So you want to get your hands on some free bitcoin, eh? By now, you might have heard of how you can make money with bitcoin, magic internet money and digital currency that can be traded or used to make purchases. This digital money uses encryption to make safe and secure transactions instantly from anywhere in the world. Not regulated by any bank, government or Federal Reserve, this open network is managed by the users and investors themselves. Here is our guide to earning real money with bitcoin in 2020.
Contrary to people’s knowledge, getting bitcoin is easy, there are a number of ways to earn bitcoin online- some more popular than the others. There are methods that involve a minimal effort with the minimal return and others more lucrative that requires you to have better expertise in the industry.
Below are some of the most famous ways to make money with bitcoin.
1. Mining bitcoin
No, you don’t have to raise the ground to get bitcoin. Not in that sense anyway.
So, why do you call it mining? Similar to gold miners, bitcoin miners have to bring out the gold, in this case, bitcoin into the surface.
Did you dare to ask how? While paper money has a government, who prints and distributes it, Bitcoin has miners who use special software to solve math problems and are issued with bitcoin in exchange. This system is what makes the Bitcoin network go round.
Mining Bitcoin used to be relatively simple, and the earliest miners were able to mine thousands of Bitcoin using their home computers. However, in today’s very competitive and volatile market, miners buy expensive computer parts, that the high street customer has little access to, required for more processing power in order to mine more difficult algorithms. Since this is a race that can solve blocks faster, miners team up in what we call mining pools where they combine their processing power in order to solve each transaction first. The reward mostly comes from several miners’ fees, is then split up by members of the pool.
This video helps to explain the process of bitcoin mining more visually:
Remember that bitcoin mining is not as profitable as it used to and many are claiming it to be the end of profitable mining.
It presents new miners with new challenges and also unique opportunities to come into the market when everyone else is leaving and then the price of bitcoin will go up. It all depends on your ability to analyze the market and correctly predict future changes.
2. Bitcoin Faucets
If you don’t mind looking at a few ads and answering surveys, you can visit a bitcoin faucet website. Generally, these websites generate revenue from advertisements placed on their pages. Those who visit their site and answer short questions or captchas will be paid from the small portion of their revenue.
3. Pay To Click (PTC) Websites
There are several websites that will pay you in bitcoin if you watch an ad or click to a certain page containing ads. If you are ad immune and want to make quick crypto buck–this can be a good idea. Bear in mind, to make any significant money is still very hard work and a rather tedious task. BTC4ADS pays around 100 satoshis (0.00000100 ฿) and Coinadder pays around 25 satoshis per click.
4. Doing Micro Jobs
Much like Microworkers and Cloudfactory, which pay you a small fee to complete very simple tasks like watching a YouTube video or completing someone’s survey, there are several micro working sites that will pay you in bitcoin. Bitcoinget is the major player in this market which will pay you around 20,000 satoshis per task while there are several others like Cointasker that will pay you a slightly lower sum.
5. Writing about bitcoin
Cryptocurrency, in general, is a new niche and there is a scarcity of writers who genuinely know this niche. This means the market is flooded with newbie copywriters who simply rehash the content that contributes to the deterioration of quality. However, if you really know this niche and you have decent writing skills, you can actually make money.
CCN, Blockchain Aliens are among several websites that pay you for writing about bitcoin. You can also find a lot of related jobs freelance websites like Upwork and freelancer.com
6. Help others, get tipped in bitcoin
You can also get tipped in bitcoin by helping other people. One of the most notable platform to do so is bitfortip, which tips bitcoin as an incentive for helping people. Bitcoin is a new technology and there are people who are genuinely passionate about it and excited about what is to follow so incentives like this help to build a positive vibe around the community and also help people solve their problems.
7. Gambling bitcoin
Though its not advisable to anyone, if you are self-aware enough, the bitcoin gambling market can still be a good source of income. Just like any form of gambling, the people in general always lose and the casinos always win but since bitcoin gambling is a very little heard of the term, you can get huge bonus for joining or even several rounds of your stake to start with. Sites like Bitstarz and mbit are major players in Crypto gambling business.
8. Buying and Holding
Start with creating a wallet to keep your bitcoin safe. There are many places that allow you to do so. Paxful, for example, provides a free digital wallet whenever you sign up for an account. This is the easiest way if you are planning on buying and holding bitcoin. Make sure that the website you’re using is a safe and reliable one.
Investing in Bitcoin is a waiting game of its value to rise. This lets you decide when is a good time to buy or sell. There are several factors that contribute to how bitcoin is valued and you never know what will trigger the next bear market.
“Hodl”, a term the Bitcoin community whenever they are holding their coin with the belief their coin will be profitable one day. The slang word earned the backronym “Hold On for Dear Life” in the cryptocurrency space.
Note that this method can be tricky so don’t take anyone’s advice about it. Research and learn about Bitcoin and come up to your own conclusion.
9. Running a signature campaign in Bitcoin Talk forum
Bitcointalk is one of the oldest bitcoin forum set up by Satoshi Nakamoto himself. This is probably the most popular forum in crypto sphere and used by millions of people. If you are an avid follower of the forum and you have racked up some authority from consistent posting, then your posts of bitcointalk will have a sponsored signature and you’ll get paid by sponsors for every post you make on the forum.
According to Steemit, you can easily make a bit of coin doing simple forum posting – for example, a full member can earn 0.0003 btc per post
10. Bitcoin Trading
There is potential to make big money trading bitcoin. Unlike buying and holding, trading bitcoin means you buy at a low price and sell them back at a higher price. This requires practice and knowledge of the market and to some extent a crystal ball. Given that the cryptocurrency market is extremely volatile, this method can be very risky.
