58 Websites Where You Can Get Paid to Write in 2023 (Even if You’re Brand New to Freelance Writing)

As long as you’re willing to do the work, it’s definitely possible to get paid to write—and earn good money—even if you’re starting out with no experience and no credentials. So, if you dream of working from home as a freelance writer, please ignore the naysayers because there are plenty of websites that will pay you to write for them.  The absence of a string of fancy letters after your name (you know, a degree) and your lack of experience doesn’t matter one bit if you can show the right kind of client that you can write!

ATTENTION: Before I go any further…This article is intended for beginners—people who are starting out like I did, with no experience, no credentials, and no contacts. If you’re already an experienced freelance writer who’s making decent money, then this is NOT the article for you, okay? Alright. Moving on.

How much can you get paid to write online?

I’m not going to lie—if you’re brand new to this, odds are your writing could use some major improvement—having the expectation to simply write and get paid instantly may not be realistic. If this is your situation, begin by starting a personal blog—publish content regularly to improve your skills. Practice makes perfect, after all.

Once you get good enough, I recommend you apply for some lower-paid gigs in the hopes of getting paid something while you practice, even if it’s not much. Look at it as getting paid to learn, kind of like a low-wage internship.

On the other hand, if you’re already a decent writer, you’ll have an easier time landing intermediate-wage gigs.

And if your writing rocks, then the sky’s the limit—you can get paid to write about anything, within reason!

Whatever you do, don’t go into this believing the “gurus” who claim everyone can start out making big bucks right from the very beginning. The fact of the matter is that clients aren’t stupid and they won’t pay good money for writing that’s not up to their standards. This is why brand new freelance writers who have no experience typically have to start at the bottom, honing their skills on low-paying gigs until their writing improves enough to command higher pay.

In summary, start low, improve your skills, then gradually work your way up to the higher paying jobs you’ve been wanting all along.

Okay, now that THAT’s out of the way, here’s the mother of all lists of websites that will pay you to write for them:

1. Upwork is a freelancing platform that grew out of the merger of oDesk and Elance- it’s now one of the most popular freelancing sites out there.  Whether you’re a beginner or an expert, you’ll see jobs where you can write articles and earn money.

This is my top pick for brand new freelance writers trying to build a career from scratch because there are tons of jobs to choose from, and you’re able to create an extremely detailed profile that helps you shine to the max. But don’t be lazy when creating your profile—if you don’t take the time to fill it out completely, Upwork will reject your application to join their site. Done right, your Upwork profile should take at least a full day to complete properly, and potentially even longer.

There’s no cost to set up your profile, but once you start working, Upwork will take a percentage of your earnings as compensation for allowing you to use their platform. They’ve experimented with various fee structures over the years, but currently they’ve set their percentage at a flat rate of 10%.

Upwork’s “Connects” are credits you can use to apply for jobs. It will cost you between 2 and 8 Connects per job application. The number of Connects required per application is based on how much Upwork expects you to earn from that job, combined with what they call “marketplace demand”.

New users get a one-time free allotment of 40 Connects. If you earn a Rising Talent badge, Upwork will give you another 30 Connects for free. For your first Skill Certification on Upwork, they’ll award you bonus Connects. Lastly, you’ll get free Connects whenever you score an interview with a client who Upwork considers to be “established” on their platform. So, that’s actually quite a lot of free Connects, and the good news is that they don’t expire for an entire year—so, once you score a good gig that’s keeping you too busy for new clients, you can stockpile Connects for a while and use them later when you need them. If you run out of Connects and need more, you can buy them for about 15 cents each—the minimum purchase is 10 Connects (which would cost you a total of $1.58).

*The above info for Connects can change at any time so please see the Upwork website for the most up-to-date info possible.

There are two freelancer membership plans: the Basic Plan and the Plus Plan. The Basic plan won’t cost you anything, but comes with a more limited number of Connects. If you’re planning on using Upwork intensively, The Plus Plan is a great option because it not only gives you more Connects, but provides you with information on your competitors’ bids. That information can be really helpful when determining what kind of bid you want to put in for a job, or even merely to figure out if the job application is worth the Connects it’ll cost you to apply.

