Microworkers Review: Scam or Legit?

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Micro task sites like Microworkers offer a tempting proposition: Sit down at your computer whenever it’s convenient, and easily earn extra money carrying out small, simple tasks.

But the reality is that some of these sites are much better than others. Some are, frankly, a waste of your time. Others swerve dangerously close to the “scam” category.

In this Microworkers review, we look at whether this one is worth your time.

Is Micro Working Worth It?

Let’s be honest: Sitting at a computer doing repetitive tasks for a fairly small amount of money is few people’s idea of “living the dream.”

But these sites certainly have their place. They give anybody the opportunity to earn a legitimate side income from simple, short tasks. Working on these sites is something you can do to earn a little extra cash, whenever you have a little spare time.

Micro-working sites, in general, have a mixed reputation. Even the bigger players like Clickworker (review here) and Amazon Mechanical Turk get plenty of negative feedback online.

I’ve personally been very scathing about some of these platforms, with Hive Work and RapidWorkers receiving particularly bad reviews on this site. (We also have a round-up of microworking sites here).

Despite all that, I don’t think anybody should dismiss micro working platforms completely.

The ability to earn small amounts of cash for completing simple online tasks is something many people are grateful for. Micro working is a convenient option for all kinds of people, such as:

• stay at home parents
• students
• people in countries where earning opportunities are thin on the ground
• anybody who wants to top up their income, or add something new to a portfolio career.

As such, I go into this Microworkers review with an open mind – as I do with all of my reviews.

Let’s begin.

What is Microworkers?

Microworkers is a website where you can complete small, quick online tasks for small (micro) payments.

It’s also possible to use the Microworkers site to hire workers to complete tasks for you.

The kind of tasks on Microworkers typically only take a few minutes, and don’t require any specialist knowledge or experience. Jobs include:

• Commenting on forums
• “Liking” things on social media
• Completing surveys
• Signing up to offers
• Writing reviews
• Downloading apps
• Giving honest feedback on new websites, apps and games.

Is Microworkers Legit?

Microworkers is a legitimate online platform that’s been in operation since 2009. Plenty of people have posted their Microworkers payment proofs online.

However, it’s fair to say that the site’s reputation is mixed. This is illustrated by the average review scores on aggregate sites. At the time of writing, the site has a 1.8 star rating on Sitejabber, and 2.8 stars on TrustPilot.

The issues that plague Microworkers are common to most micro-job sites: reports of payment problems, clients using the platform for scams, and task requests that are ethically questionable.

Is Microworkers Safe?

Microworkers can be a safe site IF you use it with caution. You should be careful and selective around the jobs you accept on the platform, especially with anything that could involve your personal details or compromise your online reputation. Also, be sure to precisely follow the terms of use to minimise the chance of payment problems.

Where is Microworkers Available?

You can sign up to Microworkers from anywhere in the world. However, each time I update this Microworkers review, I notice that many of the paid tasks are only available to people in certain countries.

The most jobs available – by a significant margin – are for those in the US, UK, Australia, New Zealand and Canada.

This isn’t great news for people elsewhere, but at least the platform does allow signups from all over the world, which many sites don’t.

Microworkers Review: Our Experiences

The Basics

The registration process is nice and simple, requiring your basic details, along with your mailing address and date of birth. 

Microworkers is very strict about only allowing one sign-up per person, and this is made abundantly clear. It is one address “per person / IP / computer.” Many sites have a policy like this, and often the complaints come from those who have tried to “work around” the rules. Don’t do it!

Once you have your Microworkers login, you gain access to a large list of different available jobs in a series of categories, including things like surveys, signups, transcriptions, social media tasks and review writing.

Before you can actually perform any tasks, however, you need to complete a very simple “Admission Test,” which only takes a few minutes. It confirms that you understand the basics of how the platform words, and have a reasonable command of English.

As you can see from the screenshot above, the tasks are varied. Some involve really simple things like logging onto a social network and liking or sharing something. Others are more involved, for example installing a mobile game, playing it, and leaving a review.

Pleasingly, on my most recent logon, I noticed more and more clients asking for “honest feedback.” One thing I really dislike seeing on microtask platforms is jobs asking people to disingenuous – doing thinks like leaving fake reviews. Leaving honest feedback feels like a much less “grubby” way to earn money!

