Best Paid Surveys UK

With many UK paid survey sites to choose from, deciding which is worth your time can be daunting. Which is why we’ve done some heavy research and gold-mined the best paid surveys in the UK to spend your time on and help you earn some extra cash.

Have you ever been surveyed on the high street? The last time my wife and I were surveyed, we were escorted to a room, asked a few questions each, and received a free chocolate bar each. Maybe that’s where my Dad Bod started!

If you have a little free time and are happy to share your opinions and experiences, you could earn extra cash by completing paid surveys on your laptop or mobile device.

It’s not going to make you wealthy or replace your job, but you could make enough to pay for a family holiday or more each year – an easy and (almost) effortless way to help beat the cost-of-living crisis.

Let’s take a look at the very best paid survey sites in the UK today, and how they can work for you. It’s going to help you decide if filling in online surveys is for you, and, critical to your success, we share what we think are the best UK paid survey sites.

The Best-Paid Survey Sites in the UK

Now you understand the basics, let’s look at the best survey sites in the UK. This list will give you an insight into the best sites for you to join.

The Fab Four

1. Swagbucks

Swagbucks is one of the world’s most popular survey sites. To date, Swagbucks has paid out more than £550 million to its members, and gives out more than 7,000 free gift cards to its members each day.

You’ll gain access to a large range of surveys on many topics, with payments in points that equate to around £0.30 to £1. The longer and more specific the survey, the more points you’ll be able to earn.

The surveys range from questions about grocery shopping to music, hobbies, and more. Some surveys pay as much as £10, though you won’t find these on the site every day.

Something you’ll like about Swagbucks is how you can earn extra cash on the site. It’s not only surveys you can take part in…

You can earn rewards and cash for trying new apps, shopping online, and playing online games. You can even earn rewards for allowing Swagbucks to collect data about your internet use while you’re surfing the net.

The rewards you can receive include cash, prepaid credit cards, Amazon vouchers, and more.

The downside? Swagbucks can be addictive, so you’ll need to be disciplined not to neglect other sites. Some surveys pay poorly – you’ll need to learn how to avoid these.

If you do join Swagbucks, you’ll want to refer your friends – you get a slice of their earnings every month for life!

2. Ipsos iSay

Ipsos is a leading market research company. It serves more than 5,000 clients and conducts more than 70 million interviews each year in 100+ countries. Not surprising, then, that this is a very popular survey site, with 6-out-of-10 Trustpilot reviews giving it 5/5 stars.

When you sign up to Ipsos iSay, you can be assured of a steady stream of survey offers. Like the YouGov surveys (mentioned in Best Of The Rest later on), each generally takes between 5 and 20 minutes to complete. You’ll need around 500 points to cash out, though surveys can pay up to around 250 points.

Like many survey companies, you’ll be asked a few qualifying questions before taking a survey, and if you don’t pass these you won’t be able to continue with that survey.

Occasionally, you may be invited to test a product – the more surveys you take, the more likely you are to be selected. This can be fun. You’ll receive a free product, and get paid to test it and take a short survey after.

Ipsos also runs focus groups for its clients. These pay much higher rates than the surveys.

By now, you’ll understand that ‘points make prizes’. The rewards on offer from iSay are among the best in the survey world (though the surveys may not pay quite as much as some other companies). These include:

• Global gift cards to use at a large range of retailers (488 points for £5 / 975 points for £10)
• Prepaid Mastercards (490 points per £5)
• Ipsos iSay Market (choose from thousands of rewards starting from 539 points from retailers such as Harvester, Primark, New Look, iTunes, and more)
• Argos card (960 points for £10)
• Charity donations

This is one of your must-have survey sites. You’ll receive several survey invites each month, be in with a chance of invitation to a focus group or product test, and have a wide choice of what rewards to convert your points to.

3. Branded Surveys

One of the best survey sites for UK users, Branded Surveys works with big companies. Your completed surveys are sent to these clients for review. Once approved, you’ll get paid in points. You need to accumulate 500 points to withdraw £4.50 – each point is worth 1p.

