16 Legit Ways to Make Money From Your Phone (2026)

Trying to make the most of legit ways make money? You are in the right place. Below we break it down in plain English, with practical tips you can actually use.

Key Takeaways

• 16 Legit Ways to Make Money From Your Phone Earning a bit of extra cash is no longer bound by the confines of overtime at your day job.
• Here are over a dozen legit ways you can use your smartphone to make some extra money.
• Written by Ben Huber Last Updated: May 6, 2024 Reviewed by Jeff Proctor Home Side Hustles Some of the links on DollarSprout point to product...

16 Legit Ways to Make Money From Your Phone

Earning a bit of extra cash is no longer bound by the confines of overtime at your day job. Here are over a dozen legit ways you can use your smartphone to make some extra money.

Written by Ben Huber Last Updated: May 6, 2024 Reviewed by Jeff Proctor

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For most people, a smartphone is nothing more than a time-wasting vortex fueled by a steady drip of dopamine hits. But for the right person, a smartphone can unlock a world of endless income opportunities.

Let’s be real. Most people are not going to get rich by just using their phone. But that doesn’t mean that you can’t make money from your phone quickly by leveraging a few apps and getting in on some of the easier side hustles.

Of course, for the right person, a smartphone actually can lead to a substantial source of income. But typically, these opportunities require a significant amount of work, time, money, or a combination of all three before they pay off.

Here we will cover a variety of options across the entire spectrum.

How to Make Money From Your Phone

1. Test Apps

“Get paid to” sites have grown in popularity over the past four years as side hustle culture takes hold across the pandemic-stricken U.S. 

While these sites frequently overstate their earning potential, we’ve found Freecash.com to be among the higher-earning platforms. This is for a few reasons.

Firstly, they offer a more diverse earning portfolio than nearly all their peer competitors. Surveys, app testing, game testing, quizzes and trivia, and platform leaderboards are among the numerous ways users can earn. 

Second, they also offer a higher portion of affiliate earnings than similar sites. I’m not sure how sustainable in the long run, but right now, they’re at the top in terms of what they’re paying out on eligible offers. Get in while the gettin’s good, or so they say! 

Note: Users get a free $5 for signing up and completing their profile. 

Related: Freecash Review 2025

2. Play video games

You don’t have to be a Dota or Fortnite champion to earn money playing video games. (Fun fact: the prize pool for The International 2022 - the Dota World Championships - was over $19,000,000).

It’s much simpler than that. For example, you can make money from your phone for free by playing the exact same games you do on a daily basis through an app called Mistplay (Android only).

A gamer loyalty app, users will earn time-accrued credits they can then redeem in the Mistplay store for free gift cards to Amazon, eBay, Starbucks, and the Apple App Store. The list of games frequently changes (Mistplay lets you game developers expose new games to the public), but at the time of writing this article, Super Mario Run, Pokémon Go, Fruit Ninja, Chess, Solitaire, Candy Crush Saga, Wordscapes, and dozens of others were all available to play.

If you’re feeling bold, you can up the ante by entering into competitions for games of skill with real cash prizes.

Solitaire Cube is a highly-rated iOS and Android app that allows users to earn real cash through competitive solitaire tournaments.* One user recently reported winning over $200 and successfully withdrawing their earnings, highlighting the app’s potential for real cash rewards.[1]

Players can engage in free practice games to hone their skills, earn daily rewards, and participate in cash tournaments where the top performers win based on their game scores.

*Cash tournaments are not offered in the following states: AR, CT, DE, IN, LA, ME, and SD

3. Sell old stuff

Most of us have stuff sitting around our house or apartment that we don’t want or need anymore. Instead of letting it stack up, sell it. After a quick walk-through of my own house, I found several semi-valuable things that I can easily get rid of through Facebook Marketplace or any number of other selling apps.

• An old surfboard I don’t use anymore ($100 or so)
• An extra coffee table from my last apartment ($50)
• A few old video games ($5 to $10 each)

This method of making money on your phone fast is a personal favorite of mine. I bought and sold over $100,000 worth of Pokémon cards on sites like eBay and Mercari during the pandemic and haven’t slowed down since.

Here’s an example of a poorly titled (and photographed) listing that made for a profitable quick flip. Ben Huber | DollarSprout

I regularly purge the clutter I have lying around, and my house is cleaner (and wallet fatter) for doing it.

Top Selling Apps

• Tech and Smartphones: Gazelle
• Collectables & Vintage: eBay & Mercari
• Clothing & Accessories: Facebook Marketplace

4. Complete microtasks

Microtasks are small projects that virtually anyone with an internet connection can perform. Think of tasks like tagging photos or videos for machine learning, transcribing audio, moderating content, data entry, etc. Companies that pay for microtask work tend not to pay very much since the work is fairly simple, but if you are looking for a way to pass the time and earn a few extra bucks, it can be worth it.

Suggested sites for finding microtask-related gigs:

• Amazon Mechanical Turk (“human intelligence tasks”)
• Clickworker (app testing, copy editing, and more)
• InboxDollars (market research)

5. Take paid surveys

We spend a lot of our downtime looking at our phones. Instead of mindless scrolling, consider adding a better “mindless” task: taking paid surveys. Nobody is going to get rich taking surveys, but there is certainly an opportunity to make $5 to $20 a month or more by answering questions about products relevant to your interests.

And in case you are wondering how this actually works, the money that is paid out from these surveys typically comes from a company that is doing market research to better understand consumers. A toothpaste company asking about brushing habits, a streaming service asking about what kind of shows you like, etc.

Our managing editor, Megan, made $7.41 with the popular survey site - Final Thoughts

The bottom line: a little research on legit ways make money goes a long way. Compare your options, watch for seasonal offers, and never pay full price when a better deal is one click away.

Originally published at dollarsprout.com.