Not available in all areas













Learn More and Sign Up











Full Sharetown Review











9. “Alternative” Investing
Alternative investments include peer-to-peer lending, real estate crowdfunding, business lending, and even cryptocurrency.
This is one of my favorite side hustles because it’s automated and passive. Check out options like Fundrise , which allows you to invest in revenue-generating commercial real estate for as little as $10.
Disclosure: I’ve been a Fundrise investor since 2015. When you join through my referral link, I receive compensation.

Another example of buying cash flow is to buy an online business. For example, Stacy Caprio bought a small portfolio of sites that—after a couple early mis-steps—was profitable enough to leave her job .
10. Bookkeeping / Accounting / Tax Preparation Service
Help other businesses with their accounting and finances. This can be a great option for people with an accounting background from school, your day job, or just for people who aren’t afraid of math.
Virtual bookkeepers can earn $60 an hour or more . Here’s a free training on how to get started .

11. YouTube Channel Host
If you generate a lot of video views, you can earn money with YouTube’s revenue sharing program.
I’ve been dabbling a bit more with YouTube lately , and recently passed $500 in monthly ad income.
YouTube is an exciting platform because it’s both a search engine and a viral engine — giving you two ways to get discovered. You may not even need to be on camera yourself .
12. Selling Printables and Spreadsheets
I’m a fan of side hustles that let me get paid over and over again from work I do once, and printables definitely fits that bill.
By uploading digital files to Etsy, you can reach a wide audience of buyers—without having to fulfill individual orders.

Rachel Jones reported earning $10,000 a month from her portfolio of Etsy printables . Examples might include habit trackers, meal plans, budget templates, chore charts, intake forms, and more.
Similarly, Emily McDermott reported earning $250,000 in her first two years of selling spreadsheets on Etsy .
13. “Software with a Service” Consulting
There are consultants for practically every area of expertise. What are you a relative expert in that others might pay for your advice?
One of my favorite angles is to piggyback on the popularity of a particular software tool, like Brad Rice did with Salesforce (earning over $200k a year part time! ). As adoption of the software grows, so too does the demand for qualified support.
14. Baking
Do people love your desserts? Maybe you could provide cakes, cookies, or cupcakes to some corporate event in town.
A friend of ours has built a pretty serious following for her custom cookies —and sometimes sells out in just minutes!

15. Virtual Assistant Service
Virtual assistants generally charge $15-40 an hour to provide remote administrative support to clients. If that sounds like a fun side hustle you can set up shop on your own or jump on board with an established VA company.
To learn more about starting your own virtual assistant company, check out the free video training from my friend Abbey Ashley, who started her VA business on the side.
16. Raw Land Flipping
This sounds a little crazy, but my guest Mark called his raw land investing business “the best passive income model” because he doesn’t have to deal with “problem tenants, toilets, or termites.”
His book, Dirt Rich , is free to Side Hustle Nation readers (just pay shipping).

More recently, I sat down with one of Mark’s students who’d built his land flipping business to $10k a month in his first year.
17. Book Flipping
Use the free Bookscouter app to scan barcodes and see what old books are worth. You can do this both for the books collecting dust on your shelf and for the ones at garage sales or the library book store.
One Side Hustle Show guest reported earning up to $4000 a month flipping books !
18. Notary Public Service
Notary certification is granted by your state and generally costs less than $100.
Once you’re certified, you can get paid to notarize documents, or become a loan signing agent . These mobile notaries can make anywhere from $1,000-8,000 a month overseeing mortgage signings in their spare time.

Check out some of the training resources at Loan Signing System to learn more.
19. Niche Newsletter
One of the side hustles I’m most excited about right now is curated email newsletters . Could you source the best articles on your topic of choice on a daily or weekly basis?
These are super valuable for readers since you help cut through the clutter in your niche. As your audience grows, you can monetize with ads, affiliate offers, or your own products or services.
Tools like Substack and SendFox make it super easy to get started.
20. Teaching an Online Course
Udemy is an online education platform with thousands of on-demand courses. You can create your own course around a topic you’re an expert in and set your own tuition rate.
I did this several years ago and have earned over $20,000 in (mostly) passive income from it!
If you have an existing audience, you might be able to sell the course directly (without giving Udemy a cut). In this episode with Nate Dodson , he shares the framework he used to earn $40,000 a month teaching people how to start a microgreens business.
21. Mystery Shopping
Companies pay mystery shoppers to:

verify their in-store shopping experience
rate their customer support staff
evaluate the competition

Some mystery shoppers report earning over $10,000 a year !
One easy way to get started is with the Field Agent app. The free app pays you to complete small tasks in your neighborhood, like photographing the inside of a store or checking inventory levels.