Surveys typically take 10 to 20 minutes.

There are also other ways to earn extra points on Branded Surveys. These include:

• Daily Polls – quickfire questions that pay a few points each
• Welcome bonus of 100 points
• Referral bonuses (paid when the referred user achieves a ‘Silver Badge’)

You’ll receive invitations to surveys based upon your profile that you must set up when you create an account. There are plenty of surveys offered, so you should always benefit from a good selection.

You’ll also be rewarded for loyalty, and Branded Surveys runs a competition that rewards the most prolific survey takers with extra points. If you are rejected for a survey, you’ll also earn points for applying.

On the down-side, you can only withdraw cash to your PayPal account. These earnings are paid in US dollars, so you may be hit with conversion costs, too.

The points payable on surveys also vary greatly, so you’ll need to be quick and select the best payers ─ but you can choose to withdraw as gift cards for Amazon, Airbnb, and more.

Branded Surveys has a 4.4/5-star rating on Trustpilot.

4. Y Live

Y Live (formerly PopulusLive) pays higher than most other survey sites. However, it only just scrapes into our Fab Four. The reason for this is that the number of surveys you receive isn’t constant. One week you may only receive a couple, while another week you might receive six or more. Another negative factor is that you only get paid when you have accumulated £50.

Like other sites, you earn points. It takes approximately five minutes of survey work to earn one point. Sounds paltry, doesn’t it? But you only need 50 points to qualify for a £50 payment into your bank (which happens automatically, like being paid by an employer).

Your survey answers are quality checked, and the points earned are awarded only after the survey is closed. This could be several months after completion. If you are screened out of a survey, you are entered into a monthly draw with a single prize of £250.

Have you worked out your hourly rate yet? At £1 per point, you could earn around £12 per hour on Y Live. It’s this earning potential that puts Y Live in the top four of UK paid survey sites.

The Best of the Rest

Panelbase

One of the sites that pay you just for signing up, but this isn’t the only reason we like Panelbase:

• You’ll receive a steady flow of survey invites
• Survey values are more consistent than most sites
• Money earned can be transferred direct to your bank account

You might also be invited to take part in longer-term studies, usually as part of a focus group. These can introduce you to other people and pay better. You may also be invited to smaller (or individual) video discussion, with earnings potential higher still.

If you are invited and agree to test a product, you’ll be sent a free sample and be asked to complete a paid survey.

You may also have the opportunity to take part in mini-polls, which allow you to enter prize draws – and could provide access to more surveys in the future.

Most of the surveys on Panelbase take between 5 and 10 minutes to complete. Longer and more complicated surveys can pay up to around £10 equivalent.

To redeem your rewards (cash or gift cards), you need to have a minimum balance of £10 in your account.

YouGov

If you want to take part in interesting surveys across a huge variety of subjects, and get paid to do so, YouGov could be for you.

This is a site with few frills and extras ─ though you can earn a little extra by allowing YouGov access to your viewing data on streaming services like Netflix, as well as your internet browsing habits. Getting paid to watch TV programmes is a bonus!

A tip here is to refer friends – you’ll receive 200 points when they have completed six surveys.

On the survey side, you’ll be answering questions on themes that include politics, television, film, current affairs, and more. Surveys typically take between 5 and 20 minutes.

Some offer as many as 100 points to complete, though the majority are lower-paying.

There is also another part of the app that offers opportunities to take part in surveys from brands.

While the pay rate isn’t as good as other sites, the work is interesting. You’ll need to earn 5,000 points to withdraw the cash reward of £50 (which can take some time), and you can withdraw direct to your bank account. It has also recently added gift cards as a payment method.

OnePoll

OnePoll doesn’t pay as well as some other survey sites, but it is easy to sign up to and the surveys are often shorter than you’ll do elsewhere. Some surveys will only take a couple of minutes to complete – ideal for coffee breaks.

However, these surveys typically pay no more than 10p to 30p, so you’ll need to complete a lot of them to reach the £25 (2,500 points) cashout threshold.