Upwork used to have various skills tests you could take to prove your skills. They’ve phased those out and now only offer a limited number of Skills Certifications that are by invitation only—none of them are for writers though.

If you’re worried that you don’t have enough experience or lack the right credentials to get a freelance writing job on Upwork, don’t be. I had zero paid writing experience and zero credentials when I got started on their site, yet I was still able to land paying gigs as a total beginner, and increase my rates fast. Read about about my recipe for Upwork success in my best-selling book, Turn Your Computer Into a Money Machine. (I know, the title is rather bold, but I literally felt like I’d turned mine into a money machine after finding success with my methods, and the tactics I wrote about are still relevant today.) Anyhow, give it a read if you’d like to know how I did it.

While Upwork has been very good to me, helping me to get my own freelance SEO writing biz off the ground back when I was first starting out, I get asked a lot about what other options are out there. To this day, I always tell people to try Upwork first. But if you have time to manage a profile on multiple freelancing sites—on more than one website that pays you to write—then by all means cast a wider net for jobs and try some of these too.

Types of websites that pay you to write (and/or list freelance writing jobs)

I’ve divided the websites where you can get paid to write online into four main categories: freelancing platforms, article writing services, job boards, and websites that will hire writers directly. Read the summaries below to figure out which ones are best suited for you.

i) Freelancing platforms are a more controlled environment that tends to have more clients willing to give writing newbies a chance. For this reason, even if you’re not quite the absolute best freelance writer, websites like these are my first choice if you want to earn some money while improving your writing, negotiating, and client-management skills. Their rules typically require you to get paid through their site—asking a client to pay you offsite via something such as PayPal will be against their terms of service and could get you banned. The nice thing about these is that prior to applying for a job—unlike job listing search engines—you can snoop a bit on the client’s profile and see what other freelancers have said about them. You can cherry pick only those clients who have a track record of being fair to other freelancers, not to mention paying them on time. Additionally, if you do good work, the client can leave you a glowing review. You can then leverage these reviews to help you land even more jobs with new clients in future.

Important: One of the keys to making good money on these types of sites is to be able to pump out quality content fast. Here’s why. Also, it’s not 2021 anymore, and we’ve now got the luxury of AI writing assistants to help us write better, faster. AI is to writing what calculators were to math, and if you’re not up to speed on how they can help you, be sure to get caught up asap!

ii) Article writing services act as a middle man between you and the client and for most people, I don’t recommend them because I find it easier (and more profitable) to deal directly with my clients. These websites will farm out article orders they get from clients to their stable of writers. Wages usually start out low, and writers have to work their way up to higher pay by proving they can produce the kind of articles clients are happy with. After you submit an article that’s accepted by their client, they can usually rate your work—your cumulative ratings help determine what type of pay you’re offered for future articles.

And of course, it goes without saying that learning how to write quality content fast is an important key to earning well on these sites.

iii) Job boards  are comparable to the classified ads in your local newspaper. You apply for the jobs you’re interested in, and it’s up to you and the client to figure out payment details—PayPal is the easiest way to invoice and get paid for these types of gigs. Generally speaking, you don’t get to review the client on these platforms after the job is done, and they don’t get to review you either.

iv) Finally, there are independent websites that will hire writers to create content for their site directly. These range from really established sites that want only the most experienced writers to those who pay less but are willing to give newbie writers a chance provided they can produce content that’s top notch. If your writing is rusty, wait until you improve before pitching these types of websites.

At the very end of this post, you’ll find a bonus list of sites you can check out once you have some experience as a freelance writer.

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2. Freelancer

Before you sign up, you can browse the jobs listed on their site to help determine if it’s worth your time to set up a profile. Listings can be filtered by things such as rate of pay, skills required, and even language.

3. Guru

You can start out with a free basic membership to test the waters. These free accounts come with 120 job bids per year, and Guru takes 9% of your earnings for its fees. Fees can get as low as 5% with their paid plans. Similarly to Upwork, they’ve also phased our skills tests. They said employers don’t trust them very much and besides that, they don’t necessarily provide an accurate assessment of a freelancer’s abilities.

