Alright folks, here is my ultimate list of free ways to earn crypto currencies. I have tried all of these (and many more which don’t really work), so this list is battle-tested.
For each method I will explain what you need to do, how much time it takes and whether it’s worth it or not. And remember, not your keys, not your coins!
Earn Crypto by Learning About it
This is my favourite way to earning cryptocurrencies for free, because it helps newcomers understand what blockchain is by learning about different blockchain projects. Now isn’t that cool?
All you need to do is sign up to Coinbase (the most trusted crypto exchange), Coinmarketcap or OkeX exchange and go to the Earn section of the website, where you watch educational videos about crypto projects and after that receive a bit of their tokens in your crypto wallet.
Coinbase can earn you the most, especially if there are currently a few Crypto projects which are promoting their idea on Coinbase Earn.
How much can you earn?
With Coinbase, for example, your initial earnings would vary somewhere between $20 to $50 and if you HODL, that amount can increase. If you want to exchange your earned coins or want to sell them, you can send them to Coinbase Pro for free and exchange them at much, much lower fees.
Create and Publish Content
That’s an awesome way to earn cryptocurrencies. There are a few major platforms that pay in crypto, such as:
Publish0x
Publish0x is a crypto-agnostic platform through which content publishers AND their readers can earn crypto by supporting each other with tips.
Here is a guide on how to create a blog and post your content on Publish0x.
LBRY and its Odysee video sharing platform
This is another content publishing platform which has stood the test of time. It is used by more than 100,000 people and is similar to Youtube. You earn by posting great content and receiving appraisal from other readers.
Another platform worth mentioning is Steemit, although I believe Steemit had it’s time and is less and less popular.
What you need to know?
Like any social media platform, your success would depend on how good your content is, have in mind those platforms often have strong base of readers who like crypto, so that is a topic you can focus on.
How much can you earn publishing content?
That would depend on your content quality and how often you publish. From a few cents per post to a few hundred dollars, the range is vastly dependant on your consistency and quality. Good luck!
Earn by Benefitting from Hard Forks
What is a Hard Fork?
A hard fork is when the blockchain of a crypto currency is ‘a radical change to the protocol of a blockchain network that effectively results in two branches’.
Examples of hard forks in Bitcoin for example, are the BCH (Bitcoin Cash) and SV (Bitcoin Satoshi Vision) which are separate blockchains derived from Bitcoin. When such a hard fork is made, the owners of the original blockchain, in this case Bitcoin, are given the same amount of coins in the newly ‘forked’ currency.
The reason I am giving this method a low score is because it is both a rare event and also might backfire.
What you need to do?
Yes, you guessed it, that means if you had Bitcoin when BCH was created, you will have equal amount of Bitcoin and BitcoinCash at your disposal.
What you need to know?
Many have decided to sell the hardforked crypto currencies for a quick profit. While that may be a great way to get some free cryptos, it requires patience as well as an initial investment.
How much can you earn from a Hard Fork?
That would depend on how much coins of the original blockchain you hold and how successful is the new project.
Earn Crypto Coins with Airdrops
What are Airdrops?
Airdroping a new crypto currency is a marketing tool that various crypto projects use to promote awareness for their project.
They send a small amount of their coin to the wallets of those who have signed up for the Airdrop.
What you need to do?
Usually you have to sign up with an email, or follow/share the twitter account of the project. As there are lots of new Airdrops popping left and right, I recommend these two websites to find all new airdrops Airdropalert.com and Airdrop.io where you can keep track of any new airdrops.
What you need to know?
Most of the time, the amount you get from Airdrops isn’t worth much, but on rare occasions such as Uniswap’s airdrop, where if you have traded on Uniswap before 1st September 2020, you get 400 UNI tokens, which now cost a loooot of money.
As most methods that earn you crypto currencies for free, your exchange the time you spend on finding airdrops and doing what’s required of you (such as registering at their website or using their platform) in order to get some of their coins in the end.
