Nowadays, there is a very high demand for developers. In the coming years that demand will increase more and more.
On the plus side, there are so many opportunities for developers to earn a passive income. With enormous demands from many companies throughout the world, the possibilities for developers have been rising each day.
If you want to utilize your technical skills in such a manner so that you can earn even in the long term with little effort, then you need to read this article on how you can earn passively.
If you are a developer and you want to make passive income, then it does not matter what language you are aware of. There are many possible ways you can easily make a passive income. Following are 27 passive income ideas for developers.
#1 Writing an eBook
You can write an ebook about developers. It does not have to be detailed about all types of developers. You can write about your story, how you ended up being a developer. What type of markets there are for growth and opportunities, along with the difficulties and hacks you discovered to resolve them.
Writing an ebook will not only help you become famous but you will earn more in the long term from the e-book. There are multiple sites, where you can upload them. You can upload it on Amazon EDP, Nookpress, or Ibook, and make moolah without moving a leg.
#2 Becoming a Silent Business Partner
If you want to earn money without working 24/7, then you can invest in a business or become a silent partner. You can contribute financially as well as by providing your software so that employees can use them. In this manner, you don’t have to handle the day-to-day operations. Your partners will have your back.
Once you have invested, you’ll get a percentage of the profits monthly. The income depends on how much you have invested in the shares. If you don’t trust any lame idea of your friends, you can always invest in their businesses and become a silent partner, and not actively engage in it.
#3 Blogging About Development and Programming
Start blogging, you can upload blogs on your websites or even small videos explaining your ideas. This is an extensive process. You need to first gather your audience. It is a long-term process but writing about hacks and tips and tricks regarding different types of developers will surely gather a big audience.
#4 Being Social Media Influencer
You must have seen many social media influencers earning big bucks. Yes, you can also be one of those people. They get paid for posts, for giving ted talks, hosting events, and much more.
You must also know that earning from social media cannot be done overnight. You need to be committed to your work, showing that developers can also enjoy their lives. With the constant hard work, you will notice that affiliate marketers, event organizers, etc. will start approaching you. You have to increase the engagement level among your audience.
Moreover, create a bond with the audience to make an income out of it.
#5 Outsourcing Freelance Clients
Once you have a stronghold on your freelance accounts or if your gig score is higher in comparison to your competitors, then you can start giving your work to beginners, freelance groups, etc. In short, you can outsource them at normal rates, keeping your profits aside.
In this way, you can build your team for your freelance projects. You only have to assign tasks to your team and proofread the completed projects.
#6 Developing and Selling Api Bridges (SaaS)
If you start a service by building connections between the software and the application, it can easily provide you with a passive income. We know that many companies these days are adopting API bridges, so it is a huge opportunity for developers to master Saas, as it will save time and cost for the company, and developers will earn in the long term.
This will also save companies man-hour by simply replacing manual tasks and converting them into automation. So if you offer API as a product to the companies out there, there is a huge possibility that it will provide you with passive income.
#7 Reselling Web Hosting
Many businesses require a space to host different elements of the website, like hosting their files and other things, etc. You can offer these elements to business websites.
But, you have to make sure that your services stand apart in terms of web hosting from your competitors. When you buy web hosting, make sure it’s in bulk, and in this manner, you will be able to add the logo to the control panel. This way you won’t only increase your branding but also have a positive impact on the promotions.
#8 Advertising On a Client’s Website
Once you have created your client’s website. You can request them by taking an order off their website. Ask them to reserve some space for your advertisement on their website. You can use that space to advertise your present services. If you have written an ebook, you can advertise the book link.
In this manner, you will be able to garner a huge clientele. If you follow this strategy it can effortlessly provide you with a greater deal of passive income in the future. This will bring clients to you without putting so much effort into marketing advertisements.
#9 Leasing Dedicated Servers
These days dedicated servers are high in demand as they are used by companies who have a huge amount of traffic. They are quite economical as they are known to lower the costs of routers, security systems, and other networks and internet costs as well. Another benefit is that they can be operated remotely. In this manner, you can easily work from home and make a fair amount of passive income.
#10 Creating and Selling SaaS Software (SaaS)
If you are tired of working hard and spending a lot of time making new content then you don’t have to worry now. You can purchase a web application and then sell it forward, easy peasy. However, you have to keep in mind that you must have the copyrights to it.
Many startups are unsure which software will work best for them, so you can study their needs and add on the requirements of the software. In this manner, you can easily make good money.
Usually, businesses require productivity, improvement in management, monetary analysis, etc. So you can design a web application that can help businesses achieve these goals.
#11 Finding Security Flaws and Hacks
There are several small bugs in companies’ websites that are easily lurked behind. Later these bugs move on to become huge security flaws. You can contact and help companies identify these bugs and help get rid of them. Hackers can easily attack a website when it has bugs.
