Ask HN: How are you making money on the side?

Posted by arkensaw 7/8/2025

Just wondering what are y'all doing for side gigs these days?

22 points | 45 commentspage 2

rozenmd 7/9/2025|

I spend two hours each morning working on my "online laundromat" (an uptime monitoring + status page service: https://onlineornot.com/).

It's been 4.5 years now, could see myself doing this for another 10 years easily.

brudgers 7/8/2025||

I buy and sell older electronic musical instruments mostly from the long tail.

It is a rationalization of my GAS, gives me an excuse to take things apart, provides the satisfactions of repair, creates an opportunity to learn new skills, and makes a little money.

quintes 7/8/2025|

What is the long tail?

dhussoe 7/8/2025||

Investing most of the post-tax compensation from my main job in VTI, and leaving it there.

jurgenwerk 7/9/2025||

I sell handmade busts and sculptures on Etsy: https://jurgenstudio.etsy.com/

Most months the profits can cover my basic living expenses.

ActorNightly 7/9/2025||

My side gig is "reverse".

I work for a higher salary, just part time, so I have more free time, and my salary is sufficient enough to let me do all the things I want to do.

iamflimflam1 7/9/2025||

I run a small YouTube channel - brings in enough to fund my hobby.

https://youtube.com/@atomic14

muzani 7/9/2025||

Hackathons. Not a huge amount, only around $3000 so far, but it's a good excuse to push certain technology to their limits.

aristofun 7/8/2025||

Nothing lately. But some time ago - teaching folks coding, selling online courses

throwaway889900 7/8/2025||

I've thought about donating plasma. Might do it this Friday or something.

chistev 7/8/2025|

"If I draw, you lose, Iron. We donating plasma!"

VirusNewbie 7/8/2025|

Side gigs aren't worth it. If you're at a decent company, my boss feeling slightly more enthusiastic at my potential could mean tens of thousands of dollars more in bonus/stock at the end of the year. I'd rather work harder on work.

bruce511 7/8/2025||

It's a good practice to question the premise of the question when writing an answer. (In this case interpreting the question as "how do I make money on the side.")

There are indeed other reasons for side gigs, but the parent question here does seem to be focused on the financial side of things.

I would agree that work-related progress is likely to be more profitable in the long run. IF (and it's a big IF) there is a route at work to more compensation then that is likely the best use of your time.

Of course not all jobs offer that path, and in some organizations it can take a bit of detective work to find out where things pay better, or where more value can be recognized.

msgodel 7/8/2025|||

I think the current instability is changing that.

muzani 7/9/2025||

Exactly. I would have said the same 3 years ago, but these days, work hard, ship products, get laid off, and management pats themselves on the back for increasing productivity.

owebmaster 7/8/2025|||

A sidegig can bring you happiness that a few thousands of bonus won't tho. Also, the current market sucks.

burnt-resistor 7/9/2025||

You're never going to get moderately rich working for someone else, especially at a corporation without a union.

VirusNewbie 7/9/2025||

>You're never going to get moderately rich working for someone else, especially at a corporation without a union

I don't know what you mean by 'moderately rich', but I know multiple people who have saved millions of dollars (including myself), some of which who were able to retire early by working for 'someone else' - also none of which are union shops.

Do you really not know that many people have gotten quite rich working for FAANG companies? Do you also not know these people are much richer than union workers?

burnt-resistor 7/9/2025||

MS+MAANG only. That's a survivor-biased anecdotal example, not a widely-applicable strategy. Most people outside of the supersized corporations make around $60-100k, not $250k-1m+ TC at MS+MAANG. Founders exiting make much more, usually/hopefully several million per (successful) exit. I was making $10k/week doing tech consulting 10 years ago. Ordinary people, in specialized fields like contingent tax credit audit accounting, make much more on their own rather than working for someone else. This type of worker is, by far, more numerous in the real world™ of America than software engineers on HN.

VirusNewbie 7/9/2025|||

>That's a survivor-biased anecdotal example, not a widely-applicable strategy

There's what, half a million or more engineers at these companies? You think there are just as many software consultants or entrepreneurs making it rich? I think both cases are not widely-applicable strategies.

If you can get rich being an entrepreneur, congrats, that's great. Making ~40k a month doing tech consulting is fantastic, good for you.

But saying "you'll never get rich working for someone else" when many of us have half a million to a million unvested shares (or many more, if at Meta or Nvidia) we are waiting on is just false.

burnt-resistor 7/11/2025||

But not all in the US. 300k tops. 1.3M SWEs in the US. That's 1M SWEs and a few million more other kinds of engineers and knowledge workers who don't have the luxury of being in MS+MAANG.

I did some work for a civil engineer who did ASME boiler and pressure vessel code consulting who made $60k (2000 dollars) for 1-2 hours worth of work. He did between 30 and 50 of them a year.

Top talent turning a side-hustle into a sellable business can easily double one's lifetime income.

I think you're just stuck that your way is "right" and cannot accept contrary data.

paulcole 7/9/2025|||

There is quite a big gap between $100k and $250k.

If you happen to find yourself in that gap you can become moderately rich over a period of several decades by living frugally and investing in index funds with excess cash.

Or don’t do that and don’t become moderately rich. That is fine, too! It’s not impossible but you must prioritize the goal of becoming moderately rich over other goals.

burnt-resistor 7/11/2025||

That's a lot of added work and extremely limiting constraints when you can just get a better job continually rather than getting complacent and grow one or more side-hustles.

paulcole 7/12/2025||

I don’t understand what the added work and extremely limiting constraints are?

I feel like buying VTI is much less added work than continually getting a better job?

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