Honestly been scrolling through all these money-making apps lately and there's way more options than I thought. Like, if you're already glued to your phone anyway, might as well get paid for it right?

So I've been testing out some of the popular ones. Swagbucks and Rakuten are solid for cashback when you shop—they actually deposit to PayPal which is nice. Then there's the game side of things. Solitaire Cube, Solitaire Cash, Solitaire Clash... all these card games that let you play for actual cash prizes. Not huge payouts but it's something.

The survey apps like Opinion Outpost and Toluna are pretty chill if you have spare time. Takes a minute to stack up points though. Some games that pay real money give you better returns if you're good at them—Blackout Bingo has like a 4.5 star rating and you can win real cash prizes against other players.

Mode Earn is weird because they actually give you a phone for $4.99 a month and you earn money using it. Haven't tried that one yet but seems legit.

The thing is, most of these apps that pay you real money require minimum withdrawals—usually $5 to $20 before you can cash out. So don't expect to get rich quick. But if you're already on your phone for hours anyway, might be worth downloading a few and seeing which ones actually work for you. What apps have you tried that actually paid out?