Secret Websites to Make Money Online: Hidden Gems Revealed

Did you know there are secret ways to make money online for free?

We’re not talking about shady scams, but legitimate ways to earn extra cash without investment or hassle. And they’re typically low-key and not broadly advertised!

Here, we’ve rounded up the best hidden cash boosters. So if you’re looking for secret websites that help you make money, let’s go!

Why Look for “Secret” Money-Making Websites?

The best income opportunities are hidden. Smart people look for secret ways to make money online.

Let’s face it. The internet is a saturated, competitive place filled with side hustlers. Mainstream sites publicize their offers widely, and everyone piles in, diluting opportunities.

Consider freelancer websites. Once, it was easy to make a few bucks with quick jobs. Today, portals are saturated with global gig workers who charge lower rates.

So get smart about cash-boosting opportunities, and find the newest secret websites to make money. These offer:

• Better opportunities
• Less competition
• Interesting and innovative ways to earn, ahead of the curve.
• A chance to have fun.

Let’s look at some of the best secret ways to make money online.

Top “Secret” Websites to Make Money Online

1. Participate in market research

Market research opportunities are well paid, often at $35-$150 per hour. Longer ‘diary style’ projects pay around $200 for a week. But few people know they exist, let alone apply for them!

Companies pay members of the public to give feedback and ideas on new products and services or potential market opportunities.

Most market research requires no prior experience, and it’s quick and easy to get started.

Note: B2B market research opportunities seek professionals for expert studies and pay more for qualified insights. $200 per hour is not unusual - look at Wynter for professional B2B market research studies.

Market research takes the form of:

• Diary studies
• 121 discussions (either in-person or remotely)
• Group workshops or focus groups
• In-person shopping visits.

Despite lucrative earning opportunities, agencies struggle to find participants. So, for some of the best secret websites to make money, sign up to platforms such as:

1. Respondent.io
2. FocusGroup.com
3. Toluna
4. Pinecone Research
5. Research Opinions
6. Saros
7. Take Part in Research.

Top tips for success:

• Complete your profile accurately
• Check and apply regularly for new opportunities, as sites don’t always push new study notifications.
• Be honest when applying for opportunities.
• Be on time and participate fully to build your reviewer scores.

2. Sell your photos

Got a good eye for visuals and slick camera skills? Monetize them with photo sites such as Foap, Snapwire, or Shutterstock.

Foap and Shutterstock let users upload photos to make between $5-$1 via a platform revenue share model. Foap also holds competitions for specific photographic content and categories, boosting revenue earnings.

If you’re a good mobile photographer, it’s a great way to monetize your work quickly and for free.

3. Earn with fun tasks and games

Check out sites such as Scrambly, Skillz, Mistplay, Swagbucks, and InboxDollars for fun games, quizzes, advert reviews, and tasks that earn you easy cash, of $100+ a month.

This category of secret websites to make money online is constantly expanding, with new and innovative ways to earn money.

Some of these apps offer multiple secret ways to make money for free. For example, at Scrambly, you can also test apps.

Here are some examples:

Top tips for success:

• Download tasking apps to participate in tasks for cash while you make coffee or line up to pay for groceries.
• Keep your profile up to date to be matched to opportunities.
• Sign up for notifications to get alerts.
• Link your payment details carefully when cashing out your earnings.
• Watch out for ‘higher earning opportunities’ that actually require you to buy subscriptions.
• Be mindful of cashout thresholds (such as InboxDollars,) which slow access to your earnings.

4. Participate in surveys

Some of the best secret websites to make money are survey sites. They’re packed with quick surveys where you share your opinions for cash.

1. Some user favorites include Swagbucks, Survey Junkie, Google Opinion Rewards, and Branded Surveys.
2. For the best earnings, head to Prolific, where users earn $100+ a month. Sign up to add your name to the Prolific waiting list. Places are released according to specific demographic research needs.

(Swagbucks homepage image showing earnings tracker, and white marketing text, with a sign-up box, against a relief image showing blurred brand logos, overlaid with a teal green filter.)

5. Test websites

Most people assume user testing gigs are for software professionals. But companies want regular internet users to test their websites, for payment.

To earn around $5-$10 for a 15-minute test, sign up to:

• Intellizoom
• UserFeel
• UserTesting
• Trybe.

Top tips for success:

• Answer demographic questions accurately
• Just be yourself, there are no ‘right’ answers
• Submit responses fully to trigger payments
• Be polite, helpful, and reliable to build your reputation as a tester… and get more work.

6. Monetize your car with OoH advertising

Out-of-house advertising is big business in the USA, and drivers earn $452 a month by making their cars into advertising boards.

Sign up for Wrapify and download the app to get started. Offers are localized by area and released into the app for drivers to accept.

This is one of the easiest secret websites to make money, and you don’t have to do anything other than drive your usual routes to earn money.

7. Sell unused bandwidth

Not using your internet bandwidth fully each month?

Share your unused data with other users through sites like Honeygain, Repocket, and PacketStream to earn $20 – $50 a month in passive income. Simply download the app, sign up, and start earning.

8. Cash in with cashback sites

It’s amazing how few online shoppers know about cashback sites in 2025! These are still prime secret websites to make money online. You earn a percentage back on your everyday spending simply by clicking through when you shop.

Look at TopCashBack, Rakuten, SwagBucks, Dosh, or Ibotta. Some users have made lifetime earnings of over $5,000 in this way!

(*Including this author! See below.)

There are also apps such as ibotta where you upload your grocery receipts to get money back on promotional items. Users earn $261 a year on average.

9. Invest for returns

Some of the best secret ways to make money online involve finances. For example, use spare change to buy fractional stocks at micro-investing sites like Acorn and Robinhood.