Screening out happens quickly – often within the first question or two – which means less wasted time and lower frustration levels.

Payment can be made to your bank account or to your PayPal account. However, payments can take 28 days or more to arrive in your account after you have made a payment request. The OnePoll app has a habit of crashing now and again, and may be offline for several days.

Overall, OnePoll is good for those just starting out or if you have short bursts of time during a busy day to fill out surveys.

Qmee

Qmee is a survey site with a difference. First, there is no minimum for cashing out. You can also earn cash when you are surfing the web, by referring friends, and signing up for special offers or free trials. On top of this, you can earn cashback from a variety of retailers, including favourites like Moonpig.

On Qmee, you can also take part in web surveys (which often pay a little better), as well as receive a constant stream of survey offers.

You’ll be given an estimate of the time it will take to complete a survey, and this will help you calculate how much you could earn from each survey. As soon as you have completed a survey and the money hits your Qmee account, you can withdraw it to your PayPal account.

When you are searching the web, you could earn up to 5p for certain search terms, but you won’t be paid for every search you make. To earn this way, you’ll need to download the browser extension. Do this, and you begin to earn immediately, just for doing what you would be doing anyway!

You can also earn cash for playing games on Qmee. Additionally, there’s a daily pop quiz that will earn you 3p for a correct answer.

Like most other similar sites, you won’t earn big money, but every little helps.

Survey Junkie

As a paid survey site, Survey Junkie is at least on a par with most other survey sites. You’ll get points for signing up, and the site has a great pedigree.

Once you have completed your profile to create your account (this takes only a couple of minutes), your life as a ‘Survey Junkie’ is controlled from an easy-to-read dashboard. This gives you access to what the site considers the most appropriate surveys.

You’ll get plenty of matches, and each includes the information you’ll need to decide which surveys you want to take. This includes:

• Number of points you can earn
• An estimate of the time it will take to complete the survey (which is fantastic if you use spare moments or coffee breaks to log in)
• An approximation of points per minute, to give you an idea of per-hour earnings

 You cash out every 500 points – and this is a simple process.

Survey Junkie started its life in the United States, and the offering is more advanced there. For example, in the UK, it is purely a survey site. In the United States, you can earn in other ways, too. These include monitoring your online activity, product testing, focus groups, and telephone surveys. Hopefully, these will come to the UK soon.

Another downside is that you can only get paid to a PayPal account at present – again, we hope that they expand this to include gift vouchers in the future.

Valued Opinions

If you prefer to be paid in gift vouchers for your efforts, then Valued Opinions could be your go-to survey site. On signing up, you’ll get a £1 bonus to start. You’ll need to accumulate at least £10.50 to cash out.

Surveys pay up to £6, and you’ll also have opportunities to test products and take part in longer-term studies that pay more. There are usually plenty of surveys to choose from, and often more than other comparable sites.

You may be asked to fill in a weekly diary or visit price comparison sites – again, these are better-paying gigs on the site and can pay as much as £20.

Now and again you may even have the opportunity to order a takeaway (paid for) and complete a survey for which you’ll get paid!

All sounds good, but there are a couple of drawbacks. First, though each survey or task has a cash payment, you can only withdraw by selecting a gift voucher. Second, you’ll be charged 50p each time you convert to a gift voucher. Retailers that you can select include:

• Amazon
• Argos
• Asda
• Currys PC World
• Greene King
• John Lewis
• M&S
• Primark
• Tesco
• TK Maxx

One for the Young!

The Opinion Panel Community

If we were reviewing survey sites exclusively for teens and young adults (13 to 30 years old), this would be number one on our list. You get the equivalent of £10 in vouchers just for signing up!

Surveys are from big companies and universities, and they pay up to 500 points (£5 in voucher credits). The average survey is 150 points.

You can also earn straight cash rewards for face-to-face or online discussions (for example, as I’m writing this, there’s a £50 offer for helping a university understand what you want to learn in an Arts degree). You might even get new products to test.