So, you can offer your services as a gray hacker. This position can get you good money these days. This can work out quite well for developers since they can start off by charging high rates from the companies and then outsourcing these tasks at lower rates.
#12 Developing and Selling WordPress Themes
Developing and selling WordPress themes, that’s one-time work, once you’ve built them, you can put them up on platforms for purchase and make a good side income.
#13 Creating and Selling WordPress Plugins
Creating WordPress plug-ins can be a wonderful way for passive income, as thousands of people are using WordPress for the promotion of their services.
One opportunity to generate passive income is that many people are looking forward to expanding their features in their WordPress. You can create WordPress plugins for them according to their needs. Once the plugin is created, it becomes very easy to sell it again and again.
#14 Developing Game Apps
Game app development is pretty easy. Once a developer has developed a game app, they put it up on the play store (both google and apple) and then earn money on every download. Also, some apps have paid features, so they can earn passively from that as well. That’s a one-time investment.
#15 Selling Your Tools
If you take pleasure in creating 2D and 3D games and want to earn money from this hobby, then you can surely increase your passive income by selling your tools to game developers. They are often looking for tools to upgrade their games.
#16 Creating a YouTube Channel
Are you one of those people who hate writing, and run away from it? But you also want people to know about your expertise? Then you can definitely start your YouTube channel. You can edit your videos in a creative way and make money through your content.
#17 Creating and Selling Chat Bots
Almost every other company these days requires chatbots. They use these chatbots for greeting purposes and any responding to different queries. They help companies increase their productivity.
In the future, these bots will also be used as a service (BAAS). Many companies are looking for chatbots to increase their productivity. You can create chatbots and sell them to different companies to earn a fair passive income.
#18 Selling an Online Course
You can create one of the online courses of your expertise as a developer. You can offer it to anyone at low rates. In this way, more people can learn from your expertise. It’s the best step if you are a blogger or a YouTuber. By doing so, you will have more students to attend your course, and then you can increase your passive income, too.
#19 Creating a Trading Bot
It is usually very expensive to hire employees to work 24/7. Nowadays, businesses want to move towards more efficient work and to cut down their cost. This can be a piece of wonderful news for all you developers.
To cut the cost out, companies now use trading bots. The main purpose of creating these trading bots is to discover and report the distinction in exchange prices. Like cryptocurrencies, trading bots are also an investment and a profitable one.
#20 Automating QA (Quality Assurance)
If automated scripting is one of your skills then you can be a great asset to all those companies who require testing their automated software. Automated testing is used to check the codes and functionality of the software.
Moreover, it is faster than any other testers out there. Providing a company with fully functional code is a great way to earn passive income. You can find your first assignments by pitching to different freelance groups.
Later, after many experiences, you can turn it into a passive income by creating your very own QA processor and later charging recurring fees.
#21 Starting a Software House
We all know that opening up a software house is a great source of passive income. It is also one of the efficient ways to develop software. Your passive income may stream up when you build your own software.
After developing your software, the next step is monetization. After this, you don’t have to work that hard.
#22 Crypto Mining
We know the cost, time, and energy for investing in crypto mining is huge, but you can still make passive income out of this crypto mining. There are powerful and expensive types of equipment that are used for mining blockchains, lite coins, and bitcoins.
These types of equipment (ASICs and GPU) will make the mining process fast and at the same time ensure a good amount of profit. With constant effort, it can become an extensive way for you to make a passive income.
#23 Selling Animations or Effects
Animations and effects are one of the content pieces that will last forever. They don’t even need any updates. If you create special effects or animations once, you should know that you can utilize them by selling them to others. There is a huge demand for animations on multiple platforms, for example, unity asset store, engine marketplace, and markets related to game development, etc.
If you somehow find designs that are not up to date, you can improve them and easily make a side income from them without putting in much effort. Later, you can sell these designs to others.
#24 Flipping Niche Blogs
One of the other efficient ways to earn passive income is by flipping niche websites and blogs. There are lots of niche websites that are easily available on platforms like “flippa.”
You can purchase these niche websites, improve them, resell them and make good money out of them.
#25 Offering Clients Monthly Retainer Services
Offer retainer services to clients. For instance, you can offer your services every month for site maintenance. Once you have developed a site, you can charge a retainer salary for site maintenance that isn’t done every day.
So, in a way, that is a method of making passive income.
#26 Renting Websites Instead of Selling
Renting web spaces will get you money without having to work on them time and again. You can rent out ad spaces on the sites and earn money passively.
#27 Masternodes (Crypto)
For cryptocurrencies, we know that masternodes are required to do a specific task. Owners of the masternodes get paid so that others can access their tasks.
There is a fair amount of investment needed but it will be profitable in the long run.
Final Word
All in all, we can say that there are many opportunities for developers out there. It does not matter what language you are aware of, smart use of your knowledge can lead you to places and help you retain a passive income too.
