With the recent swath of tech layoffs — including another 10,000 at Mega announced on March 14 — and the continued demand of employees for remote work, you might be wondering if parlaying your skills into a side hustle is a viable option. Well, not only is it a viable option, there’s more demand than ever for these types of jobs that take advantage of tech skills. The bonus is that all you really need to get started is a strong internet connection and the ability to sell yourself. Many of these high-paying side hustles could see you earning upwards of six figures or more, depending on how much time you want to put into them —t hat’s another upside, as many of them are flexible enough to do on your own schedule. Work as much or as little as you like, or moonlight in the hours around your 9-5. You’ll be in good company, too. A 2022 survey by LendingTree found that around 44% of Americans have taken up a side hustle, an increase from the 12% of Americans who had one in 2020. As companies continue to lean on freelancers to reduce costs, there’s plenty of opportunity for high-skilled tech workers to launch or expand their side hustle — with some jobs paying upwards of $100 per hour or more. If you’ve got skills, go ahead and create an online portfolio where you can share your work with potential clients. List your services on freelance job boards or reach out to prospects directly with your services. Getting the word out about your services is key to ensuring you have a steady stream of clients. Here are 8 ideas for high-skill side hustles. QA testing Difficulty: Medium Annual salary range: $104,000+ QA — or quality assurance — testers are responsible for running tests on websites, applications, and even software programs to ensure there are no bugs or other issues with the code. While the idea of checking code might seem intimidating, you don’t need a lot of experience with coding in order to be successful and make bank. You really just need to know how to run the automated tests that inspect the code for problems, though you’re bound to pick up some coding experience along the way. Tech support Difficulty: Easy Annual salary range: $75,000 If you’re familiar with technology, consider putting those skills to work for yourself or for a company on a part-time basis as a technical support specialist. While there are certification programs (like Google’s IT Support Professional Certificate) (Opens in a new tab) that allow you to learn more about tech support and be able to demonstrate your knowledge to potential clients, they’re certainly not a prerequisite. Most important is your ability to take technical concepts and be able to explain them in an easy-to-understand manner. Web development Difficulty: Hard Annual salary range: $156,000+ In order to be successful at making web development your side hustle, you’ll need experience with a variety of […]