When you have built up 2,500 points, you’ll be sent a £25 voucher to your email inbox automatically. The list of retailers who accept the Opinion Panel Community vouchers is almost endless.

Now, one of my personal bugbears with survey sites is being screened out of a survey. It’s frustrating, to say the least. But, as a member of the Opinion Panel Community, you’ll be rewarded with a chance to win £50.

You can also write articles for the website and earn yourself the chance to win another £50. (This is also a great way for budding writers and journalists to build up a portfolio of work.)

Finally, get this – every time you redeem a voucher, you’ll get 1,000 points toward your next £25 voucher! (Yep, you’ve got it, in reality you only need to earn 1,500 points for each £25 voucher.)

However, it’s not all good news. While 85% of the reviews on Trustpilot award either 4 or 5 stars, the ‘poor’ reviews often mention being screened out of surveys just before completion and a lack of survey invites. That will be extremely frustrating.

One to Wait For…

Prolific

This site is closed to new participants. So, why do we include it in the best paid UK survey sites? Because you should sign up to join the wait list. As soon as space becomes available, you’ll receive an email that invites you to join. Do it!

Prolific would have been in our top three survey sites had it not been for the wait list. Here’s why:

Pay rates for ‘studies’ are more than most, if not all, other survey sites. This is because the studies (surveys) are usually created by research students and lecturers at university – and these have typically received grants for their work. Because it’s not their money, they usually pay better rates to those who complete their surveys.

When you have been accepted, keep a watchful eye on invites, and be quick to get in on the action – these surveys get filled fast. With equivalent pay rates that can be as high as £50 an hour or more, it’s easy to see why this site is so popular.

Tips to Maximise Your Earnings from UK Paid Survey Sites

While online survey sites won’t make you rich or replace the job you hate (a profitable side hustle or passive income stream might), you can use them to make some decent income in your spare time.

However, this is only possible if you approach it strategically. Here are our tips to maximise your survey site earnings:

Sign up for at least four sites

Like owning an investment portfolio, having accounts with several UK survey sites will help you to keep a more consistent flow of survey opportunities. When one is underperforming, another could flood you with survey invites.

Remember that variety is the spice of life

No matter how much you enjoy sharing your thoughts, too many surveys could get boring after a while. Therefore, include a couple of sites that provide other earning opportunities, such as product testing, gaming, discussion panels, and so on.

Use your smart phone as well as your computer

Computers and laptops are great for when you are at home or in a place with space. When you are on the go, or hanging around a train station, or in a café, having the apps downloaded to your smartphone gives you the chance to use those available minutes more productively than staring out the window.

Make time to complete surveys

Consistency is a key to success, and this is certainly the case when you are a survey-taker. Make time to log in and search for surveys. Set alerts from your email account to notify you of survey invites. Figure out when you have time in your day, and create a survey routine.

If you can set aside just 30 minutes five days a week and earn, say, £3 to £5 each day, after a year you’ll have an extra £780 to £1,300.

Use those two hours of social media surfing for survey work each day, and it’s possible to earn £5,000 or more each year.

That’s the family holiday and Christmas paid for – or you could pay it into a Lifetime ISA or pension plan and get a 20% to 45% bonus from the government!

Learn to multitask!

I’m not a fan of multitasking. Trying to do too many things at once is distracting and often leads to sub-par performance or tasks taking longer to complete.

However, when you’re watching television, listening to music, or fishing (or any other activity that doesn’t require your undivided attention) could be the perfect time to log in and complete a few surveys.

Why Do Businesses Pay for Your Opinion?

Ever heard the saying ‘The customer is King’? This is certainly true when it comes to brands wanting to know what you think of their products and services. All businesses want to increase their sales. To do this, it’s essential that they give their customers what they really want.

Brands want to know how you feel about them and their goods and services. Most of our purchases are based on emotions.

Brands want to know if their latest crisps leave you with a taste sensation that makes you return for more. They’re desperate to understand how their customer service reps stack up – even how you prefer to be addressed on the phone. They want to know whether you prefer a red or blue wrapper.

