How to make money with Toluna surveys
Toluna is most well known for its surveys, but there are a whole host of other ways to earn rewards on the site. Our review reveals what they are, and which are the biggest earners.
Looking for a way to earn some extra cash from the comfort of your own home? Survey sites could be the answer, and Toluna is one of the major players in the game.
Not only is it free to sign up, but the site has far more than just surveys to offer: we're talking competitions and even some games – all of which can earn you points that can be exchanged for gift cards or cash.
Before we get started, you'll need a free account with Toluna.
Guide to Toluna
What is Toluna and how does it work?
Toluna is an online community platform that lists frequent surveys you can complete in return for rewards.
Users who fill in these surveys are known as 'Toluna Influencers'. The name 'Toluna Influencers' stems from the fact that the surveys you complete are used by major brands to help them figure out what they're doing right, what they're doing wrong and what they should be doing.
Toluna Influencers are paid in the form of points. These can, in turn, be redeemed for a range of things including gift cards, donations or good old-fashioned cash.
But surveys aren't the only way to earn rewards on Toluna. You can earn some extra goodies by interacting with the Toluna community, entering competitions and playing games.
How much money can you make with Toluna?
It's hard to put an exact number on your potential earnings, as how much you get out of Toluna kind of depends on how much you put in.
That said, it's safe to say that surveys are undoubtedly the biggest and most reliable way to earn rewards on Toluna.
Their FAQs state that each one can pay between 15–50,000 points (depending on its length). But we've found that most of the Toluna surveys available to us pay 2,000–4,000 points.
Judging by the number of points required to buy each value of a gift card, it seems that £1 is approximately 5,500 points.
You can only cash out to PayPal in £35 instalments. If you want to redeem points for a value below this, you'll have to go for a gift card.
A few of the vouchers are for shops that sell pretty much everything (Tesco and Amazon specifically), so if you go for these, your gift card will basically be as good as cash.
What's more, based on the number of points required to buy each value of gift voucher, the Tesco and Amazon credits work out as better value than the £35 PayPal payout anyway!
What can you buy with Toluna points?
| Retailer* | Voucher value | Cost (Toluna points) | Toluna points per £ |
|---|---|---|---|
| Amazon | £5 | 27,000 | 5,400 |
| Starbucks | £5 | 27,000 | 5,400 |
| ASDA | £10 | 55,000 | 5,500 |
| Costa | £10 | 55,000 | 5,500 |
| Currys | £10 | 55,000 | 5,500 |
| Iceland | £10 | 55,000 | 5,500 |
| Tesco | £10 | 55,000 | 5,500 |
| Waterstones | £10 | 55,000 | 5,500 |
| Morrisons | £10 | 55,000 | 5,500 |
| Amazon | £20 | 107,000 | 5,350 |
| Marks & Spencer | £25 | 135,000 | 5,400 |
| Tesco | £25 | 135,000 | 5,400 |
| PayPal** | £35 | 190,000 | 5,429 |
* All credits are redeemed as e-vouchers.
** Paid as credit to your PayPal account.
Toluna also offer non-monetary rewards for your points. For example, at the time of writing, for 14,000 points you could plant a tree in Ecuador, Thailand or Uganda.
Toluna reviews
When we asked students in our Facebook deals group what they thought of Toluna, one thing kept coming up again and again: the amount of time you need to invest to get rewards.
– I personally found it took too long to build up the points, but if you don't mind the time it takes than I'd recommend it. There's all sorts you can do on there, not just surveys. Narice
– I've used it for years and managed to get the £35 PayPal credit a few times. Takes such a long time to get there though. Rochelle
– It takes ages to build up the points, but you do get sent loads [of surveys] every day. [Your points] also expire 16 months after you earn them, so I lost £20 worth of points. Sophie
– Yeah it's good if you're willing to put in the time and commitment, takes an awful lot of surveys to build up points [though]. Shannon
Toluna on its own isn't a way to make big money quickly, so combine them with the dozens of other paid survey sites to maximise your online income.
6 ways to earn points on Toluna
These are the best ways to make money on Toluna:
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Toluna surveys
Credit: Violet Giddings – Flickr
As we touched on above, surveys are at the heart of Toluna's offerings. They're the most lucrative and reliable way of earning Toluna points, and there are usually multiple surveys available for you to complete at any given time.
The surveys are uploaded by brands who then use the responses to inform their work, and they cover a whole host of topics.
We've seen surveys on personal banking, shopping habits, films, travel, sports and loads more. Each one is listed alongside the number of points on offer, as well as the time it'll take to complete.
There are two benefits to completing Toluna surveys: the main one being that the more you do, the more you'll be rewarded. But on top of that, the more surveys you complete, the more Toluna will send you – and the more relevant to you they'll be.
