If you’re looking for the best side hustles for introverts, including remote and work-from-home side hustles, then this list is for you.
As an introvert and someone who took a side hustle to multiple six figures per year, I’m going to share all of the best side hustle ideas for introverts.
1. Digital Marketing
Digital marketing is how I got my start in the world of freelancing. I didn’t realize how good of a side hustle it is for introverts until I started, though.
Most businesses don’t know much about digital marketing and so they rely on you for all input/guidance.
This means there’s very little back-and-forth or hassle when you work as a digital marketer.
As a freelance marketer, you take a project, quietly do the work on your own, and then deliver it to the client via email and get paid.
And you can charge $100 or more per hour once you gain some experience.
These are the best digital marketing courses/bootcamps to gain that experience.
Overall, digital marketing is one of the best side hustles for introverts, especially those who want to earn a high income from home, for the following reasons:
- It’s an in-demand area that businesses across practically all industries need help with.
- There’s very little back-and-forth communication required, very few revisions, etc., compared to other high-paying side hustles like programming, design, etc.
- You can make enough money to earn a good living from just a few clients, so you won’t be scrambling to talk to 10, 20, or more clients if you choose this side hustle.
- Digital marketing is a relatively new field that most business owners/managers know little about, so they’ll trust your input fully with no hassle, and pay you highly for it.
You can also “niche down” into one of the many sub-topics within digital marketing to become a specialist in an even narrower area, where you’ll be seen as even more of an expert.
Examples of areas you can specialize in include email marketing, social media marketing, content marketing, digital advertising, and more.
Digital marketing can also lead to a six-figure full-time career if you decide to move on from freelancing and take an office job, so it’s an excellent choice if you’re hoping that your side hustle can turn into a full-time career.
All the benefits I described above will remain if you take a full-time job. And digital marketing is a field where many employers allow employees to work from home or remotely.
And if you want to take this side hustle further but have no intention of taking a full-time job to make money, you have a couple of other options available to you. Digital marketing leads incredibly well into online side hustles like selling a course, opening an online store, affiliate marketing, or starting a website/blog.
I’ll share more about all of those options coming up because they’re all in-demand, lucrative side hustles for introverts, so keep reading if those sound interesting.
Here are the best places to learn digital marketing online.
2. Freelance Writing
Freelance writing is another one of the best side hustles for introverts, and one I’ve done myself.
As a freelance writer, you’ll typically have little to no interaction with a client after you accept the freelance writing gig and begin work, until you deliver the work.
You may want to offer revisions, but these are typically straightforward when compared to what other online freelancers, such as software developers or graphic designers/web designers, have to deal with.
Freelance writing is a great remote side hustle that you can do from home (or anywhere in the world) and it’s surprisingly easy to make money if you choose a narrow niche and repeat the same type of project over and over.
Choosing a narrow niche within the freelance writing side hustle helps you in two ways:
First, you get better at performing the work so you can complete each project faster.
For example, when I worked as a freelance writer, I eventually became a copywriter focused on driving sales for businesses (instead of writing blog articles, etc.) and I eventually specialized in just email copywriting.
I was able to make money by simply writing emails for businesses to use, typically to send out and hunt for new clients of their own.
And also, you can charge more money if you brand yourself as an expert/specialist.
I ended up charging $200 to $250 per email, usually sold in a batch of four emails (designed to be sent out in a series, with a few days of waiting time between each email).
Since I was the expert in this, businesses would take the emails with little to no questioning. There was almost no back-and-forth.
I took the project, wrote the emails, and got paid. That’s essentially the end of the interaction except if I wanted to circle back and ask about results and possibly get a testimonial, which is a good way to grow your online side hustle.
So don’t rule out writing as a side hustle for introverts. While some jack-of-all-trades writers aren’t well-paid, a specialist who niches down into copywriting or another expert field can get paid great money.
Read how to start a freelance writing career here.
3. Blogging
It’s slow to start a blog (they say you shouldn’t expect to get paid much at all in the first year) but over time, it’s a potentially high-earning side hustle and one that’s excellent for introverts.