As a survey filler, you become an integral part of the process of market research. You help drive the decisions that companies make when creating new products or offering new services. When a huge global business such as McDonald’s changes its corporate colours from red to green outside America, you get to say, “I was part of that decision”.

How Do Paid Online Surveys Work?

Before the internet became integral to our way of life, companies would send people onto the street to survey customers. These people, often carrying a clipboard, would be paid to collect customer opinions. How much they earned would usually depend upon how many people they persuaded to complete their surveys.

This still happens today. However, the big survey market is now online. So, how do online surveys work?

In a nutshell, you create an online account with a survey company. These companies represent lots of businesses, who pay them to gather information from target customers.

Once you have created your account, you can then choose surveys to complete. These can take anything from a few minutes to do. For completing a survey, you get paid (the amount varies depending on the survey site and type of survey). Usually, this is in the return of ‘points’.

You can then convert the points in your account into pounds, and withdraw your earnings to your bank account or PayPal account. Some survey sites also allow you to take your earnings as other rewards such as gift cards.

You can’t fill in any old survey. Companies want the views of their target customers. For a car manufacturer to survey non-drivers would be pointless. Therefore, you’ll be tested on eligibility to be surveyed before being allowed to take a survey.

Are Online Surveys the Gig for You?

Before you get started, you should decide whether online surveys are your cup of tea. Go make yourself a cup of tea, grab a biscuit to dunk (if that’s your thing), and think about the following questions:

• Have you got access to the internet?

To do online surveys, internet access is a prerequisite. It doesn’t matter where you are – you could be up a mountain – so long as you can get online, you can complete online surveys for cash.

• Do you like sharing your views and opinions?

Are you the sort of person who is happy to comment on Facebook posts, to let other people know about how you feel? Do you take part in conversations about the latest issues when you’re with friends? If someone asks for your opinion about a product you use, are you happy to share what you think?

• Do you have the time available?

Free time is key. You’ll need to consider how you can spend time each day completing surveys online. You’ll be surprised how much time you might have available:

• When you’re on a bus or train, commuting to work
• During your coffee breaks
• While you’re waiting for your washing cycle to finish
• The downtime between putting the kids to bed and retiring yourself

How much time do you spend on social media? If you’re anything like the average person, it’s nearly two hours. Could you spend even half of this filling in online surveys?

• Do you want to make a few extra quid with little effort?

Other than logging into your account and answering a few questions, there is little effort required to fill in surveys online. If it’s something you like doing and you have a few minutes each day, you could soon be earning extra money from wherever you are.

If you’re answering yes to these questions, then you should have no problem filling in online surveys.

Can You Get Scammed on a Survey Site?

The internet is a hotbed for scammers, so getting scammed on survey sites is likely to be a concern for you. If you follow a few simple rules, you’ll avoid potential scam sites and only log on to legitimate survey providers:

• Never pay to open a survey account
• Never provide your bank details when you first create an account
• Do your research – ask others if they have used the site, and consider how long the company has been going
• Read online reviews (you’ve found a reliable place right here!)

How Much Can You Earn on Paid Survey Sites in the UK?

There’s no set amount that you can earn on the best sites. Some claim that you can earn £10 an hour or more, but how much you can earn depends on many factors.

These include which brand is surveying, how long each survey is, and how much each survey pays – yes, some surveys pay more than others. Your opinion may also be more highly sought, which could lead to higher earnings.

Some sites also offer other ways to earn money – such as tracking your online journey or taking part in focus groups. The former provides passive income, while the latter is a higher-paying gig.

The Bottom Line

In conclusion, there are some great survey sites available to UK residents. While what you can earn won’t make you a millionaire, working on survey sites strategically can provide a tidy little annual monthly and annual bonus from little effort in your spare time.

In this article, we’ve suggested a Fab Four of survey sites to log into, and another eight sites that are worth considering.

By opening accounts with four or more survey sites, you should benefit from a steady stream of opportunities that will help you maximise your survey earning potential.