4. Hubstaff Talent

They don’t charge any fees, which is fantastic if you’re someone who needs to keep expenses to an absolute minimum. As with Upwork, you can either apply for jobs you see listed, or simply leave your profile up for potential clients to find whenever they’re looking for a writer.

5. Jooble

This is another no-cost option, and you don’t even need to have an account to use their website—all you have to do is enter the type of job you’re looking for (ex. “freelance writer”), and location (ex. “remote”), then search! They’ve been operating since 2006, and have hundreds of thousands of job listings gathered from thousands of websites. Their job postings come from a whopping 69 countries, including the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Australia, and New Zealand.

6. PeoplePerHour

You need to fill out an online application to join their site as a freelancer. Once accepted, you can send up to 15 job proposals per month at no charge (if you need more than that, you can purchase credits from them). This is a very high traffic site, so it usually has lots of gigs listed for you to browse. Once upon a time PeoplePerHour charged the client fees, rather than the freelancer. However, being an outlier must have been too tough, so they’ve now fallen in line with other platforms and instead take a percentage of the freelancer’s earnings as their fee. Their fee structure encourages freelancers to stick with one client for multiple projects: below £250-lifetime billing per buyer, they charge freelances a 20% fee. Whereas between £250 and £5000-lifetime billing per buyer, their fee plunges to a much-nicer 7.5%. As with any other freelancing website, their fee structure and policies can change any time. So, for full details please see their website.

All of the above sites have nuances that differentiate them from Upwork, but if you’re brand new to this freelance writing thing, the tactics I used for Upwork (and wrote about in my best-selling book) can also be applied to sites like Freelancer, HubstaffTalent, iFreelance, and PeoplePerHour.

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7. iWriter

This site doesn’t accept new writers 100% of the time. But at the time of this writing, they’re accepting applications from writers in North America, as well as South America, Asia, Australia, and Europe. However, that could change at any moment, so if you’re looking for writing platforms that pay, by all means check them out soon.

To apply, all you have to do is fill out the application form which includes a mandatory 200-word sample article on a topic they provide. They also ask you to write 200 words on why you want to work for them.

After you land a job, iWriter handles the collection and distribution of payments so you don’t have to concern yourself with manually invoicing your clients.

8. Textbroker

Because this is an article writing service, you won’t have direct access to your clients. Before you start working here, you need to submit a sample article for their editors to review and rate. Once this process is complete, they’ll provide you with access to gigs based on that rating. Lower ratings equate with lower pay until you improve your ratings.

9. WriterAccess

When this article was first published, they would only accept writers based in the United States. But now they’re also accepting people with residency in Australia, Canada, Ireland, New Zealand, and the United Kingdom.

During the application process, you’ll be required to write some skills tests—your results (along with your writing samples and any references you have) will help determine the initial rating on your profile. The higher your rating, the more money per word you can earn.

WriterAccess does not charge a monthly fee, but they do take a higher percentage of your earnings: 30% at the time of this update (June 2023).

10. WritersLabs

At the time of this writing, they accept both native and non-native English speakers, but require all writers to have a bachelor’s degree and to pass a test. Starting wages of 5-6 USD per page are low. Their rates top out at 26 USD per page for “native language writers” who have a PhD and can provide a 24-hour turnaround time.

As of the time of my April 2020 update, they say the 4 writers who earned the most on their platform made $4386, $3397, $2719, and $2644 in the past 30 days. Fast forward to June 2023 and I don’t see any new updates about that on their site… so for now I guess we’ll just have to go by what they said back then.

In any case, just think about that for a minute—the 4th highest earning writer on their entire site only made $2644 in the past 30 days. Based on that, I think overall earnings potential is likely higher on sites like Upwork (once you become established). The fact that WritersLabs puts a cap on how much you can earn “per page” definitely limits your earning potential.

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11. BloggingPro

Although many of the jobs here call for experience or credentials, there are some gigs that pop up for writers who have neither of those things. Keep an eye on their board and who knows—you might just find the perfect client to work for!

12. FlexJobs

They say they hand-screen all jobs listed on their website, to help avoid scams and provide higher-quality listings.  You’ll find a wide variety of gigs on their site—not just ones that allow you to earn money writing online—but what they all have in common is that they are flexible and involve either part-time work, telecommuting, or remote work.

