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How to Make Money by Selling Your Data
Making money by selling your data may not be the first thing that comes to mind when thinking about making money online, however, it is a great way to earn. There are always concerns around data, but the likes of Netflix, Google and others already sell your data so why not take back control and profit from your own data?
The data you sell is anonymized and in a lot of cases inconsequential, such as Netflix viewing history or Spotify viewing history. Our list below is complete with guides so you can fully understand the implications and as always, we make sure that the sites and guides we have are only for recommended sites that are safe to use.
Caution: Selling data comes with certain potential risks, so please make sure you fully understand the implications. We will outline this below and again in every individual earning guide related to earning money by selling your data.
Don’t forget to check out our big list of ways to earn online which covers every earning opportunity available. Expand your horizons and check out other ways to earn.
We add new profit-earning guides for sites and apps all of the time so make sure to check back regularly!
What Data Can You Sell to Earn Money?
Our list of ways to make money by selling data shows a whole host of ways that you can monetize your data. You can earn by selling:
- Streaming service viewing data.
- Shopping history.
- Browsing data.
- Health & fitness app data.
- Your internet bandwidth.
- Your phone’s processing power.
- By receiving text messages.
- And more!
The majority of these data selling opportunities are totally passive. However, please always be cautious when selling your own personal data. We’ve highlighted any such risks in the list below.
The Best Ways to Earn by Selling Your Data Online
Not all data selling opportunities are created equal, so we’ve highlighted the top 10 for your convenience below. We’ve made sure that these are all legitimate companies and opportunities. We’ve also pointed out any opportunities that may be problematic, namely where you share your internet bandwidth.
So, with that, let’s look at the top 10 ways to make money by selling your data.
"Get paid to watch Netflix, YouTube, Prime Video & more. A genuinely unique data selling earning opportunity."
YouGov, and specifically their YouGov Safe opportunity allows you to sell your data and earn extra cash on the side. The data you sell will be anonymized and is a manual action. This means you can choose specifically what you share and when. YouGov will buy the following from you on a fortnightly, or monthly basis depending on the type of data:
- Netflix viewing data.
- Amazon Prime Video viewing data.
- Disney+ viewing data.
- Apple TV+ viewing data.
- YouTube viewing data.
- Steam gaming library data.
- Amazon shopping history.
Depending on your country, you may also have access to share data from your Paramount+ or Hulu viewing data, or your Spotify listening data.
YouGov is a reputable business, meaning that of all data selling opportunities, this comes with effectively zero risk. You just passing along a list of what you’ve watched, and this data is not tied to your name, address, email account etc. It is completely anonymous.
These companies like Netflix, YouTube etc. likely already sell your data and profit from it. Why not take your cut and earn money by watching Netflix or other streaming services?
YouGov Safe Review: This one is a no-brainer for us. A no-risk way to profit from your personal data. Handing a list of movies and TV shows you’ve watched to YouGov in exchange for cash is one of the easiest ways to earn online today. Turn your streaming service around and let it earn money for you.
#2 Honeygain
"Get paid to lease our your unused internet bandwith. Great opportunity, but does come with warnings."
Caution: Using Honeygain comes with a warning. You are selling access to your unused internet bandwidth. If the person(s) using your bandwidth carry out attacks on a website or view illegal information, that all happens through your connection. There have been reports of people getting IP blocked from accessing Twitter, PSN and more due to their connection being flagged for attacks and/or being used as a VPN.
Honeygain is a fantastic opportunity to earn by renting out your unused internet bandwidth. What this means is that Honeygain will allow its customers to access websites by tunnelling through your connection. It only uses unused bandwidth so your internet speeds will not decrease.
However, as above this means that you are relying on the fact that those using your connection are not doing anything illegal, and also that you won’t get flagged/banned for operating as a VPN (which is effectively what Honeygain are using your connection for).
You earn simply by installing Honeygain on your device (Windows, macOS, Linux, Android or iOS) and from that point on its completely hands off, passive income for allowing others to use your internet connection.
Honeygain Review: While it is a fantastic earning opportunity, it dances on the edge of danger.
Personally, we here at Earnologist are not prepared to have our IP address blocked or blacklisted (even though it would only be temporary). That being said it is a good earning opportunity. So this one is a judgement call on your behalf. If you understand the implications above and are OK with that, it is a great way to passively earn.