There is money in Arbitrage
The volatile nature of the market, however, gives rise to the opportunities for arbitrage. Arbitrage–as per Investopedia is the simultaneous buying and selling of securities, currency, or commodities in different markets or in derivative forms in order to take advantage of differing prices for the same asset.
There are several reasons why bitcoin arbitrage takes place, Market demands, the difference in the quality of the markets and diversity in client behaviors to name a few. If you have a good knowledge of the market and you can keep surveillance over multiple exchanges spanning over multiple countries, there is a good chance of making a big profit margin.
If you have at least some technical knowledge, you can also profit from using arbitrage bots.
Profit Strategy using bitcoin bots arbitrage
Day trading has a good profit margin if done correctly
Though bitcoin is getting less volatile by day, we should not forget that its still early adoption years and there was price fluctuations of more than 3% in a single minute as early as April 2018. Day trading has a lower risk than say “hodling” but also lower rewards unless you are investing heavily. But if you are prepared to do your research on the bitcoin market and rules of economics in general, you can come up with your own strategies to profit from day trading without sacrificing too much.
11. Accepting Bitcoin as a means of payment
Bitcoin is, after all, a digital currency. So why not sell goods or services in exchange for bitcoin. This gives you the freedom to sell anything to anyone without going through any banks or financial institutions that may prevent you to do so. If you are already selling, why not accept bitcoin as payment. As a matter of fact, there is a massive list of businesses that accept bitcoin.
These are some ways in which you can earn money with bitcoin. If you choose to mine or invest, it is important to do as much research as possible and be prepared for all possible outcomes.
12. Lending bitcoin
The decentralized nature of bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies make it simpler to make transactions without needing authorities to validate it. In such a case, you can also loan bitcoin to potential loanees at a certain interest rate. It is also a very good alternative to “hodling” as you are actually making use of the wealth rather than keep it unmoved and it’s better for the economy in general. Several lend-and-borrow platforms like Unchained Capital, Bitbond and BTCpop allow you to lend your bitcoin for interest rate up to 15%.
Bear in mind that this is still a new market and there are hustlers who may try to cheat you. Always choose trustworthy platforms and loanees while making your investments.
13. Binary Trading with bitcoin
Binary tradings have existed in the financial world for a very long time and did not take long enough to make a journey for that financial scheme to migrate to the crypto world. Binary–as the name suggests has just two options, a trader purchases an option and at the expiration time, the trader either is either “in the money” or “out of the money”. In its true essence, its not too much further from gambling or Russian roulette.
All you have to do is make an investment on an option. Say there are two options to invest– for the bitcoin price of $3000 now (at 10 AM), you can either invest in the price will be more than $3000 by 6 PM or the price will be less than $3000 by 6 PM. If at 5 PM the bitcoin is indeed higher than $3000, you earn the payout of certain payout percentage of your investment, if it’s lower, you lose your investment. Another option is to “put” if you think the price of BTC will go down. If the price at the expiration time is lower than the original price, you earn the option’s payout.
This YouTuber explains binary trading with real-time trading guide:
14. Make money with Bitcoin Affiliates
Affiliate marketing works when you generate sales leads for a product or service and the organization offering a product or service pays you certain commission for bringing in potential consumers who would otherwise not have been interested.
Usually, these 3 steps allow you to set up your own affiliate business for passive income:
Sign up for the affiliate program as an affiliate marketer.
When you are accepted as a marketer, you will receive a unique URL that has a link to their product or service but also has a unique identifier which means they keep a record of who sent them there.
You then share that link on any web or social media platform(Website, Facebook, Twitter etc. ) When someone comes to visit the website through your link and makes a purchase, you get a certain percentage as your affiliate fee.
We at Paxful also have an amazing affiliate program where you get paid 50% of the bitcoin escrow fee from your direct affiliate and 10% of the escrow fee from the affiliates made by your affiliates.
15. Being a master node
Bitcoin is usually used as an umbrella term for all the cryptocurrencies and though experts would say the return for being a bitcoin master node is not all that profitable, you can still serve as a master node for several other cryptocurrencies and get a reward for your service to the blockchain.
Masternode is a dedicated node that keeps track of blockchain in real-time. Much like bitcoin full nodes, they are always up and running.
In addition to saving, validating and announcing valid transactions to other nodes, master nodes also perform other tasks with the blockchain including ensuring smooth protocol operations, governing voting events etc Next to validating, saving and broadcasting transactions, master nodes sometimes also facilitate other events on the blockchain-dependent on their nature, such as governing voting events etc. For their dedicated service, they are heavily incentivized. It typically depends on the type of cryptocurrency but Dash, PIVX, Blocknet, Stakenet, and Zcoin are the 5 major coins that have the best incentives for a master node.
Tips for making more profit with bitcoin
Needed to say, here are a few tips before you start earning money through bitcoin. There are several scams in bitcoin space that you should be aware of and try to avoid them.
Like having physical cash, keep your bitcoin safe and keep your bitcoin wallet safe. This may mean enabling your Google 2FA, backing up your device or keeping your antivirus updated. There are a lot of digital threats waiting for you.
The industry is prone to fluctuations. This can be a good thing when you stay on top of it and learn the risk that comes with it.
Keep in mind that there is no free Bitcoin. Although there are several methods to earn from it. With the market always growing, there will always be a demand in expertise or a new product that will develop with time.