Moreover, there are lots of websites for airdrops as well as scammy projects which simply want your personal information, so beware!
How much can you earn with Crypto faucets?
As I mentioned before, you can earn a lot if you join the right Airdrop at the right time, such as Uniswap’s 400 UNI airdrop, which now is worth around $10000.
However, most of the time your airdropped coins will be worth a few cents or dollars, but as it doesn’t require much work, it is still worth the try in my opinion.
How to Earn Cryptocurrencies by Playing Games
There are endless amount of games that you can play which can give you crypto currencies as a reward. But let me be clear, this method is a lot of fun, but won’t give you any big profits. Don’t expect to become the next Elon Musk by relying on the profits of these games.
CryptoPop – a fun puzzle app
Up for some Tetris or puzzle solving, this is the most famous mobile game for crypto.
Play Quake 3 on Your Browser
Now this one is a dream, playing a legendary FPS without even having to install it, and on top of that, earn some crypto? Sign me up! Here’s the website.
Fan of PokemonGo? Here is One for You
WeNano – a mobile application where you can capture spots near you which earn you 0,1 Nano on average.
Walk to earn – Sweatcoin
Yep, that exists. An app that pays you in crypto when you walk. It doesn’t give much (1 sweat coin per 1000 steps, which is around $0.05) but it’s something, right?
Get a Salary in Cryptocurrencies or do Gigs and Freelancing
Earning crypto currencies
Most of the jobs that pay in crypto currency are in blockchain projects. Check this blockchain jobs website if you’re interested: Cryptojobslist.com Apart from blockchain jobs, you can do freelancing and gigs in exchange for crypto, here is a long list of websites which pay in crypto, as well as many standard freelancing websites are listed as well.
What you need to do?
Well, anything, really. From programming on blockchain to doing gigs, to simply doing any job and then buying crypto with it.
How much can you earn getting paid in crypto.
As much as getting paid in fiat currencies, however, if you HODL your salary, its value will change often, as crypto is a volatile sector.
Overall, I give this method a score of 75 as it requires the same effort as doing any job.
Sell your Art with the help of Non Fungible Tokens
What is an NFT?
A Non Fungible Token is a blockchain product which is unique and the originality of any information added to it, such as digital art, music, videos etc can be proven as it is forever added on the blockchain.
What you need to do?
There are a few major websites where you can upload your digital art, add a price, description, any physical bonus gift such as a print, a brochure or anything that comes to mind.
For now, the most famous marketplaces for uploading your art are Opensea and Rarible. What you need to upload art there is create a Metamask wallet and connect it to these marketplaces.
What you need to know?
The NFT is currently on the rise and is becoming very popular and lucrative for artists. It is used by Lindsay Lohan, Mark Cuban as well as Elon Musk creating some NFTs.
Moreover, the most famous NFT collectible cards are the NBA top shots, which release new ones only occasionally, with some rare and legendary cards getting sold for hundreds of thousands of dollars. So if you’re into collecting or simply want to try your luck by buying and selling for profit, now is a good time.
One last thing, as most of these NFT marketplaces are based on Ethereum platform, when you create an NFT art, you’ll need to pay the gas fees to upload it on the blockchain, which depending on how busy it is, it might cost up to $20-$30 to upload a piece of NFT art.
How much can you earn with Crypto faucets?
The possibilities are endless, especially if you are a good artist or are able to find trendy theme to create art for. Collectible cards, crypto-themed memes are popular right now.
Use the Brave Browser and earn BAT token
What is the Brave Browser
What you need to do?
Install the Brave browser for your desktop or mobile and use it, when you view ads, you get BAT token, which you can withdraw and exchange to any other crypto currency.
How much can you earn with Brave Browser?
That would depend on your location and how often you use it, I earn around $10-$15 dollars per month with moderate use.
Earn Interest through Staking and Yield Farming
Before we begin
What are Staking and Yield Farming?
