14 Best Jobs to Work Online and Get Paid Instantly

The holy grail of making extra income is being able to work online and get paid instantly. Who doesn’t want flexibility and fast cash!?

But here’s the thing about articles like this — most of them are just lists of survey sites. And yes, you can work online and get paid instantly with surveys, but you’re only making a dollar or two per hour. 

We can do that better than that.

This list has survey sites, but you're also going to get some of the best side hustles that pay quickly — at least weekly.

So if you want to work online and get paid instantly, I’m going to make it easy and separate this list into two sections:

Don’t you love choices?

Here's how to work online and get paid instantly

Get paid in 72 hours or less

These first options are for easy ways to make extremely fast cash. They may not be the most lucrative options, but they're ideal if you're looking to make a few extra bucks with minimal work.

1. Survey Junkie

Survey Junkie is one of the most well-known and reputable survey sites online. It's 100% free to sign up for and use, and you can start getting paid to take surveys in about 5 minutes or less.

You earn points for each survey you complete, and 100 points = $1 on Survey Junkie. You can request a payout once you've earned 500 points. Survey Junkie used to require users reach 1,000 points, but lowering the cash out threshold to 500 points means you can practically get paid every day you take surveys.

The points you earn on Survey Junkie can be cashed out for PayPal cash, bank transfer, or gift card to major U.S. retailers.

2. Branded Surveys

What we love about Branded Surveys is that it has one of the fastest payment processing times — just 1-2 business days! Plus, the minimum cashout amount is only $5, which means you can pretty much work online and get paid instantly.

Branded Surveys is like the rest of the survey sites on this list in that you're not making serious cash, but it's very easy work. You're getting paid to answer short surveys about different products and services.

You're paid in points that convert to PayPal cash, gift cards, or bank transfer, and the average survey pays $0.50 to $3. In theory, you could take two surveys and cash out immediately.

3. Opinion Outpost

Like all of the survey sites on this list, you are helping companies with valuable market research. The survey companies match you with surveys, and the majority of them take only a few minutes to answer. 

Through Opinion Outpost, you’ll take surveys for electronics, medicine, sports, politics, advertisements, appliances, food, and more. It’s mindless work, but take the time to answer honestly.

You earn points for each survey you complete, and each point is worth $0.10 with a minimum cashout of $10. Opinion Outpost also enters you into a prize drawing for every survey you finish.

4. Pinecone Research

Pinecone Research is an online survey site that pays you in points for taking surveys. You can redeem your points for special offers through Pinecone, or you can cash them out to PayPal. Pinecone says it can take up to five days to receive your funds, but I always received my funds in just a couple of days.

Yep, I made money with Pinecone Research when I was paying off my student loans, and my experience was really positive.

5. Offer Nation

Offer Nation is a GPT site, which stands for “get paid to.” Signing up for Offer Nation takes a minute or two, and you are paid in a few hours of completing tasks. You can cash out at a minimum of $1. 

There are no fees to work online and get paid through Offer Nation — you should never sign up for companies that ask you to pay for access to surveys. 

6. Amazon MTurk

Amazon Mechanical Turk, or MTurk, isn’t a survey site. You’re getting paid to do short tasks online that have to be done by a human. Some of the tasks you might get paid for are:

• Identifying objects in a photo or video
• Performing data re-duplication 
• Transcribing audio recordings
• Researching data details

The way you work on Amazon MTurk is by setting up a free account, browsing through a list of online tasks called HITs (Human Intelligence Tasks), and submitting your work.

Once your work is approved, you can immediately transfer your earnings to a U.S. bank account or receive them in your Amazon account in the form of a gift card.  

7. Ibotta

Ibotta is an incredibly popular cashback site where you earn cash by shopping online and in stores for things like groceries, clothes, home goods, travel, and more. Ibotta has already paid out over $500,000,000 to users!

What you’ll love about Ibotta is that it pays cash, not points.

Here’s how you can work online and get paid instantly with Ibotta:

• Earn in-store by adding offers to your Ibotta account and upload a photo of your receipt. You are paid in cash within 24 hours.
• Link loyalty accounts at participating retailers so you don’t have to photograph your receipts.
• Shop through the Ibotta app to make cash when you make an eligible purchase.

Ibotta works with over 300 different retailers, and they recommend checking the app as often as possible because they regularly add new offers.

8. Mindswarms

Mindswarms is an online market research platform that pays you to you record one-minute long video responses to short surveys. All of this happens through the Mindswarms apps, and you earn $10-$50 per survey.

You’ll need to fill out a short application before you are approved for a survey, but Mindswarms will only send you applications if they match your basic information (like age, gender, and region). Surveys are on a first-come, first-served basis, so they recommend applying for as many studies as possible to increase your opportunities to work online and get paid instantly.