Blogging is another side hustle I tried personally, right here on this site.
I did the side hustles above first… working as a freelance digital marketer and copywriter, while I waited for this blog to start making me enough income to rely on.
It finally happened, and I was able to drop all of my freelance work a couple of years ago to focus entirely on blogging. From there, my income took off and I never looked back.
The best thing I ever did in my career was start a blog.
How good is blogging for introverts? I just decided to take a quarter of the year off from Zoom calls and phone calls.
Yes, for the next three months I won’t be talking to anyone. Why? Because I don’t have to. The business model doesn’t rely on it.
So if you’re patient and looking for a way to make money passively in the long-term, and not necessarily just needing quick money in the first year, then I highly recommend blogging as a good side hustle for introverts.
What are the ways to make money with a blog?
Bloggers can place advertisements, publish sponsored posts, sell a digital product like a course or e-book, or participate in affiliate marketing. These are all ways to make money without much (or any) live interaction with others.
Let me dive deeper into a few of the above ways of making money next, since you can do them without a blog as well…
4. Affiliate Marketing
Affiliate marketing is a side hustle where you make money for promoting products and services from other companies.
You’re paid for sending them leads, signups, or sales (depending on the offer/arrangement).
Like blogging, affiliate marketing is a great side hustle for introverts because you can make money online without having much live interaction with anyone.
You share an “affiliate link” that you’re given by the partner company and then that link tracks each click and sale you send to them.
You’re usually given a dashboard where you can track your starts, and then each month, you get paid for the leads you send over.
Affiliate marketing is a long road, like blogging, though, and it’s best if you’re willing to put in months of learning.
Many people start affiliate marketing looking for quick money and then give up and get frustrated.
I tried it myself years ago, promoting brands/offers via social media and other channels, and never found success until I grew my blog audience and then used that to promote some affiliate offers.
So it’s a great way to make money (even multiple six figures per year) but it does take work.
From what I’ve seen, the best way to make money via affiliate marketing is to promote high-ticket offers (real estate courses, premium/luxury products, etc.)
Or, promote products that give you a recurring commission each month that a person stays signed up for. These products/services are typically subscription businesses that charge the customer each month.
You need some type of audience in order to make money with affiliate marketing, but that audience can be built via paying for ads, collecting contact details in an email newsletter, starting a YouTube or TikTok channel, or creating a blog like I did.
5. Food Delivery
If you’re looking for a side hustle that’s easier to get started and will make you extra income faster than the above ideas, then food delivery/grocery delivery is a great choice for introverts.
You’ll start earning pay in the first week, unlike some of the virtual options above.
Of course, food delivery and grocery delivery jobs do require walking up to people’s homes, so there may be a tiny bit of interaction, but it’s quite minimal.
Most people will just let you drop the bags at their home and you’re off to the next delivery gig, with a possible cash tip, too!
To get started, you can check out apps such as:
The amount of cash you can earn depends on your area and how many deliveries you do per day, but some people earn thousands of dollars per month through grocery delivery and food delivery gigs.
6. Dog Walking
Dog walking is a lucrative side hustle for introverts in cities or suburban areas.
While it doesn’t quite have the income potential of some online side hustles mentioned above, like starting a blog, you can still get paid well by walking a group of dogs instead of just one at a time.
This is why I recommend being in an urban or suburban area if you want to earn as much as possible as a dog walker.
If you want to make money in your spare time with little to no upfront cost and little time spent before you begin earning, then consider being a dog walker.
You won’t need any cash to begin, just spare time, and you won’t even have to invest weeks of free time before you start seeing the money. You’ll get paid each day/week.
To get started, you’ll just need to find clients in your local area. You can post fliers in local coffee shops and restaurants, or simply ask people with dogs if they’re interested in dog walking services or know anyone who is.
You can develop this side hustle into a channel for a lot of extra money, or just do it a couple of hours each week in your spare time to earn a side income.
7. Freelance Graphic Design
While I prefer freelance writing/marketing or even programming for less back-and-forth with clients, freelance graphic design can also make an excellent side hustle for introverts.