The tasks on Microworkers are generally pretty simple stuff. You confirm you’ve completed each task by leaving the proof each client requests, usually in the form of a screenshot.

You then wait for each task to be “signed off” before the money gets added to your balance. Signed off tasks contribute to a “success rate,” which mustn’t drop below 75%.

In turn, this feeds into a Microworkers “reputation” of one to five stars. Workers with a higher reputation score have access to a wider range of tasks. You have a different reputation score for each type of work, such as transcription, data collection and social media.

The Platform

The Microworkers interface isn’t the most attractive in the world, and it’s not really evolved in many years. However, it does what it needs to once you’ve learned your way around it.

Given that as well as working, you can create tasks of your own (and pay people to do them), it’s actually quite a clever platform. However, there is a learning curve, with no shortage of acronyms – “TTV Campaigns,” “SG Jobs,” “PL Jobs”  – eh?!

Plenty of people work regularly on the site, and there’s a lively Microworkers Reddit thread.

As far as I’m aware, there isn’t currently an official Microworkers app. You’ll need a computer to use the platform, not just a tablet or phone.

As for the jobs themselves, what you have to do is generally laid out clearly for you, as per the example below:

It’s fair to say that some clients on Microworkers push the boundaries of fairness in what they ask workers to do. I saw some tasks where people are instructed to click and read through an additional bunch of guidelines to complete a task. This can seem a bit much for something that’s paying a handful of cents.

What are the Jobs Like?

As discussed above, jobs on Microworkers vary, but they’re typically the kind of things anybody can do, without the need for particular skills and experience – things like liking pages on Facebook, signing up to websites, and completing surveys.

On one hand, this is a good thing – it means there’s work here anybody can do. However, it doesn’t take much “reading between the lines” to realise that there is a darker side to what you’re doing.

Many of the tasks on Microworkers are about “gaming the system” somehow. But I’m pleased to say it’s pretty low-level stuff, such as boosting a company’s number of followers or “likes.”

On some micro job platforms, things go a step further, with jobs that involve:

• Being paid to sign up to sites in order to earn your “client” a commission (obviously more than they’re paying you!)
• Clicking adverts to earn the client revenue.

Clients paying people to do these things is almost always against the rules of the schemes and ad networks in question.

Microworkers deserves some credit here, because on my most recent trawl through the jobs, I didn’t notice anything truly representative of this “dark side” of crowdsourced work.

Microworkers lay out some pretty clear rules on what clients should and shouldn’t ask workers to do. Clicking on ads is one thing that’s supposed to be “off limits.” It seems the company is enforcing this pretty strongly these days, because last time around I still saw jobs asking people to do it, but there were none this time.

Picoworkers (our review here) seems to have a much bigger problem with jobs like this.

It’s important to be honest here, and acknowledge that helping people boost their follower and like counts isn’t something that makes the internet a better place. However, it’s good to see fewer jobs that present a major moral dilemma than there were in the past.

How Much can you Make on Microworkers?

Tasks on Microworkers pay anything from 10 cents, for something that will take less than a minute, to a few Dollars for more involved jobs.

The screenshot below shows some of the jobs available when I last looked, sorted by “highest rate first.”

How much you earn from a single job is less important than what it can really work out to over time. Micro jobs often only take seconds or minutes, and you tend to do lots of them in bulk.

We’re definitely looking at pocket-money-level income here. Microworking is not a full-time job (or certainly not a well paid one!)

You may find you can earn $10 or so per hour, for a couple of hours. But there simply aren’t enough tasks on the platform to sustain this for any length of time. There were 1290 different tasks in total when I last looked.

The total number will also reduce when you discount jobs you don’t feel comfortable doing.

All that said, if you’re not too “ethically concerned” about which tasks you undertake, you can earn a reasonable amount of money from Microworkers if you log on regularly and put in a couple of hours of work each time.

How do I get Paid from Microworkers?

Microworkers offers several payment methods, including US bank transfers, PayPal, Payoneer and Skrill.

Unfortunately there are some complications and hoops to jump through.

Most significantly, the company puts you through a KYC (Know Your Customer) process, and insists on sending you a mailed PIN before you can make your first withdrawal.

