The COVID-19 pandemic unlocked the door for remote work, a door that’s not likely to close anytime soon. StrongDM reports that in 2025, there are three times as many remote jobs as there were in 2020.
This, in turn, has led to profitable opportunities for university students. How so? Many students work their way through school, juggling classwork, homework, extracurricular activities, and a part-time job. Below, we’ll look at the benefits of the shift towards online jobs for students and highlight our top picks.
Working online (instead of traveling to a job site) has its advantages for college students. These include:
Check out these online jobs perfect for university students. Find one that matches your major or interests.
Freelancing is one of the best ways to put your skills to use, be they writing, photography, editing, web design, or graphic design skills. You can find customers by creating an online presence — a personal website, social media, and a Google listing are a good place to start.
You can also find work using general freelancing platforms like Fiverr and Upwork, or brokerage platforms like Textbroker for content writing and Ocus for photography.
Did you know that you can get paid for having conversations? Many adult English learners and the parents of children want to interact with native English speakers to improve their skills. When teaching children, you may be required to write and submit lesson plans in advance. Some platforms require a bachelor’s degree (which may not be a problem if you’re a graduate student), but others, such as Cambly, do not.
Artificial intelligence (AI) is still a work in progress, and its responses to prompts can be inaccurate, biased, or even hallucinatory. AI moderators check prompts for accuracy and flag inappropriate outputs.
About 16 percent of all sales were made online during a recent fiscal quarter, up from 15 percent at the same time last year. Students can tap into this by creating original products for sale or reselling existing ones.
Etsy is a well-known marketplace for selling handmade items, and a number of platforms, such as Zazzle and Printify, allow users to design items that are printed and droppshipped on demand. This is especially valuable for students who may not have a lot of space for storing inventory.
Retail arbitrage, or reselling items, is another option. Students with a good eye for fashion labels or collectables may be able to purchase inexpensive items from thrift stores and resell them for a profit on eBay, Poshmark, or Mercari.
University students can earn money mining Bitcoin or similar cryptocurrencies, but it requires careful consideration of costs, risks, and technical know-how. Mining involves using high-powered computers to solve complex mathematical problems that validate transactions on the blockchain. Successful miners earn Bitcoin as a reward, but with today’s competitive landscape, solo mining isn’t usually profitable without access to specialized hardware such as application-specific integrated circuits (ASICs), cheap electricity, and technical expertise.
Instead, students might consider joining mining pools, which allow participants to combine computing power and split rewards. Before getting started, ensure mining doesn’t violate campus internet or dorm policies. When done responsibly, it can be a passive income stream or a gateway to deeper involvement in crypto and blockchain technology, especially for technology-focused majors.
Working online can help students pay the bills while maintaining a reasonable schedule and learning valuable skills. With technology changing every day, keep your eyes open for new online job opportunities.