Speaking of getting paid, Mindswarms sends out your payment via PayPal within 24 hours of taking the survey. 

Work online and get paid every week

If you’re up for making even more cash and are willing to wait just a little bit longer, this section is for you. You can earn $1,000/month or more with at least one of these ideas!

9. Facebook ads for small businesses

Running Facebook ads for small businesses is when you create, run, test, and manage ad campaigns on Facebook. It’s digital marketing on the world’s largest social media platform. And it’s my favorite way to make money online… next to blogging, of course.

The reason I love it so much is because in just a few hours a week, you can make an extra $1,000-$1,500/month per client. 

Running Facebook ads is how I supplemented my income after quitting my teaching job to run this site full-time. After landing a few clients, I was out-earning what I made as a teacher. After realizing I could teach others to do the same thing, I teamed up with my good friend Mike Yanda (lawyer turned ads guru who earns $30k/month with Facebook ads) to create the Facebook Side Hustle Course.

Now, I never thought I would put this side hustle in a list of ways to work online and get paid instantly, but let me tell you a story…

A few months ago, someone in my Millennial Money Facebook Group was asking about the course. They wanted to hear from other students before joining. Comments rolled in from happy students, and then the wildest thing happened — someone in the group hired the original commenter to run ads for their business.

Before this person even took the course, they had a paying customer waiting for them.

These ARE NOT typical results, so don’t think this is a get-rich-quick scheme. But if you are interested in earning an extra $1,000-$1,500/month or more, it’s worth learning more about.

10. Virtual assistant

Virtual assistants (or VAs) work online and get paid to help business owners with behind-the-scenes work that doesn't have to be completed by the business owners. These include tasks like:

• Email inbox management
• Social media management
• Publishing blog posts
• Assembling reports
• Bookkeeping
• Scheduling appointments

VAs are vital to running a business — I couldn't run my business without my VA! You can work online and get paid daily or weekly depending on the arrangement you have with your client. The average virtual assistant makes $500/month per client, and you can work for multiple clients at a time.

This is some of the best online work if you have experience in executive assistance, HR, customer service, or project management.

11. Proofreading

Proofreaders correct punctuation, grammar, and spelling errors in written content, and they can be a massive help to professionals who don't feel confident in their own proofreading skills. Proofreading is a very flexible online job if you're detail-oriented and good at spotting errors.

You can work online and get paid daily, weekly, or with whatever arrangement you have with your clients. Pay ranges from $15 to $30/hour depending on your experience.

12. Bookkeeping

Freelance bookkeepers help business owners record and manage daily financial transactions. This can include paying bills, managing payroll, and collecting payments. Bookkeeping is not the same thing as accounting, and that difference is why you can start bookkeeping online without a degree or certification.

Bookkeepers need to be familiar with popular financial software like Quickbooks and know how to read and create balance sheets. Pay is around $15-$20/hour, and you can work online and get paid daily or weekly.

13. Freelance writer

Freelance writers are responsible for writing a lot of the content you see online these days, from web copy, blog posts, advertising copy, and more. What's great about this gig is that you don't necessarily need a background in writing or a degree in journalism or English. It takes solid communication skills and a natural ability to write well.

The way you work online for clients is that they give you an assignment and you get paid as soon as you complete the work. Some clients even offer long-term freelance contracts and will even pay up front for a portion of the work.

Freelance writers can realistically expect to $1,000 or more a month. It can take a little time to build up your client base, but you can begin finding clients on freelance platforms like Fiverr or Upwork and start today.

14. Sell digital printables on Etsy

This is a really cool way to work online and get paid instantly because it can become a fairly passive way to get paid. Hear me out...

Digital printables are files you create and sell on Etsy for items like planner pages, wall art, invitations, party decorations, and so on. It takes some graphic design skills, but many people use Canva, which is very user-friendly graphic design software.

Because these are digital files, you can sell them virtually indefinitely with minimal work. You still need to drive traffic to your Etsy shop, but there's no need to manufacture, store, or ship physical products. New Etsy sellers (when your shop is less than 90 days old) get paid 3 business days after they make a sale, and after that 90-day period, you get next day payments.

Learn what kinds of products sell best throughout the year with this free Seasonal Products ebook. It outlines printable ideas for each month of the year and how you can capitalize on them.

The final word on how to work online and get paid instantly

Technology has made it so much easier for you to work when and where you want and get paid as quickly as possible. There are over a dozen ideas on this list, but my top picks are:

• Taking online surveys: While you're not going to get rich taking online surveys, it's easy and you can start today! I recommend starting with Branded Surveys and Survey Junkie.
• Run Facebook ads for small businesses: You can make $1,000 to $1,500/month per client running Facebook ads. Learn how to get started with the Facebook Side Hustle Course. One of the best parts is that it takes 3-5 hours per week once you have your client's ad system set up.