As a new Toluna Influencer, you'll often find that you're rejected from the survey after a couple of screener questions (e.g. "Do you have children?") which determine whether or not you fit the profile of respondent they want.
After a while, however, Toluna will take your responses into account and tailor the types of surveys they send you in future to your profile.
How much money can you make from Toluna surveys?
The majority of Toluna surveys pay 2,000–4,000 points and take between five to 20 minutes. But there are occasionally some that pay far more than this and others that take far longer.
5,500 Toluna points are roughly equivalent to £1, which isn't a huge amount – especially given that some surveys can take a long time and still pay a small amount. As such, it kind of goes without saying that you should always prioritise shorter surveys with bigger rewards.
Sometimes the differences in points and time taken can make this choice tricky. But don't sweat it. You can quickly calculate this by dividing the number of points on offer by the number of minutes Toluna says it'll take, leaving you with what we'll call the Points Per Minute (PPM).
To demonstrate this, let's use the two examples in the image above.
The General survey pays 3,000 points and takes 10 minutes, meaning you can earn up to 300 PPM.
Meanwhile, the Lifestyle survey pays 4,000 points and takes 20 minutes, meaning you can earn 200 PPM. Clearly, the General survey is the most economical use of your time!
If you want to take things to the next level, you could even convert the PPM into an equivalent hourly salary. All you need to do is multiply the PPM by 60 to get the hourly points rate and then divide the remaining figure by 5,500 (the approximate value of £1 in Toluna points).
We worked out the equivalent hourly rate for all of the surveys available to us at the time of writing and found that the average pay was about £2.50 per hour. That said, there were some outliers – one paid almost £5.50 per hour, and another paid just £0.82 per hour.
As you might have guessed, these figures fall well short of the UK National Minimum Wage. But rather than binning off the surveys altogether, we'd recommend sticking to the ones with the highest equivalent hourly rate.
For example, the General survey from the picture above pays an equivalent of £3.27 per hour. This is still below minimum wage for those aged 18 or above, but not an awful way to earn a little extra cash.
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Complete your profile surveys
Click on the 'Account' tab in the menu, you'll find a section called 'Profile surveys'. Unsurprisingly, these surveys help to give Toluna a better idea of the kind of person you are, as well as what you're interested in.
There are 13 profile surveys in total, with each one paying up to 100 points and taking a couple of minutes apiece.
You can only complete each survey once. It's best to do so when you first sign up to Toluna as going forward it should mean you're only presented with surveys relevant to you.
In terms of the effort required and the points on offer, profile surveys are definitely one of the best ways to start earning on Toluna.
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Vote in sponsored polls
Head to the 'Sponsored Polls' tab at the top of the screen once again and you'll find a whole host of simple, multiple-choice polls.
This will redirect you to the polls in the community which have a points reward (usually 15 points apiece). Each poll takes just a couple of seconds to complete.
A heads up for you, though. In the past, we've spotted sponsored polls with no points reward at all.
Although you won't lose much time by answering these, it's always nice to be rewarded for your efforts. So, give the 'Vote' button a quick check first – unless it specifies a points value, there won't be any bonus for taking part.
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Take part in a contest
Credit: Ververidis Vasilis – Shutterstock
Toluna runs monthly contests to encourage users to post more content in the community. In return, those who participate are often rewarded with some points and entered into a prize draw.
Take, for instance, their 2023 October contest. Toluna Influencers were asked to guess the object in a zoomed-in image.
Of those who took part, five were then chosen at random to receive up to 1,000 points each. Not bad for a quick game!
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Refer a friend to Toluna
We love a referral bonus here at Save the Student. And happy days, Toluna has one too.
Share your referral link with your mates and you'll get 500 bonus points for every friend (up to 10 each month) that successfully signs up.
Oh, and before you try to set up some fake email accounts to refer yourself, Toluna say they check each referral to make sure it's legit!
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Play Toluna's games
Under the 'Games' tab in the navigation bar, you'll see that Toluna also has a few fun little distractions for you to play.
Some games are always there, while some are only available for a limited time. But crucially, some can also win you points.
All the games are free to play, and the primary chance to win points is the Daily Toluna Wheel. All you need to do is spin the wheel and you could win anything from 40–1,000 bonus points – assuming you don't land on the dreaded 'Better luck next time' spot.
Clearly using Toluna is never going to make you a millionaire. But if you're willing to put in the hours, you can certainly make a small amount of extra cash on the site.
It's free to join, so it's worth signing up and giving it a go to see if it works for you!
Take your survey game to the next level – check out our list of the best product testing companies and start receiving all the freebies you could ever want.