13. Cision Jobs

This site has a wide variety of jobs that includes writing gigs! On the day I checked it out there were posting for a work-from-home technology writer for Investor’s Business Daily, and someone to write about celebrities for OK! Online. Assuming you want a remote gig, be sure to input “work from home” or “remote” in the “location” field for your search. Under “description”, try “writer”.

This site is more likely to require specific experience to get the job. So, before you use this site, I recommend waiting until you either have some experience, or, some sort of industry-specific knowledge/training/credentials that’ll give you an edge for the right kind of job.

Lastly, this isn’t one of those sites that tends to have dozens of remote writing jobs listed at once. So, to ensure you don’t miss any good opportunities, sign up for their email alert and get notified promptly when new listings that match your criteria get posted. You can filter by industry, location, salary, and more.

14. FreelanceWritingGigs

This is a cool site that posts job listings from a variety of sources in their weekday blog posts, Monday through Friday. They also have a job board that has new listings added regularly.

15. Indeed

Indeed collects job listings from a wide variety of websites. Their search engine is intelligent enough to know where you’re located, and can list jobs near you. This could be particularly helpful if you’re an aspiring freelance writer, but not a native English speaker, and are looking to find writing clients in your home country.

16. LinkedIn Jobs

Although this site is best suited for those who can leverage their past experience to land writing jobs, there are exceptions. To begin with, the majority of writing positions I saw there were looking for someone with experience or credentials (for example, either a degree in English, or a degree in a field related to the topics you’d be writing about for them).

However, I also saw a job posting where the client was looking to train from scratch a full-time intern at 11.50/hour (which, at the time of this writing is significantly more than the U.S. federal minimum wage). If you’re willing to sift through a bunch of listings that are a no-go to find the hidden gems, this could be a good site to check out.

You’ll need a LinkedIn account to use this job board. For best results, treat your LinkedIn profile kind of like an online version of your resume—be thorough when filling it out.

17. ProBlogger

This is a well known job-board for writers so if you see a gig on this board that interests you, expect to have lots of competition. The good news is you can find all sorts of freelance writing jobs here, ranging from entry-level to more advanced. You can counteract the effects of high competition a bit by checking the board frequently in the hopes that you’ll be one of the first to notice and apply for any jobs that fit your skills and interests.

18. Writers Weekly

About once a week they put up a new post full of recent job opportunities for writers. If you’re brand new to this and don’t have any experience or credentials, expect to sift through quite a few listings before you find something suitable. But remember, if you’re persistent you’re bound to come across some gems eventually.

19. VirtualVocations

That link goes to the writing subcategory. It’s not as much as a goldmine as the ProBlogger board can be, but some gems definitely show up there from time to time.

20. Freelancing Females

At first I thought this site might only be for females. However, their job board listings do not specify female-only. So, whether you’re male OR female, take a minute or two to check out their job listings and see if anything suits you.

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When looking for job postings on sites that are outsourcing their content, you almost always have to scroll to the very bottom of their home page and look at their footer menu for a link that says “Careers”, “Jobs”, or “Write for us”. Most of these are individual websites, but when I’ve found a parent company site that lists jobs for a whole bunch of websites they own, I’ve linked to that since you’ll get more bang for your buck (err time) by searching there for opportunities. Keep in mind that these websites aren’t always hiring writers—so if all you see are jobs for programmers, social media managers and that kind of thing, don’t give up—bookmark the page and check back regularly to see what’s new.

21. JournalismJobs

When I first saw this site, I almost skipped it because I assumed this would only be good for those with journalism degrees. But that assumption was wrong.

As it turns out, the first job listing I looked at did not require anything special for credentials. All they wanted was someone who has a passion for community journalism, produces quality work, knows how to create a smart headline, is social media savvy, and is willing to learn.

So if you’re a decent writer, their site is worth browsing. Sure, many of the jobs will indeed want someone with formal training in journalism, or maybe a Bachelor’s degree. But many others don’t need that stuff at all.