Build your skills and confidence and get into crypto or day trading (with a clear understanding of the risks and rewards.)

If property is more your thing, get into real estate with as little as $100 on Arrived.

10. Get into matched betting

Matched betting has been around for years, but it’s still under the radar! Some of the ultimate secret websites to make money include matched betting sites such as OddsJam, DarkHorse Odds, and ProfitDuel. Earn $100 – $1000+ a month risk-free.

With matched betting, you take advantage of bookie offers and free bets to make money, covering your positions so there’s no possible loss. There’s a large, active, and supportive community of matched betters, too.

Top tips for success:

• Start slowly
• Engage in the community, which is well-known for being active, friendly and helpful
• Use platform software to find opportunities
• Use test environments as you learn how to match bets.
• Track winnings carefully.
• Avoid getting gubbed!

11. Develop and sell course content

Teachable is a platform that lets creators make and sell course content. Whatever your specialism or niche, it links you with potential students.

Some creators make between $1,000 and $10,000 per month. Lucrative niches include business, personal finance, and IT.

12. Become a mystery shopper

One of the best secret websites to make money is mystery shopping! Did you know people get paid to stay at hotels, eat at restaurants, and visit branded experiences? Earn $10 – $100 per assignment.

As a mystery shopper, you go undercover to see how well a brand performs in ‘real life’. Mystery shoppers are reimbursed for purchased goods and services and paid for their time.

Check out mystery shopping websites such as Second to None, A Closer Look, and Market Force Information.

Top tips for Success:

• Complete the full profile with all required information
• Sign up for alerts and engage with the platform
• Be professional, reliable, smart, and follow all guidelines.
• Produce high-quality reports to stand out.

13. Sell print-on-demand products

Create designs and use them to sell print-on-demand products at websites such as Printful, Printify, Gelato, Zazzle, and Spring. Expect earnings of $20 – $300+.

Profit margins tend to be 10% to 30% depending on the profit and niche, but this is a great way to earn money by starting a small business, risk-free.

Top tips for success:

1. Research carefully to find a profitable niche
2. Choose the right platform (terms and earnings vary greatly)
3. Market yourself well through social media and email lists.
4. Treat it like a business!

14. House sit

Earn money to look after other people’s houses and sit their pets! Look at sites such as Trusted Housesitters to discover house-sitting and pet care jobs around the world.

Some people combine these earning opportunities with travel.

Earn an average of $17 an hour, or a full-time housesitter’s salary of $29,000 and $42,000 annually, according to ZipRecruiter.

15. Chat for cash

No, not ‘that’ kind of chat (although there are plenty of secret websites to make money with flirty chat available!) - however, you can chat for cash as an English tutor at Cambly.

Earn an equivalent base hourly wage of $10.20 per hour for standard lessons and $12.00 per hour for Cambly Kids.

How Much Can You Realistically Earn?

Some secret websites to make money online offer a fast route to a few extra bucks. Others have the potential to build a steady income or even create a career.

At the top of this article, we laid out some of the best secret ways to make money online. But the reality is, there’s no single ‘best’ way.

These secret websites to make money do earn cash, but it’s dependent on the time and skill you put into the work.

• For a few easy bucks on the side, game and task sites such as Scrambly, InboxDollars, and Swagbucks are ideal.
• For websites that make more money over time, invest your skills and efforts to build a presence on sites such as Teachable and Cambly.

Best secret websites to make money without investment

“Speculate to accumulate” is all very well, but what if you want to make some money without any investment at all? That means, no cameras, gaming software, etc.

These are some of our favorite secret websites to make money quickly and for free.

1. Scrambly
2. Swagbucks
3. Respondent.io
4. Topcashback
5. SurveyMonkey

No need to let a lack of investment cash hold you back!

What Do You Need to Get Started?

There are three things you’ll need to make a start:

1. Hardware & Software

Some websites require nothing more than a device and an internet connection. Others require headphones, a microphone, and a good camera.

For platforms that are a route into your own business, such as print-on-demand platforms, you will need additional resources for digital manipulation software and marketing and advertising, for example.

1. Time

As with all side hustles, the amount of time you invest will influence your likely earnings.

1. ID for verification purposes

Some sites require ID (driver’s license or passport), scanned via a third-party verification app, plus image and voice verification, provided via your phone.

Read the small print and privacy documentation carefully before providing this information.

Are These Websites Legit and Safe?

If you grew up with “secret websites to make money from home” type offers, it’s good to be skeptical. Scams exist everywhere on the internet, and you need to be smart.

The resources listed above are all legitimate. However, if you come across an untested ‘make money for free’ website, proceed with caution.

These steps will help to protect you from scams such as phishing or identity theft:

• Check reviews on third-party platforms.
• Protect your personal information and set up two-factor authentication and password retrieval processes.
• Look for trustmarks and digital seals such as Norton, RapidSSL, GeoTrust, GoDaddy, or McAfee.
• ID the secure padlock graphic on Chrome, Safari, Internet Explorer, and Firefox browsers.

Secret ways to make money online: Conclusion

The websites we’ve explored above aren’t really “secret” ways to make money online, but they are less well-known, and many fly surprisingly under the radar for most internet users!

The key to success with all online opportunities is to verify authenticity, follow the sign-up steps, adhere to platform policies, and then put in the work.

Check back daily at your preferred sites to see which new opportunities are in, work to a high standard to build your reputation, and adopt a ‘service mindset’ to help others.

Remember, even the biggest oak trees grow from tiny acorns.

Your efforts with online earning opportunities can pave the way to bigger earnings over time, new skills, and exciting opportunities (before the rest of the crowd!)