50 Easy Side Hustle Ideas for 2025 (Ranked by Effort)

The new way to make extra money this year — even if you’re not very enterprising, don’t get a loan, and don’t have the skills or time (even for a weekend job!)

I don’t care if you need to pay off your debt, save for a vacation or want to escape the 9–5, getting started with a side hustle can change your life.

But not all side hustles are created equal — some are super easy and require hardly any work, while others are going to take time and consistency on your part.

In this post, I’ve ranked 50 side hustle ideas by how much work it takes to get started — so you can see what might work best with your lifestyle in 2025.

Lazy (Get Started Today Without Any Special Skills or Money)

These need almost no setup and you can start today.

1. Paid Online Surveys – Companies reward you for your opinions. Visit sites such as Swagbucks, InboxDollars or Survey Junkie. You can expect to make $1-5 per survey. Great for multitasking.
2.  Cashback Apps – Utilize Rebate apps like Rakuten, Ibotta, and Upside and get money back when making everyday purchases. Connect your cards or snap receipts for automatic savings. 
3. Getting Paid for Walking — Apps such as Sweatcoin and StepBet reward you for keeping active. Earn points for walking and redeem for gift cards or PayPal rewards. 
4. Get Paid to Play Mobile Games – You can even earn gift cards for playing games on your phone by using Mistplay. Scanning Grocery Receipts – Fetch Rewards, 
5. Receipt Hog, and other apps reward you with points or other types of credit when you upload your receipts from shopping trips. Quick and passive.
6.  Browser Extensions That Pay You – Download services like Capital One Shopping or Honey to receive coupons and cash-back and autopilot your purchases.
7.  Referral Bonuses — A lot of apps reward you to bring in friends. Share your referral links on your social media accounts and blogs to get passive bonuses. 
8. Flipping Free Facebook Marketplace Finds – You find “free” items, grab them, and flip them for cash. Ideal for furniture, electronics and home goods.
9. Sell Your Old Clothes Online – Sell clothes that you no longer wear on Poshmark, Mercari, or Depop. Clear clutter and earn cash. 
10. Dog Walking on Rover or Wag –Do you love pets? Signup and get matched local pet owners. Flexible hours, easy cash.

Medium There’s work involved in setting this all up but it’s a great payoff.

These require a bit more start-up time — but the upside is orders of magnitude larger.

11. Selling Digital Downloads on Etsy – Graphic templates, planners, or journals can be sold on Etsy. Use free tools like Canva. “The one-time work, the one-time effort, and the ongoing income. 
12. Selling Print-on-Demand Fabrics – Upload designs to Printful or Redbubble. No inventory necessary — they do the printing and shipping.
13. Freelance Writing on Fiverr or Upwork – Provide your services as a blog writer, write email copy, or write website content. Start a portfolio and increase your prices as time goes on. 
14. Providing Virtual Assistants Service – Assist business owners with answering emails, scheduling or using social media. There’s a lot to be said for remote, flexible and in demand. 
15. Begin a Budgeting Instagram Page – Post budgeting advice, post updates on your own finances and build a following in the budgeting niche. Monetize with brand partnerships and digital products. 
16. Delivering Food with DoorDash or UberEats – Get fast cash in your spare time. You can make $15–25/hour during peak hours.
17. Get Paid User Testing Websites – Get paid to test websites and apps for usability with UserTesting, TryMyUI, or Respondent. io. Pays $10–20 per test. 
18. Creating and Selling Notion Templates – Notion is exploding. Create helpful templates and offer them for sale on Gumroad or Etsy.
19. Selling Filpped Items on Ebay -Buy unique items from thrift stores and list them for sale. Search for vintage, name-brand or trending items.
20.  Flipping Clearance Store Items (Retail Arbitrage) – You can use Amazon Seller apps to scan clearance deals and then sell them for profit.
21. Teach English Online – Websites such as Cambly and Preply gives you the opportunity to teach English to foreign students. No teaching degree required.
22. Pinterest Virtual Assistant for Small Businesses – Assist business owners in generating traffic with pin creation and schedule. Sell at $300+/client/month.
23. Editing YouTube Videos or TikToks – The demand for video is INSANE. Provide editing services on Fiverr or pitch creators directly. 
24. Starting a Faceless YouTube Channel – Content creation with stock videos, voiceovers, AI tools. Monetize with ads.
25. Selling Canva Templates for Bloggers or Coaches – Create versatile templates to sell on Creative Market, or your website.

High Effort (High-Pay, Long-Term Employment)

These are actual businesses that can scale to a few thousand/month — but require patience.

26. Creating a Niche Blog (such as this one!) – Choose a niche, create amazing posts using SEO to generate and monetize with ads and affiliates. 
27. Publish eBooks or Printables on Amazon KDP – Write short, useful books or printables and get paid a passive royalty on Amazon.
28. SEO content+ AFFILIATE MARKETING – Write content targeting a keyword with high intent and link to affiliate related offers. Amazing potential for passive income. 
29. Online Course – Teach Other via websites such as Teachable or Gumroad. Can scale massively.
30. Website Flipping or Domaining – Purchase an already existing website or domain, fix it up and sell it for a profit.
31.  Dropshipping with Shopify – Create a store that sells products from suppliers. Concentrate on the marketing and customer service.
32. Managing Airbnb Rentals (even only through Co-Hosting!) — Don’t own property? Be a co-host for someone else’s and make a piece of the earnings.
33.  How to Start a Freelance Business – Brian Downard details the way he made $13,000 from his new freelancing business.
34. How to Start An Etsy Shop for Custom Digital Art – Sell made to order portraits, pet art, digital drawings.
35.  Instagram Reels/UGC Brand Collabs – Collaborate with a brand to create content on the platform. No huge audience required.
36. Online Coaching or Consulting – Help others succeed in an area of achievement of your own. You can charge premium prices.
37. Stock Photography Sales – Upload photos to Shutterstock or Unsplash+ and sell it to make a royalties.
38. Podcasting with Ads and Sponsorships – Build a niche listenership and make money with sponsorships.
39.  Mobile App or Tool – If you’re tech-oriented, create a cool app or a useful chrome extension and sell or monetize.
40.  Investing Online (in platforms like real estate investing if you choose Fundrise) – Passive income over the long run. Not fast, but builds wealth.
41. Faceless TikTok Monetization Channels – How to grow without revealing your face! – Leverage trends + sound overlays to get famous without showing your face.
42.  Local Service-Based Gigs (cleaning, organizing) – Begin a business that costs little to open and that you can charge by the hour.
43. Teaching Skills on Skillshare or Udemy – Make video shorts of your class, and continue to make money monthly. 
44. Running Paid Webinars – Provide live courses or workshops and charge for the attendance.
45. Run a Paid Newsletter – Provide behind-the-scenes content in exchange for a subscription. Great for niche audiences.

Bonus – Passive Income Side Hustles

They take work upfront, but can pay you passively for months (or years)

46. How To Write Evergreen Blog Posts – A long piece of content that ranks in Google can get you ad revenue for years.
47. Uploading Audiobooks to Audible – Record and publish your books to earn money and royalties.
48.  Etsy Bots – Auto deliver digital products and passively market with your own Etsy Shop.
49. Make AI Generated Digital Products – Use AI to create and sell planners, journals, templates. 
50. Dividend Stocks: Getting paid for becoming an investor.

There’s no one “right” side hustle — it all depends on how much time and energy you have and how much money you want to make. Need something fast and customizable? Start with surveys or apps. Looking to create something that lasts? Start a blog, or selling a digital product. It doesn’t matter what, just start — even that $100/month amount can snowball into a life-changing amount.