If you know how to create logos or other business graphics, you can approach businesses and try to make money with your skillset.
You can find clients on freelance sites like Upwork, through your existing network, and more.
Graphic design isn’t an area I have direct experience in. But as an online business owner, I’ve seen that graphics can fetch a good price with little or no human interaction… making this one of the better online side hustles for introverts with some type of art/graphics background.
Note that you can also create and sell your own art. While difficult to get noticed at first, selling art can turn into a lucrative long-term side hustle and is perfect for introverts. I’ll cover how to open your online shop (including for selling art) next.
8. Online Stores
Another way for introverts to make extra cash is by starting an online store.
This can earn you income a bit faster than side hustles like blogging since you have a real product to sell and don’t need as large of an audience to start monetizing.
In fact, your site is monetized from day one via the products you offer.
I recommend using Shopify to set up your online store, which will allow you to sell anything from t-shirts to jewelry to pet products.
You can design and sell your own products or resell existing products with Shopify, and starting an online shop is one of the best side hustles in terms of your ability to earn a full-time income over time.
9. Online Surveys
Numerous sites and apps let you take online surveys and reward you with gift cards or cash payments.
Being paid to complete an online survey is perfect for introverts who want to earn money with no human interaction.
The amount you can earn varies depending on which sites you use, but on average, survey sites seem to offer USD $3 to $5 for surveys that take approximately 20 minutes to complete.
A couple of the more popular sites that pay you for taking surveys include:
- swagbucks.com
- acop.com
- inboxdollars.com
Most purvey websites will pay you in gift cards or cash payouts via check or PayPal.
Completing online surveys isn’t one of the top ways to make money and isn’t the right choice if you want to become wealthy through a side hustle (which is possible with many of the side hustles listed previously).
But if you just want to earn some good side income to pay a few basic bills, then this is an easy, simple choice to get started with.
Just know that this is never going to pay as well as most of the side hustles mentioned earlier such as freelance writing, starting a blog, or even a job like working as a delivery driver.
Taking surveys isn’t a career and won’t lead to much. It can’t generate passive income, either. It’s a dead-end that just lets you trade a bit of time for money without human interaction.
Only consider this online side hustle if you want to earn money quickly and don’t care about a chance to grow your income or build this side hustle into something bigger over time.
10. Selling an Online Course
Let’s get back into some higher-paying side hustles for introverts now.
Selling a course is one of the most lucrative side hustle ideas on the list, and I personally know course creators who have earned more than a million dollars.
You do need to be on camera, but after the course is created, you’ll have almost no human interaction, so it’s still an excellent side hustle for introverts and can turn into a full-time career.
You could create a course to earn extra money by teaching a skill you already know. Anything from basketball to classical guitar to pottery to archery.
Or, you can go through the process of learning one of the business skills above, like affiliate marketing or blogging, and then once you’ve mastered it, create a course teaching others.
So selling a course is one of the best ways to make money online from home. Keep this idea in mind if you’re interested in a long-term, lucrative side hustle that can potentially replace your career. Offering an online course is much more than a way to earn a bit of extra money online.
Top-tier business courses (on topics like copywriting, digital advertising, etc.) often sell for near $1,000. So at that price point, you just need 1,000 people to buy your course to earn $1,000,000.
11. Self-Publishing a Book
If creating a course isn’t your thing, you can share your knowledge via a book instead. Anyone can publish these days, thanks to self-publishing on Amazon.
You can release a book of any length and sell it in e-book format, physical format, audiobook, or a combination of these options.
While it’ll take you time to write the book and you won’t be making money per hour to write it, you can earn thousands of dollars after the book is complete.
The book can also help drive awareness to a secondary side hustle such as freelance writing, business consulting, etc.
Writing a book is a way to build an audience and show expertise in a field, along with being a way to make extra money.
I only recommend self-publishing if you’re willing to write a series of books or if you have a bigger project in mind (like an online course or consulting business) that you hope this will build toward.
Otherwise, the amount of work that goes into self-publishing a book versus the amount of extra money you’ll make with this side hustle isn’t worth it.