Staking is the process of holding a cryptocurrency in a wallet which helps the operation of the blockchain platform of the coin.
Yield farming can shortly be explained by locking cryptocurrencies for certain amount of time on order to earn rewards (more of those or other cryptocurrencies).
What you need to do?
Staking and Yield farming consists of holding a crypto currency on an exchange, a platform or on a hardware wallet and choosing a certain financial service they offer, such as staking or yield farming.
Some websites offer flexible farming, where you can withdraw your funds instantly or in the next 24 hours, where others provide higher % interest, yet in order to receive that interest, you have to keep your crypto locked.
What you need to know?
This method is very similar to placing your money in a savings account, where you earn interest. The reason people choose it above placing their money in a bank are the much higher interest rates you earn in the crypto sector.
One thing to always remember is ‘not your keys, not your coins’ maxima, which means that in case of an exchange being hacked, going bankrupt or other negative event, you might lose your coins. That goes for any online service where your private keys are not exclusively owned by you.
That means that although some websites offer higher % interest, they are slightly less secure than hardware wallets. For example, Binance, the biggest exchange in the world, has been hacked before, and although they have paid their customer’s losses from their own pocket, the hacks have happened nonetheless.
How much can you earn from Staking and Yield Farming?
Earnings vary, depending on the type of staking you choose and the exchange/platform.
For example, you can earn an average of 6 to 15% on stable coins, which are cryptocurrencies which have the same value as the dollar. Earning interest on native coins such as Ethereum or Bitcoin or Cardano varies greatly, from values under 1% to values above 100% per anum.
Here are a few examples of the most famous and profitable platforms and exchanges:
- Ethereum 2.0 staking with 3-7.5% yield
- Blockfi – earn 6% on BTC and 8.6% on USDC
- Cardano staking – 4 to 5% per year
- KuCoin exchange with lots of staking and crypto lending possibilities such as 12% DOT APY, 12.8% USDC APY and more
- Binance – the largest exchange in the world, with lots of earning options such as flexible and locked staking as well as liquid pool farming
- Nexo – one of the highest lending and APY staking percentages
- Celsius Network – wide range of staking and yield farming options
How to Earn Crypto with Crypto Faucets
What are Crypto Faucets?
A crypto faucet is usually a website or a mobile application where you are required to complete micro tasks in exchange for small amounts of crypto currencies. Crypto faucets are not a get rich quick schemes, and that’s the reason they’re called faucets – you get small ‘drops’ of crypto consistently.
What you need to do?
The micro tasks consist of viewing ads, completing captchas, completing quizzes and watching videos.
It is not much, but it’s honest work. If you have nothing better to do and want to kill some time, crypto faucets are a nice way to earn some for free in exchange for your time. The crypto faucet I’ve tried is called BtcSpinner.io, although there are endless crypto faucets.
What you need to know?
Be aware of clicking links or giving away any of your personal details. Also, research each crypto asset beforehand by finding out if other people have used it and what is the minimum withdrawal limit.
How much can you earn with Crypto faucets?
In my experience, you can earn from as little as 5 dollars a week to up to 150-300 dollars, depending on how well you automate your process and how much time you have on your hands.
Other Methods Worth Mentioning
Bitfortip
Shop online and receive crypto bonuses with Lolli
You can shop from more than 1000+ online brands such as Nike, Adidas, Booking.com, Microsoft, eBay, Hilton etc an earn up to 30% in bitcoin rewards.
Methods to Stay Away From!
Gambling
Cloud and Mobile Mining
If you know about crypto currencies and bitcoin, you surely know the vast quantities of processing power needed to mine cryptocurrencies. So let’s ask ourselves a few questions:
1. Why would a company lend you their mining rigs and software instead of keeping all earnings to themselves.
2. How much cryptocurrency can a smartphone or a tablet mine compared to a mining rig which was designed for optimal mining?
It is simple, there is no free lunch, and renting mining gear over the internet or using your phone to mine are simply unrealistic.
Other