I was looking on The Penny Hoarder to find ways to make some extra money for the holidays back in 2016 and was hoping to earn a few hundred dollars for presents, etc. I was mostly interested in UI (user interface) and UX (user experience), since I did web development for work. For my full-time job, I am a small business consultant for Level Up Colab and help clients find inefficiencies; doing UX and UI testing is all about that. I like looking for errors (like when I do functionalities tests) or giving my input on how to make websites better, what colors look better, and more.
I signed up at a few places (from Usertesting.com to Utest.com) and was quickly getting paid tests. So now I have been doing UI and UX testing, as well as functional testing, for websites and apps for the past two years. In between my full-time job, I have been averaging $800-1000 a month, and it's been great to have money to save or have extra spending money. (The most I have earned in one week was $1200.)
What I like about having a side hustle is that I don't count the money I make doing this as part of my salary, the part I budget into my life. The money from my side hustle goes into savings, investments, trips, buying things I feel like splurging on, and extras, like Netflix subscriptions — all the little things.