Many self-published books only earn a couple of thousand dollars on Amazon, or less, and quickly fade after launch and therefore earn little or nothing after a few months.
12. Freelance Proofreading
If you’re detail-oriented and have excellent knowledge of grammar, you could offer proofreading services to make extra money.
You can proofread books, manuscripts, website content, and many other types of written material.
Proofreading doesn’t take nearly as long as writing or editing, so you could pick up a couple of side jobs per month or per week without committing too much time.
Therefore, this is a good side hustle for introverts who just want a part-time schedule and flexibility in how much they work per month.
I much prefer a side hustle like this versus taking surveys, which I mentioned above. Proofreading is less of a dead-end and will help you build real skills and a base of clients who know you.
From here, you could grow your side business beyond proofreading and into editing, and/or start doing some writing on a freelance basis, too.
13. Virtual Assistant Services
A virtual assistant works remotely/online to support a business or person in their day-to-day tasks, either business or personal.
You may be asked to do a variety of tasks as a virtual assistant, from helping with a company’s marketing and social media to researching and scheduling flights for your client’s travel.
Depending on the specific clients you work for, you could have almost no live interaction in the typical day, so this could be a good side hustle for introverts. But you’d need to confirm what type of tasks you’ll be asked to do before accepting a gig because each client will want to use your skills slightly differently.
14. Transcription Services
Next, you can make money selling transcription services. As a transcriber, you’re paid to turn audio recordings into written text.
Many transcription jobs are offered on a virtual basis. Companies and individuals will pay you to take their audio recording, type it out at home, and then send the document to them.
Transcription as a side hustle choice is best if you’re a fast typist and able to type without looking at the keyboard. You’ll complete the work faster if you can type while looking at your screen to ensure the transcription is accurate.
If you look down to type, or are a slow typist in general, then this may not be the best side hustle to consider.
If offering transcription services sounds interesting, you can get started by creating a profile and searching for gigs on freelance websites like Upwork and Fiverr.
15. Reselling/Flipping Items Online
If you enjoy shopping, consider browsing thrift stores or other low-cost stores for items that you can then flip on Amazon, eBay, or other sites.
You can even look for free or cheap items at garage sales or moving sales in your area. Some people list free items on craigslist, and you can find everything from bicycles to kitchen appliances.
They won’t be in perfect condition, but they’re free and you can clean them up and sell them for an easy profit.
You’ll also get better at this side hustle over time. You’ll learn what sells quickly and what doesn’t. You’ll get better at messaging people on craigslist and other sites to try to get great deals, etc.
16. Online Game Apps
Believe it or not, you can earn money by playing games online.
While this isn’t a great side hustle if you’re looking to build a real business and eventually escape your day job, it’s certainly a way of getting paid online from home on a flexible schedule.
Various online games offer real-world prizes (often gift cards) and cash, and some are free to play.
I don’t personally recommend this and haven’t tried any sites myself that I can recommend. I tend to shy away from this type of “opportunity”. Just like when you take surveys for money (mentioned earlier) it’s somewhat of a dead-end and can even lead you to scams and dishonest websites.
But I felt it was at least worth mentioning on this list, since there are people getting paid via this method.
Conclusion: The Best Side Hustle Choices for Introverts
As an introvert, if you want to make money in your free time, the list above will give you a variety of ideas to test and try.
Remember to think about your end goal before choosing which option you’ll use to make money, since some of these side hustles are quick to start and make money with but are limited in growth potential.
Others are slower to start but can earn you six figures and above.
Usually, there’s some tradeoff between the speed that you make money and the amount you can make long-term, so always identify your primary goal when choosing a side job to pursue.
Also consider your financial situation, since some of these side hustles take serious cash to start, while others are nearly free to get started.
Jobs where you perform a service tend to be cheaper or nearly free to start, whereas side jobs where you’re selling a product often requires more cash to get started.
Finally, consider your location and decide if you’re in a place where you could do any in-person side hustles (like dog walking) or if you need to consider only virtual options.
You may decide you only want to consider virtual options anyway as an introvert, since they’ll often be free of live interaction.
