Are Paid Online Surveys Safe, Legit, and Worth Taking?

We’ll cut to the chase and tell you that most sites and apps that pay you to take surveys are safe to use.

We’ve extensively tested more than a dozen of these apps, including the biggest names in the industry (such as Swagbucks, InboxDollars, and Survey Junkie), and we’ve verified that the money they pay is real.

Additionally, many of these sites are extremely popular, with thousands or millions of regular users who have publicly reviewed them and vouched for their legitimacy. If a major market research company was in the business of scamming the people who took its surveys, it would come to light very quickly.

With all of that said, some smaller and lesser-known sites might be less safe to use than the major ones. We’ll go over the biggest red flags you should watch out for (and list several sites that we’ve confirmed are safe) below.

Although taking online surveys is largely safe, that doesn’t mean it’s always worth your time. Our testing has also shown that there isn’t very much money to be made from this side hustle.

Again, most survey-taking sites pay just a few cents per survey. Moreover, on most sites, it’s possible to get disqualified from surveys after starting them; sometimes, you’ll earn a small token payment for this, but other times, you won’t get anything to compensate you for your wasted time.

We’ve found that on average, it’s possible to earn $1–$5 per hour from most survey sites. That isn’t nothing, but it isn’t a great rate compared to what you can earn from more conventional gigs. (Check out our list of the best side hustle ideas to get a sense of what your other options are.)

Why it can still be worth using survey sites

That isn’t to say that nobody should take surveys for money. This side hustle does have several advantages:

• Low time commitment: A single survey usually takes just a few minutes to half an hour to complete. If you have very little time to spend on a side hustle, then taking paid surveys could be a decent choice.
• Minimal equipment required: All you really need to take surveys is an internet connection and a phone or computer. It’s possible to earn money by fiddling with survey sites for a few minutes while commuting (e.g., on the bus) or sitting in waiting rooms.
• No barrier to entry: Virtually anyone can earn money by taking surveys. You don’t need any special skills or credentials—just a little free time and the motivation to stick with a site long enough to earn a payout (which may take anywhere from 3 to 10 hours).

If you’re like most people, if you spend an hour or two taking surveys per day, you’ll be able to earn a few dozen extra dollars per month.

That’s real money, and you’ll be able to earn it without much effort or risk, but there are other, more demanding gigs that you’d almost certainly be able to earn more from. Ultimately, whether taking surveys is “worth it” or not is a personal decision; it depends on what your goals and needs are and whether you want to prioritize ease or efficiency.

Again, many paid survey sites are perfectly safe, but a minority of them may be operated by scammers who will steal your info or simply fail to pay you on time.

If you know how to tell legitimate survey apps from bad ones, you won’t have any trouble. Follow these tips to vet survey-taking companies before you sign up and continue keeping yourself safe once you do:

1. Always read each site’s reviews

Reading the user reviews for paid online survey sites is one of the best ways to get an overview of each site’s reputation. While this isn’t the only safety step you should take, it’s a great start.

Look for online reviews in these places:

• Google Play and the App Store: Many major survey companies have mobile apps. You can check out their customer reviews on their Google Play and App Store pages (which feature reviews from Android and iOS users, respectively).
• Trustpilot: This is a website that collects consumer reviews for all sorts of businesses, including most major survey sites.
• The Better Business Bureau (BBB): This is another organization that rates businesses and also solicits reviews from consumers. You shouldn’t place too much stock in the BBB’s own rating of each company—their own scores don’t mean much—but if a company has received lots of complaints from their customers, that will usually be apparent on their BBB page.

Note that when you research survey-taking apps, you’ll probably encounter a few horror stories about virtually every company. All sites accumulate a few of these, and they aren’t always fair or representative.

Don’t panic if you see one bad review. Look at the complete picture to get a sense of whether or not the site is legit.

2. Avoid “get rich quick” schemes

If a website claims you’ll be able to make a lot of money very quickly by filling out surveys, it’s probably a scam. At the very least, the site isn’t being entirely honest about its rates.

While online surveys do usually pay real cash, we aren’t aware of any that pay significantly more than the $1–$5 hourly figure we mentioned above. Unfortunately, stories about people making thousands of dollars per month by spending a few hours per day on survey sites are simply false.

3. Don’t overshare your personal information

Filling out surveys virtually always requires providing some personal information, but watch out for anything that seems excessive. If you think a site is asking for too much, trust your gut and stay away.

Legitimate information that most survey sites ask for

Survey sites collect demographic information, which they use to show you surveys that they think are particularly relevant to you. You’ll often be asked about your:

• Age
• Sex/gender
• Ethnicity
• Location
• Phone number
• Annual income
• Purchasing and spending habits
• Interests/hobbies
• Health
• Marital status

Some of these questions will be mandatory and others may be optional. It’s up to you how much you’re willing to share (many people decline to provide details about their health, for instance), but these questions are all normal, and none are red flags, even if some are a bit intrusive.

Information you should never provide

You shouldn’t ever be asked to provide your:

• Social Security number
• Bank account details
• Credit or debit card numbers
• Driver’s license number

If a survey asks you for any of that info, it’s a major red flag. You should navigate away from the site immediately and take steps to protect yourself if you already provided any sensitive information.