22. Back2College

This site is looking for writers who can share info geared towards older students who are going back to college to pursue advanced training or professional development. They pay 55 bucks for accepted articles.

23. Sports Collectors Digest

Sports fans rejoice! You can get paid to write about one of your favourite topics! This website looks for content about modern sports collecting, including memorabilia, cards, art, and autographed material. They also publish content about athletes whose collectibles are highly desirable, plus, sports collectibles auctions and shows.

24. BootsnAll

This is a travel website that focuses on complicated itineraries, long-term travel, and around-the-world trips—it’s best-suited to writers who have done some of that and are interested in helping others do the same. BootsnAll doesn’t always have openings for writers, but if you’re well-suited to their niche, it’s worth keeping an eye on their website.

25. Discover Magazine

This website pays rates starting at a dollar per word for print, or, $300 per web story. They cover a wide range of topics, including technology, the environment, lifestyle, health, science, and more. They like evergreen content that’ll remain relevant and up-to-date for a long time, and are looking for articles ranging from 600 to 1000 words in length.

26. ChangeAgent

Check their site regularly to see what they’re looking for. In the past, I’ve seen them seeking adult learners who are interested in writing about social justice issues. More recently they were looking for students to write about resilience and success skills. The pay is $50 per article, so not half bad at all considering the fact that their minimum word count is only 200 words.

27. Constant-Content

I wouldn’t put this site in the long-term work category, but if you need some practice honing your skills, and want to get paid while doing it as a ghostwriter, this might be worth a shot.

28. Cracked

This comedy website pays its writers and doesn’t require them to have any prior experience. If you’ve always had a great sense of humor and can transmit it via the written word, give Cracked a look. You’ll find their careers page, here.

29. DollarStretcher

They aren’t always hiring, but this is the perfect site to apply to if you have a background in personal finance (and if you don’t, they ask that you find an expert or two to quote in your article). One of the things I like about them is they provide very detailed instructions on what they’re looking for in article submissions, which should make it easier to get your article accepted if you’re good at following directions. 🙂

30. DropZone

Skydiving aficionados can apply to write for DropZone. They’re looking for content on buying guides, safety tips, advice, interviews, reviews, events and other topics of interest to their readers. Contact their editor to discuss compensation, as they don’t share specific figures on their site.

31. eCommerceInsiders

These guys don’t always have submissions open but they sure did when I checked them in June 2023! In any case, they’re definitely worth keeping an eye on if you have experience with e-commerce, or knowledge that’s relevant to the industry—check out their website’s menu and subcategories to get a feel for the type of content they publish. They pay between $75–$150 per article.

32. Elite Personal Finance

If you know a thing or two about personal finance, you may want to earn money by writing articles for EPF. Topics of interest to their readership include credit cards, business, identity theft, loans, credit reports, and saving money. The best part? They pay a whopping 300 bucks per article. Yes, you read that right!

IAC

IAC is the parent company to numerous blogging sites that pay, since they know content marketing can help spread their message. Here are some of the websites they operate:

33. TripSavvy

34. CollegeHumor

35. DailyBurn

36. HomeAdvisor

37. OKCupid

38. Investopedia

39. TheDailyBeast

40. DotDash

…and many more. For a quick and easy way to check which websites are hiring writers, the IAC job postings page is your one-stop shop.

41. iWorkWell

If they accept your pitch, you can get paid over $200 for an article. They’re mainly looking for content in the human resources niche.

42. LadyQ’s

They pay 50 bucks an article and are looking for content geared towards women on a wide range of topics, including marriage and dating, shopping, fashion, personal finance, social media, and more.

43. Listverse

Believe it or not, you can get paid to write lists on this site and they specifically said, “you don’t need to be an expert”. They pay 100 bucks for every “listicle” they accept. It could be a great way to build your portfolio and make some cash while you’re at it.

44. Loaded Landscapes

Photography buffs who can write can pitch an article to this site in exchange for $20-$150 per accepted piece. They’re looking for tips and techniques articles for nature and travel photography, how-to articles about image processing, and other related topics. If they like your work, this could turn into a long-term gig.

