Are survey apps worth it? The honest maths
Survey apps are the most-hyped and most-disappointing corner of the "make money from your phone" world. Half the internet says you'll earn hundreds a month; the other half says they're a scam. Neither is true, so here are the actual numbers.
What they really pay
A typical survey pays somewhere between 20p and £1 and takes two to ten minutes — when you qualify for it. You won't always qualify: plenty of surveys screen you out partway through, which is time you don't get paid for. Averaged honestly, most people land at £2–£4 per hour. That's the number to hold in your head: less than half the minimum wage.
The two we actually list, and why
- YouGov — the surveys are genuinely interesting (politics, current affairs, brands), the company is a legitimate research firm you've seen cited on the news, and payouts are reliable. The catch is the £50 cashout threshold: expect it to take months of steady use to reach. Slow, but real.
- AttaPoll — the opposite trade-off: smaller, quicker surveys, but a cashout threshold of just a few pounds, paid to PayPal or your bank. You see actual money in weeks rather than months, which is why it's the one we suggest trying first if you're curious.
When survey apps make sense
Dead time, and only dead time. On the bus, in a queue, watching telly you're not really watching. As a replacement for scrolling, they're mildly profitable; as a "side hustle" you sit down to do, they're a bad deal — your time is worth more, almost whatever you do instead.
Red flags in this category
- Never pay to join a survey site. The legit ones are free. Anyone charging a "membership fee" is selling you nothing.
- Ignore "£100 a day from surveys" content. The maths doesn't exist. Anyone claiming it is selling a course or farming referrals dishonestly.
- Watch the threshold. A site with a high cashout threshold and a habit of screening you out of surveys can mean months of effort you can never actually withdraw. (It's why we list YouGov, whose threshold is high but whose payouts are dependable, and skip the ones where it isn't.)
Our verdict
Worth it for dead time, with expectations set at pocket money. £10–£25 a month for time you'd otherwise spend scrolling is a perfectly fine trade — just do the big one-off wins on this site first, because a single afternoon of bank switching pays more than a year of surveys.
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