4. Create a survey-specific email address

If you’re worried about sharing your personal email address with too many companies—which is a sensible concern—it’s a good idea to create a new address that you’ll use only for surveys.

Creating a new Gmail address won’t cost you anything, and it can save you from unwanted spam.

5. Check each site’s privacy policy

To get the clearest picture of an online survey site’s policies on security and privacy, check their privacy policy. All sites should have one, and if they don’t, that’s a red flag.

In an ideal world, you’d actually read each policy cover-to-cover. In the real world, many of them are very long and riddled with legalese and other jargon, which makes that impractical for most people. However, you should still at least skim the policy.

Pay attention not just to what it says but also how the policy is presented—is it easily accessible or buried deep in the site, and does the page look polished or sloppily constructed? A clean and professional privacy policy doesn’t necessarily mean that a site is legitimate, but the lack of one is a red flag.

6. Watch out for fees

Last but certainly not least, you should never pay money to an online survey site, even if they claim they’re providing a valuable service (like sending you a weekly batch of hand-picked and high-earning surveys).

It’s sometimes necessary to spend money to make money—but not with this side hustle. If a paid online survey site charges fees, it probably isn’t legit, and you’ll be able to find those same surveys (or equivalent ones) freely available from its competitors.

As promised, we’ve included a list of some of the most well-known paid survey sites, all of which we’ve tested extensively and cashed out our earnings from. You can click into each to read our comprehensive review of the platform. This list isn’t exhaustive, but it includes many of your most popular options.

Again, most of these sites don’t pay very much in absolute terms, but we can confirm that the money is real, and the sites are safe to use.

1. InboxDollars

InboxDollars is one of the best-known survey sites out there. It pays a relatively high hourly rate (for a survey site), and includes other types of small tasks (known as “microtasks”) that you can complete to earn money, such as watching ads and playing games.

The variety of tasks on InboxDollars means you’ll rarely run out of things to do. It also means that using InboxDollars can actually be fun. That’s a significant selling point—if you’re not going to earn much money from a platform (which is the case for all of these), the least you can ask for is that you’ll be able to pass the time enjoyably.

2. Swagbucks

Swagbucks is very similar to InboxDollars, and, in fact, is owned by the same parent company. It also offers plentiful surveys, as well as games and other microtasks.

You can expect to earn a few dollars per day on Swagbucks if you devote an hour or two to taking surveys. The turnaround time on cashing out and getting paid is 1 to 10 days.

If you’d like to get a deeper understanding of both Swagbucks and InboxDollars and how they stack up against each other, check out our comparison of Swagbucks vs. InboxDollars. Overall, we prefer InboxDollars due to its higher signup bonus and hourly rate, but both sites are safe and usable.

3. Survey Junkie

This is arguably the third-biggest name in the survey-taking space. It has a tighter focus on surveys than InboxDollars and Swagbucks—it doesn’t offer games, for instance—and it pays somewhat less than they do, but it’s still a legit site with many thousands of regular users.

Our recommendation is to use it if you discover that you genuinely enjoy taking surveys and you want more than you can get on the other popular sites. However, we don’t recommend using it as your primary (or only) source of paid surveys.

4. InstaGC

InstaGC is less popular than the first three sites we’ve listed, and for good reason: it offers a very low hourly rate. However, it does have a few selling points, including the wide variety of methods it offers to allow you to cash out your earnings.

Most notably, once you’ve used the site for a while and earned a fair amount ($50+), it becomes possible to cash out via crypto (Bitcoin). This is unusual, and it’s understandable if it sends up a few red flags, but like the other platforms on this list, InstaGC is perfectly legit, and so is the money they pay. You just won’t be able to earn it very quickly.

5. Branded Surveys

Branded Surveys is another relatively well-known survey site. It offers a mediocre hourly rate, but it’s relatively user-friendly, in contrast to some of the other platforms on this list (which can be more than a little clunky).

As with Survey Junkie, it might be worth digging into Branded Surveys if you’ve run out of surveys on its more lucrative competitors, but it probably shouldn’t be your first stop.

6. Opinion Outpost

As we mention in our review of Opinion Outpost, one of the main highlights of the platform is its relatively low minimum withdrawal threshold of $5.

Otherwise, this site is quite standard, and the pay isn’t great. Our tester found that it’s possible to earn about $1.73 per hour from it (counting the initial signup bonus that it gives you). Because you can withdraw your earnings fairly quickly, it’s a decent option if you need fast cash to pay for something small, but it isn’t a great long-term option.

7. Toluna Influencers

Toluna Influencers is another well-known website that will pay you real cash to take surveys. Unfortunately, our testing uncovered a host of problems, including a dismal signup bonus, a mediocre hourly rate, and a significant number of glitches in the app.

We aren’t able to recommend Toluna Influencers, except perhaps as an addition to a group of sites that you regularly cycle through. However, if you do give it a try, you can rest assured that it will pay you as promised, and it won’t steal your info. Like all of these sites, it’s safe—it’s just a bit frustrating to use, which makes it questionable whether it’s really worth it.