As we enter the new year, it feels as though the world is changing at an accelerating pace. Artificial intelligence is set to continue transforming the workplace, cryptocurrencies have been buoyed by the election of Donald Trump as president, and the geopolitical chess game continues on.
While there is a lot of uncertainty, there is also a clear upside for those of an independent frame of mind: it truly has never been easier to make money online.
Below, we look at some of the simplest ways to immediately start making significant money from your computer at home.
1. Investing
Perhaps the fastest way to make money online is to invest or trade your existing assets wisely.
Of course, this carries the unavoidable risk of losing a lot of money as well. And it is something of a law in finance that the most potentially profitable trades – whether you are betting on stocks, FX, or crypto – are the riskiest.
The tricky question is what exactly to invest in next year. Many fortunes have been lost, as well as made, by people trying to predict the market.
As the Goode Money Guide’s expert financial analyst Jackson Wong has noted recently, the boom in tech and artificial intelligence-focused US companies has delivered spectacular returns over the last two years. While this bull run cannot continue forever, in general, it is very risky for investors to bet against such enthusiasm, whether it is rational or not.
Yet, Wong also noted, “Risk discipline must be respected, as the risk-reward in 2025 will be vastly different from that in 2023.” Traders may be interested in looking at the emerging opportunities in less expensive areas, such as emerging markets, the UK, and more cyclical mining and commodity stocks.
While we at the Good Money Guide have doubts about the long-term utility of bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies, crypto markets have also undeniably delivered bumper returns recently. Yet readers should also bear in mind that by some estimates 90% of those who dabble in trading crypto lose money.
Those interested in buying crypto regardless can check our guides on how to do so safely here, but readers should bear in mind the immense volatility and high risk of losses facing these assets.
One of the most popular ai stocks for investing at the moment is Nvidia, you can see it’s share price performance below:
- Find out more about the NVIDIA share price here
2. Freelancing
Freelancing has historically been the main way people earn money from home, and as such, it has been given something of a boost by the shift to digitized post-Covid working patterns.
Readers may have some trepidation about venturing into freelancing – but if you have even the most basic skill that can be performed with a computer, whether that be just speaking or typing, there are numerous freelance opportunities out there.
There are a number of platforms that allow you to sell your expertise online on a freelance basis, but perhaps the most widely used – and the easiest to get started with – is Upwork. This site allows users to quickly build a profile and then bid for jobs, which range from basic entry-level tasks to highly paid projects requiring significant relevant experience. Users are able to tailor their searches for the types of jobs that best suit them.
Fiverr is another well-known freelancing site that provides a similar platform from the other side of the fence: instead of clients advertising jobs to freelancers, freelancers advertise their skills to clients.
Many freelance jobs are also advertised widely on job boards such as Indeed.com as well as those on the business social network LinkedIn. Even landing one such job can be the start of a mutually beneficial long-running collaboration.
3. Interest on savings
While interest rates began to fall last year, they remain at a far higher level than the decade following the 2008 global financial crisis, when they were slashed to support the world economy.
This means savers are able to earn a decent return on their cash — considerably above inflation — with very little risk. A number of brokerage platforms offer significant interest on savings, either through special accounts, money market funds or simply on uninvested cash held in any of their accounts.
Depending on which firm you park you money with, interest rates on cash range all the way from 1-2% all the way up to 5% or more. You can check out our full list of rates provided by different platforms here.
4. Creating video content
Making money from video content online has become a real possibility for most people.
A host of digital platforms now pay people to share their ideas, expertise, or work online for money. Some of these, such as YouTube, are well-known and long-established. Others, such as Facebook and TikTok, have recently developed new ways for creators to earn money. Each platform targets a different audience and offers different incentives for content creators.
The important thing to keep in mind for beginners reading this is that it is quicker and easier to start earning considerable amounts of money than they may realise.
For example, monetized YouTubers earn around $0.018 per ad view, which amounts to about $18 for every 1,000 ad views. To be monetized, they must attract 1,000 subscribers and have 4,000 hours of watch time or 10 million views of public shorts videos.
That may seem like a lot, but given YouTube has more than 2.5 billion active users, it is actually quite a low bar to pass if you can find an appealing niche.
5. Training artificial intelligence (AI)
In the last few years, a host of companies have popped up offering reasonable sums of money to people who can help them train artificial intelligences (AIs).
These include the likes of Outlier AI, Mindrift, and Telus Digital, which host AI training tasks for users to complete. They typically set their standard pay at around $20 (£16) per hour, though users may be able to earn more than this depending on how quickly they can complete tasks.
These platforms all have some sort of basic screening process, generally involving online exams that test reading comprehension and the ability to follow their guidelines. Beyond this, they are generally hands-off, leaving users to complete tasks at times of their own choosing.
6. Open an online shop
In recent years, a wave of digital platforms has come to the fore that makes it possible for people to open their own shops and sell whatever they want online in just a few clicks.
Perhaps the best known of these is digital marketplace Etsy, which now hosts around nine million sellers and provides access to almost 100 million buyers. Other such platforms include Shopify, which is different in that it facilitates users developing their own shopping website, rather than providing an online marketplace.
Setting up shop may seem daunting for beginners, but these platforms make it much easier to get started, and there is a niche for almost anything: from digital diaries and planners to ceramics to jewellery.
Depending on local laws and the rules of specific platforms, users can pursue a dropshipping strategy – meaning they can even sell products that they may not hold in their inventory.
7. Set up a digital newsletter
The rise of subscription newsletter platforms such as Substack has made it much easier for those who have in-demand views or expertise to make enough money to support themselves through writing.
Substack, for example, allows writers to publish for free and set their own subscription pricing for their content.
There are many different strategies you can pursue here, from offering insights derived from professional experience, to journalistic reporting, or even just aggregating and curating information.
If you have significant experience in a specific industry – or even if you’re just a quick learner – it could be well worth your while financially to share your knowledge through a regular newsletter.
8. Write e-books
There is an almost unlimited amount of information available on the internet, but most of it is of poor quality.
Partly for this reason, the market for e-books – which can be a way to condense higher-quality information into an accessible format – continues to grow, and by most estimates now sits at more than $20 billion. Platforms such as Amazon’s Kindle Direct Publishing allow almost anyone to have a go at writing and publishing their own books and make money from sales.
If you have some sector-specific knowledge, or are a good researcher, writing a decent e-book about a subject people are interested in could be a way to supplement your income. And, who knows, if you are really good, you might even be able to make a living from doing so.
9. Become an online tutor
Another easy way to earn money online is through online tutoring, either through one of the many digital platforms out there, such as tutorful, or simply through advertising your own availability through a website, forums and job boards.
If you have some expertise in a specific area – say business, or music, or data analysis – then you should find plenty of eager minds out there looking for support with their studies.
And even if your only skill is being able to speak English, you may find that is also in demand online. There is a whole host of English language teaching platforms set up specifically to cater to this huge market.
10. Paid research and surveys
Sure, you probably won’t get rich from this, but if you want to earn a little money on the side, you can try filling out paid digital surveys and other research.
There are now websites offering the opportunity to be paid to take part in market research. One of these, researchopinions, currently offers projects paying up to £40 an hour or more.
There are also apps, such as Qmee, which aggregate digital surveys and pay for each successfully completed survey, ranging from a few pence to a few pounds.
Robin has more than six years of experience as a financial journalist, most of which were spent at Citywire, and covers the latest developments in the investing, trading and currency transfer space. Outside of work, he enjoys reading literature and philosophy and playing the piano.
You can contact Robin at robin@goodmoneyguide.com