#3 Nielsen Computer & Mobile Panel
"Highly respected research firm that pays you for non-intrusive data selling. Totally passive income!"
Nielsen Computer & Mobile Panel takes a completely passive approach to allow you to earn money by selling your data. You will need to install an application on either your PC, smartphone or tablet and that’s it. The app will continually collect your internet usage data and send it back anonymously to Nielsen.
Whenever you’re selling data online it is important to understand who you’re selling it to. Nielsen is a widely regarded research organization so is a very safe option in that respect. But as with all the items on this list, you need to be comfortable with the situation of making money by selling your data to someone else.
You can earn around $50-$100 a year by doing absolutely nothing after the app install.
Nielsen Computer & Mobile Panel Review: With Nielsen being one of the most well-known and reputable research companies in the world, this opportunity comes with zero risk. Added to that, your data is anonymised and they will never collect information on IDs, passwords, private info etc.
It is 100% passive and does not impact the performance of your device. So sit back, let the app sell your data to Nielsen for cash and enjoy the passive income!
#4 PhonePaycheck
"Rent our your phone's processing power when not in use. Passively earn with your phone."
Phonepaycheck is an interesting concept that pays you to rent out your phone’s CPU. It will only access the processing power of your phone when it is not in use, charging and connected to WiFi. This means no mobile data usage and it will not slow you down or drain power when it’s in use/not plugged in.
This is completely passive and you will feel no impact of the usage. Businesses will rent your CPU only to test their websites and services making it a safer option than the likes of Honeygain. We have heard no reports of IP blacklisting from using PhonePaycheck.
PhonePaycheck review: A great way to earn money from selling your phone’s processing power when not in use. You feel no impact but your phone is constantly earning in the background for you. You’re not selling personal data, only for businesses to be able to use your data bandwidth/processing power.
Earnings will vary depending on demand, what country you’re in and even what phone you have but can be up to $200 a year which is a nice sum of money for doing pretty much nothing.
#5 Evidation
"Earn while you exercise by passively selling your health and fitness data."
Evidation is an app that pays you for your health and fitness data. It integrates with all popular fitness apps/trackers such as Google Fit, Apple Health, Fitbit, Runkeeper, MyFitnessPal and more. It can also hook directly into your wearable fitness tracker and smartwatch.
The great thing here is that you’ll already be using these fitness apps, and you’ll be able to passively earn just by selling the health data that these apps generate. As with all others on this list, the data you sell is anonymous.
Over time, if your data fits with what they’re looking for, you can even earn $200 on top of the normal data selling rates to take part in specialised health studies.
Evidation Review: Get healthy, and earn money by selling your data on health and fitness. Another completely passive earning opportunity that pays you for your data. Earning while you exercise is the ultimate way to earn with your data.
#6 Sweatcoin
"Sell your steps data for gift cards & even physical items!"
Sweatcoin works on a similar principle to Evidation but is purely based on the number of steps you do per day. As a free member, you earn around 1 sweatcoin per 1,000 steps and up to 10 sweatcoins per day. For premium members ($24.99) you get 2 sweatcoins per 1,000 steps and up to 100 sweatcoins per day.
In terms of converting sweatcoins to cash (or items such as peloton equipment), it can get a little complex. A $100 Amazon gift card may be available for 4,000 coins one day and 7,500 the next. Additionally, they have auctions where the highest bigger pays with their sweatcoins.
If you’re a serious walker/runner then this can be a good passive earning option. If you walk 10,000 steps a day you get 10 coins as a free member or 20 as a premium member. If we look at those numbers, you will be looking at a year before you can cash out unless a great offer pops up. See this as getting something for nothing though – don’t change what you do and install the app. Wait for it to hit a few thousand sweatcoins and then wait for a good deal.
Note: You can now convert your sweatcoins into SWEAT, Sweatcoin’s own cryptocurrency!
Sweatcoin Review: It can admittedly take a year to get to the point where you can cash in your sweatcoins for something worthwhile but it’s free money/items. Really this will only work out if you do around 10,000 steps a day unless you’re willing to wait longer than a year to cash out. With auctions, you even be able to grab items or equipment several times the worth of your sweatcoins.
But let’s face it, if you’re not actively trying to bump your steps up and you’re just letting this chug along in the background naturally, you’re getting paid for something you usually wouldn’t Why not install the app, let it do its thing and check in on it in years time!