I found several of these tasks near me, from companies like Home Depot and Walmart, with the payouts ranging from $3-8 per assignment.
22. Tutoring
Put your education to use helping students learn in a comfortable one-on-one setting. WyzAnt is one of the largest marketplaces in the online tutoring world, where you can set your own rates.
Or you can apply to work with BookNook , a popular online math and reading tutoring company for kids in Kindergarten through 8th grade. Pay is $15-22 an hour.
In this post, Matt Fuentes shared how he built his tutoring business up to $1000 a week.
23. Picking Up Trash
Brian Winch has been doing this for over 30 years and calls it “America’s simplest business.” He says you can earn $50,000-$100,000 a year to walk local parking lots and clean up the garbage.
Check out the interview I did with Brian to learn more.























Suggested Playlist: Local Business Ideas
Money is already flowing through your city, town, and neighborhood. Here are some actionable ways to get it flowing to YOU!
Add to Spotify










24. Reselling on Amazon
In this popular side hustle, you find bargain deals locally and ship them off to sell on Amazon. Thanks to the Amazon FBA program (Fulfillment by Amazon), the e-commerce giant handles all the logistics.
I even made a bit of money when I tried it myself .
25. Online Arbitrage
With a trained eye—and often some software to help—you can buy products from one website, and resell them for a profit on Amazon. Online arbitrage pros can earn $10,000+ per month from home.





















Too Many Choices?
Join the Free 5-Day $500 Challenge. I'll show you step-by-step how to add $500 to your bottom line.







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I'll also send you my best side hustle tips and weekly-ish newsletter.
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26. Kindle Publishing
Selling ebooks on Amazon is one of the income streams I’m cultivating . I love the idea of having my work for sale on the world’s largest store!
From my very first author royalty check in 2012, I keep learning more about self-publishing and am hopefully getting better every time I put pen to paper … or fingers to keyboard.
Since then, I’ve earned over $79,000 in author royalties:

27. Part-Time Remote Work
With legit jobs ranging from entry-level to executive and freelance to full-time, FlexJobs is the leading work from home jobs site. At press time, there were more than 30,000 openings in dozens of career categories.

They charge a nominal monthly fee to access their listings, but you’ll easily earn it back (and then some!) with one job.
28. Becoming an Adjunct Professor
You may need a graduate degree for this one, but it can be a fun way to share your knowledge with the next generation of students and earn some good money on the side.
The  average pay  for adjunct professors is  $3500 per course and some jobs allow online teaching and pre-recorded lectures.
29. Proofreading
Do you like to read? If you have an eye for detail you can set up shop on Upwork as a proofreader and bid on jobs large and small.
I actually offered this service on Fiverr for a while and made some decent money .
30. Ridesharing
Earn extra cash driving your fellow citizens around with Lyft  or Uber .
One cool “hack”: Both companies offer “Destination Mode.” This allows you to tell the app which direction you’re headed—and only accept riders along your route. It’s a relatively easy way to monetize your commute!
If you don’t have a car of your own, HyreCar can help get you on the road.
31. Freelancing on Fiverr
Fiverr is one of the most popular freelance marketplaces in the world.
Check out these fine Side Hustle Nation posts/interviews for more on how to make Fiverr work for you:

How to Build a 6-Figure Side Hustle on Fiverr
Rapid Side Hustle Prototyping: A New Income Stream on Your Lunch Break?

32. Print on Demand T-Shirts
Upload your clever or artistic t-shirt design to Merch by Amazon or Redbubble , and collect a small profit every time it sells . You never have to touch any physical inventory; the platforms handle the shipping and fulfillment.
For years, this had been worth $50-200 a month for my wife and I, very part-time.
Another platform to check out is Printful , which has tons of print-on-demand products and lets you syndicate your listings to Etsy and other stores.
33. Your Own E-Commerce Store
Sell products online through your own store or through Amazon or eBay. In this episode, Connor Meakin walked me through how he bootstrapped his e-commerce business to 6-figures in his first year .
Next Step: Set up your shop with a free trial of Shopify , the leading shopping cart provider.
34. Freelance Writing
With millions of websites all competing for attention, freelance writing is a service that’s constantly in demand. Someone’s got to create all that content, right?
Georgia Austin even