As someone both new to crypto and a student without a significant income source to contribute towards my investments, I have sought methods of earning free crypto in order to supplement my portfolio. I will go through the sources that I currently use, and briefly elaborate on them.
1) Coinbase Earn (Value: $20-$30)
- By far the best method I've come across, in terms of returns generated vs time taken
- All you have to do is verify your identity and complete short quizzes (you can try as many times as it takes so there is no harm in getting questions wrong)
- These quizzes will be about specific coins, and in completing them, you will receive some quantity of that coin (Sometimes $3, $5, and $10)
- New projects are always being released (every few weeks/months from what I've seen), so keep checking!
- Potential downside: They are notorious for having a waitlist, so it's possible that you could find yourself in a seemingly endless loop of identity verification. Patience is key!
2) Reddit's r/CryptoCurrency (Value: $20-?)
- Spent a week or so contributing to the community and was rewarded in their token (Moons - Currently trading around $0.05)
- It is certainly possible to earn significantly more through this method, but that is contingent upon positive contribution: you are rewarded moons for a certain amount of upvotes
- Distributions are monthly, last month roughly 5 upvotes equated to a moon, but this will decrease over time
- Not advocating for using this method to try and 'farm moons', but it's a great community to be a part of, and essentially getting paid to contribute is a welcome bonus!
3) Here - Publish0x! (Value: $1-?)
- Again not advocating for using this method solely for financial gain, as you can see I have not made much at all
- Regardless, it's a great place to learn more or share your knowledge with a community
- If you have something to share that you believe is interesting/helpful, make a post, and get tipped for it!
- Equally, if you see a post that is interesting/helpful, tip the author!
- Here, the benefit comes from the articles themselves, the financial incentive is simply the cherry on top.
4) CoinMarketCap Earn (Value: $0-$50)
- Perhaps not as good as Coinbase's equivalent, CoinMarketCap do still provide 'Learn and Earn' campaigns
- Rewards tend to be first come first serve, and you must get all the questions correct, first try, to be eligible
- Although I haven't been successful in the 3 that I have tried so far (tend to get just ONE question wrong!), it is certainly another way to earn free crypto
5) Faucets (Value: Cents)
- Certainly not a get-rich-quick method, faucets are probably the slowest in terms of payouts out of all the avenues I've covered
- Typically, you complete a CAPTCHA and submit an address, and you are sent a small amount of crypto
- It can be a good way to collect some crypto to cover transaction fees, or get exposure to a new coin
- Here are some examples:
6) Brave Browser + Swash + Presearch (Value: few dollars a month)
- The trifecta of passive earning on the internet!
- Brave Browser:
- As the name suggests, it is a web browser, which essentially operates by controlling the ads you see, and giving you a cut of the revenue generated through that ad
- You earn in BAT (Basic Attention Token - the browser's native token)
- Ads are limited to a maximum of 5 per hour, and the revenue depends on your location. In my case, I can earn a little over 2 BAT a month (0.01 or 0.005 per ad), which equates to just over a dollar
- Withdrawing can be a hassle though, as you either need to earn 15 BAT (which is quite plausible in certain locations), or create and verify an Uphold account
- Swash:
- Swash is a browser extension that essentially pays you for the data you're anyway giving out for free
- You earn in DATA
- Although withdrawal is straightforward, earning has been slow in my first month (I earned 0.1 Data, which equates to less than a cent at current prices - bearing in mind that the market is not performing well at the time of writing)
- Certainly not ludicrous at the moment, but if the price of DATA were to rise, or I continue to accumulate over a long period of time, it could be worth more
- That said, it's difficult to complain about earning crypto for doing nothing!
- Presearch:
- It's a search engine, simple as that.
- You are paid in PRE, the native token, currently trading at about $0.03,
- DOWNSIDES:
- This is quite significant. You earn 0.12 PRE tokens per search, capped at 30 searches a day. There is a minimum withdrawal amount of 1000 tokens, which would mean that it could take up to a year, minimum, to be able to withdraw. There is some speculation that this limit will be removed in due course, but that has not been officially confirmed, so I cannot speak to that.
- Also, the search engine works well for 'mainstream' searches, but if you're looking up a more niche topic, you might find yourself out of luck.
- Brave Browser:
Other Mentions:
7) Airdrops (Cents-Dollars)
- Not had much luck with these, but there are an abundance of simple tasks out there that can result in getting rewarded in crypto
- Check out the links below if interested:
8) Staking (2%-20%)
- I intend to make a separate post about what exactly staking is, but for the sake of this one, consider it to be locking up your coins for a fixed period and earning interest on it.
- This is the only method that I have mentioned that has an inherent financial risk involved, as you are losing control over your coins for a specified period of time
And that concludes my list of ways that I use to gain free crypto! If you've got any more that you use and that I have not mentioned, please do drop a comment, I'm sure a lot of us would appreciate it!
As always, DYOR, and have a good one :)