#7 MoneySMS
"Get paid to receive test text messages to your phone. Simple, passive income."
MoneySMS turns data selling on its head as in reality you’re being paid to receive data. What happens is that MoneySMS will send you SMS text messages and for each one you receive they pay you 0.02 EUR (or your currency equivalent). That doesn’t sound like much, but remember you don’t actually do anything. The text messages arrive, and you just delete them. That’s it.
One thing though, you will need an Android phone and will need to install the app via APK instead of the Google Play store (explained on their website). This is because Google removed all apps that dealt with SMS from their store. The app itself is safe and used by many to boost their data-related earnings.
MoneySMS Review: Small earnings but you get paid to receive test text messages sent by companies and services. Just ignore them, and let them top up your balance by 0.02 EUR each time. Absolutely no effort, no danger and easy passive income.
#8 McMoney
"Paid to receive text messages. Double it up with Money SMS to earn in tandem!"
McMoney works in exactly the same way as MoneySMS. You receive a text message and they pay you $0.02. Small earnings but money for absolutely nothing. Put your phone’s text messaging app to work for you and get paid for the pleasure.
Similarly, it requires an APK install from their website rather than the Google store.
McMoney Review: Works effectively the same as MoneySMS. Try out both to see which is most profitable for you, or even double up and earn from both simultaneously. Nice, no-effort income and cool spin on selling data, to actually earning by receiving data!
#9 Peer2Profit
"Earn decent money by leasing out your unused bandwidth but comes with warnings."
Caution: Using Peer2Profit comes with a warning. You are selling access to your unused internet bandwidth. If the person(s) using your bandwidth carry out attacks on a website or view illegal information, that all happens through your connection. There have been reports of people getting IP blocked from accessing Twitter, PSN and more due to their connection being flagged for attacks and/or being used as a VPN.
Peer2Profit works in the same way as Honeygain and comes with the same stark warning. You are leasing out your data/bandwidth to be used by others. So, you are at risk of being IP blacklisted/blocked from certain sites if those that use your connection use it for nefarious means.
Money-wise you’re looking at $8 per month on average according to Peer2Profit. This is a judgment call on your behalf as to whether selling your bandwidth for $8 is worth potentially being temporarily blocked from using certain websites from your home PC/phone.
Peer2Profit Review: A tempting way to earn money for nothing but you need to be OK with potentially being temporarily blocked from accessing some websites. If this is OK for you, then jump in but if not then check out the other less intrusive opportunities on this list.
#10 Brave Browser
"Earn crypto just by changing which web browser you use and sharing a little personal browsing data."
Brave Browser is an alternative to Google Chrome, MS Edge etc. that pays you to browse the internet. Or rather it pays you if you allow it to track your internet usage data.
When you turn on Brave Ads and Brave Rewards in the browser, you will be shown 1-10 ads per hour (you decide how many) and earn when Brave tracks that you’ve watched the ad.
Any data collected by Brave is completely anonymous. You will be paid in cryptocurrency, namely BAT. The main benefit is that the value of crypto can go up. So, if you’d earned 1 BAT in 2017 ($0.14 per BAT), in 2021 it would have been worth nearly $2, although recently it has fallen to around $0.40.
Brave Browser Review: Brave is actually a great browser in its own right, utilises less power than, and is faster than Google Chrome. But with their rewards feature you can earn while you browse simply by turning on the feature. Another no-brainer, easy earner for allowing a company access to a little bit of your anonymized data.
Remember to check out our earning guides linked in the list below before your jump in, to ensure that you don’t miss out on extra profits or productivity/time saving tips for your chosen website/app.
| Name | Type | Signup Link | Guide | Country Availability | Pay Out Methods | Best Site | Countries |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 YouGov | Surveys, Sell Data | Sign-Up | YouGov Earning Guide | United Kingdom, United States, Canada, Europe, Japan, South America, Australia, New Zealand, India, Worldwide | Bank Transfer | Best Site |       |
 Evidation | Exercise, Sell Data | Sign-Up | - | United States | Bank Transfer, Gift Cards, PayPal, Prepaid Cards | | |
 Gener8 | Browse the Internet, Sell Data | Sign-Up | - | United Kingdom | Gift Cards | | |
 Measure MSR App | Listen To Radio, Sell Data, Surveys, Watching TV | Sign-Up + 20 Free Points | - | United States, Canada, United Kingdom, Australia, South America | Gift Cards | |