45. Matador Network

This is a travel site that seems to be always on the look-out for freelancers to produce content on specific locations. It’s best suited to writers who are well-travelled.

46. Parade Media Group

They specialize in content relating to food, family, and entertainment. Last I checked, they were looking for football writers.

47. Oyster

A TripAdvisor company, they periodically have openings for freelance writers who can blog about specific regions of the world. For the right person, this could be a cool site to write for.

48. SitePoint

This site publishes content primarily geared towards web designers and developers. If you have knowledge in these areas, it could be a good fit, particularly since they claim to pay “generous rates”.

49. Smashing Magazine

This site is looking for people to write top notch tutorials, opinion pieces, or case studies on topics relating to web design and development, and they specify that they’re open to first-timers. They pay an honorarium for any articles they accept, plus, they’ll give you full credit for your work, making this a nice option if you want to expand your freelance writing portfolio.

50. The Penny Hoarder

Writers in the personal finance niche who are located in St. Petersburg, Florida should keep an eye on the Penny Hoarder careers page. They don’t always have jobs available, but are worth watching if this niche is of interest to you.

51. UX Booth

Another website geared towards web designers and developers, this is a great place to share your knowledge if you have a background in that area.

52. TutsPlus

TutsPlus is a website that features written tutorials (and video, in case you’re interested in making one) on a wide range of topics:

• coding
• illustration
• web design
• photography and video
• business
• music and audio
• 3D motion and graphics
• game development
• computer skills

If your submission is accepted, they’ll pay you. When you go to their webpage, look for the section titled “Create a Tutorial”.

53. Healthy Place

If you have an interest in mental health and would like to write about anxiety, relationships, personality disorders and other related topics, be sure to check out their site. They can take up to a month to get back to you after you apply—so patience is needed—but if these types of topics are a good fit for your interests, it could be worth the wait!

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54. Compose.ly

Category: Article writing service

If your writing is really rusty, skip this site for now and start on a site that’s much better suited for beginners, such as UpWork. Compose.ly requires that anyone wanting to work for them passes their assessment. At the time of this writing, they say they only accept 1% of writers who apply.

55. LinkedIn Services

Category: Job board

LinkedIn is now competing with the likes of Fiverr and Upwork, providing you the option of setting up services and pricing so clients browsing LinkedIn can book you directly without ever leaving that website. Originally marketed as LinkedIn Pro Services and only available to U.S. freelancers, this is now opened up to freelancers in other countries, too. To find this option, go to your profile in LinkedIn and look for the option to set up your “Services”. Their menus change every now and then, so you may not see what I see on my own profile… but for me, it shows up as a section that says I’m “Providing services”, and I have the option to edit it as I see fit.

56. MediaBistro

Category: Job board

This site wouldn’t be my first choice for new writers with no experience and no credentials because it mostly lists jobs suited for applicants with lots of experience and/or degrees. But once in a while something pops up that even a newbie could try for. Use their filter to dig up entry-level jobs—if you’re lucky, you’ll find one that’s a good fit. Don’t spend too much time on this site if you’re brand new to writing though because odds are you’ll have better luck on sites truly intended for beginners such as UpWork.

57. WeWorkRemotely

Category: Job board

The writing jobs I found on this site were listed under the “Copywriting” category. The companies hiring tended to have high standards, but they also offered attractive hours and consistent work.

And if you’re in the mood, you might want to check out the “Other” category. Sometimes you’ll find cool jobs you never knew existed, like “Freelance Researcher” (they were hiring someone to do internet research for them!).

58. ZipRecruiter

The best way to find a writing job on this site is to enter terms like “writer”, “content writer”, or “blogger” in the site’s search box. You’ll find a wide range of options depending on where you live: there are remote jobs, and also more traditional ones where you’re expected to show up in the office every day.

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Next steps…

If you’re already a seasoned freelancer and you simply wanted ideas for websites that’ll pay you to write, then get going and start applying to the ones on this list!

But if you’re brand new to freelance writing online or you’re having trouble landing gigs, find out how to starting earning asap in my best-selling book. You’ll learn how to start from scratch and built a lucrative freelance writing biz in an often overlooked niche, even if you have no experience, no contacts, and no credentials.

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