This is all to do with identity verification and making sure people only have one account, but it’s also a considerable cause of complaint about the platform, especially for those who live outside the US.

There are plenty of reports of delays receiving PINs, and although you are – in theory – able to bypass the PIN requirement for some payment options, these aren’t available everywhere, and people report other issues too.

I’m not for a moment suggesting that Microworkers routinely fail to pay their members. However, there is plenty of negative chatter online.

It is worth noting that a LOT of the negative reviews saying “Microworkers is a scam!” seem a little questionable to me. Some people even admit breaking the terms of service by doing things like setting up multiple accounts.

The minimum cashout amount on Microworkers is $9, but you also have to pay (sometimes quite substantial) fees, such as 7.5% for PayPal payment or 3% for a bank transfer.

When you combine the fees with the potential difficulty in getting that first payment through, it does make you wonder how many people fall away before they actually get paid.

You certainly need patience and tenacity for this platform, and I imagine quite a lot of people earn a few bucks and never get around to actually cashing out.

Despite all of that, it’s worth remembering that this site has been in business for over a decade. If it was routinely scamming people and not paying out, it wouldn’t still be in business.

Conclusion: Is Microworkers a Good Site?

Microworkers isn’t a BAD site, but it’s not a GOOD site either.

It’s hardly an accolade, but I’m going to conclude my Microworkers review by saying that the site isn’t terrible! It doesn’t list jobs with downright exploitative rates, like those on Hive Micro, and it doesn’t have the same problem with morally-questionable tasks that Picoworkers has.

However, that doesn’t mean I’m giving it a recommendation. There are many things I’d suggest trying before Microworkers. If it’s microtasks you’re particularly interested in, I’d go for Mechanical Turk or Clickworker first, IF they are available in your country.

All that said, you may still choose to give Microworkers a go. I know that home working options are really thin on the ground in some countries, so the fact Microworkers accepts international signups is a plus.

As previously mentioned, however, MANY clients on the site only accept workers from certain countries. Try to “work around” (i.e. cheat) these rules, and you only have yourself to blame if you don’t get paid.

Finally, the payment rules are unnecessarily complex and withdrawal fees are high. A cynic might say they’re almost designed to make it hard to get your hands on your earnings…

So, in conclusion, if you decide to give Microworkers a go, I’d suggest making sure you’ve exhausted your other options first. If you do proceed, there are some tips below:

Microworkers Tips

1. Many tasks on Microworkers involve following and liking things on your social media accounts. Unless you want to clutter your own accounts and annoy your friends, you may want to use separate accounts dedicated to this kind of work.
2. As payments on this platform are rather convoluted, it makes sense to cash out once you’ve reached the threshold, and check you get your payout successfully before doing any more work.
3. Be very wary of potential scams. It would be unwise to complete any tasks that involve handing over personal details.

Alternatives to Microworkers

Microworkers vs. Mechanical Turk

Many of the tasks on Microworkers are similar to those you’ll find on Mechanical Turk. However, the key difference is that on MTurk you’ll find MANY more of them. If you live in a country where Mechanical Turk is available, and you manage to get accepted, it’s probably best to concentrate your energies on that.

Read our full MTurk review.

Microworkers vs. Clickworker

Clickworker is a very different platform to Microworkers. Many of the tasks on Clickworker come from big companies, rather than individuals promoting their websites and small businesses. Clickworker also gives you a route into UHRS (read about that here), which can provide steady and reliable work.

On the other hand, Clickworker is only available in a relatively small selection of countries. If you’re not fortunate enough to live in one of them, it’s off-limits. The company is very proactive about preventing people cheating the system. As such, you may find Microworkers is a better option for you.

Read our full Clickworker review.

Microworkers vs. Hive Micro

Hive Micro and Microworkers are both available across the world. Both websites are far from perfect, but Microworkers has the edge, and would be our first choice for people without access to many micro-working platforms. This is because the rates on Hive Micro are insultingly low.

Read our full Hive Work review.

Where Next?

• For information on various other side gigs, this article has 30 great options.
• For a MUCH larger and more sustainable home-based income, learn all about how to get started in online freelancing with my Freelance Kickstarter course.