Real Opportunities, Side Hustles and False Hope

With the job market so bleak, it's good for us to fully understand all of our options for how we can make money. From my research and personal experience I present an overview of opportunities that exist and present my comments on how realistic and worthwhile they are.

A quick note before diving in: social media is full of people selling sensationalistic ways to make money, because that content gets more views. Creators regularly exaggerate or flat out lie about how much they're making or how easy it is. Always take what you see online with a pinch of salt. It's very rare to find an easy way to make money, and if it exists, it will probably only exist for a very short window before other people find out and the market becomes too saturated.

I've sorted everything into three categories — legitimate, legitimate but oversold, and deceptive — plus a bit of extra information at the end.

Legitimate

These are real, achievable, and reasonably close to what they're advertised as.

Armed Forces

There are lots of positions available throughout the Army, RAF and Navy in a wide range of different fields and with good salaries and growth opportunities.

Criteria: you need to pass a fitness test in order to join and also be willing to commit to a guaranteed length of service.

Based on my research, the fitness test currently varies by branch and role. The Army's currently centres on a 2km run plus strength assessments (medicine ball throw, mid-thigh pull), the RAF's is a 1.5-mile treadmill run, and the Navy's is broadly similar in structure. Alongside the physical test, you'll go through medical checks, background/security checks, and an intelligence/aptitude test. Better results here open up more (and better-paid) trade options, so it's not purely a fitness gate.

On commitment: for the Army specifically, the minimum term is 4 years from age 18. You can hand in your notice after 3 years, but then serve a further 12 months notice period before you actually leave, so in practice it's a 4 year floor either way. Navy and RAF terms are broadly similar (3.5–4 years minimum after training). This isn't a short term commitment and you should only consider it if you are willing to serve the term in full.

Worth flagging separately if you've spent time living abroad: cyber and most specialist trades in the Armed Forces require SC-level security clearance, and that generally needs 5 years of continuous, verifiable UK residency immediately beforehand. Time spent living in certain countries can be scrutinised more heavily than others. Official guidance says a lack of UK residency "is not necessarily a bar," and recommends checking directly with a recruiter. Standard entry-level soldiering roles are much less affected by this than specialist/cyber trades though, so it's still a genuinely open door for most applicants.

Teaching English Abroad

If you are a native English speaker and have a degree, there are plenty of opportunities to work abroad teaching English. Here is a breakdown of the options by region:

• China / South Korea / JapanHighest pay relative to cost of living, and employers often cover flights and accommodation. Downsides: longer hours, stricter contracts, and (China specifically) visa requirements have tightened in recent years.
• Vietnam / Thailand / CambodiaEasier to get hired with less experience, lower pay but a very low cost of living, so you can often still save. More relaxed lifestyle overall.
• UAE and Gulf statesThe best pay by far, often tax-free, but usually requires a degree plus TEFL and sometimes a couple of years' prior experience. Also the biggest cultural adjustment of the options here.
• Spain / Italy / Central EuropePopular for lifestyle reasons (easy travel home, familiar culture), but pay is low and genuinely hard to live on without savings or a side income.

General requirement across almost all of these: a degree in any subject plus a TEFL certificate (100+ hours is the usual minimum employers ask for). Native or near-native English fluency is expected virtually everywhere.

Domestic Jobs with Higher Acceptance Rates

A few options that, according to my research, have higher than usual acceptance rates are below.

• HGV drivingFully funded training routes exist, and there's a genuine ongoing shortage of drivers.
• Care work / NHS support rolesHigh demand and a low barrier to entry, though pay is often modest.
• Trade apprenticeships (electrician, plumber, etc.)Slower to pay off up front, but strong long-term earning potential and consistently in demand.

Starting a Business

You can start your own business, either as a private company or a sole trader. If you have money saved already, some skills and a network, maybe you can turn this into something profitable. It's easy to register as a company, which gives you liability protection. You can also get a loan of up to £25,000 to pay back over 3 years to help you (although this is a personal loan that you have to pay back). It's even easier to register as a sole trader. These options require a lot of work and effort, but if you have the time, ability and network, it might be worth looking at instead of just applying for jobs. Note that you can still receive Universal Credit for one year whilst building your business, and by going this route you don't have to prove that you are looking for jobs, you only have to work on building your business.

Matched Betting

Matched betting is a completely legitimate way to make guaranteed profit if you learn the method correctly and execute it without mistakes. If you have decent mathematical ability you should be able to pick it up quite quickly, and if not there are plenty of learning resources online, both free and paid, which take you through and guide you on how to do it correctly and safely.

In short, matched betting is a form of betting where you take advantage of bookmaker offers and bonuses, and you only make bets which have or which lead to a reward, usually a free bet. The trick is to bet both on and against the same result, so you only lose a minimum (the difference between odds), and then do the same with the free bet. The UK is one of the few countries where matched betting is a genuinely profitable side hustle, due to the relaxed gambling laws and the amount of online bookmakers. Most of the money is made during the sign up offers, as they provide lucrative incentives to open an account with them in the hope of keeping you gambling more in the future. It should be noted, however, that after you have completed the sign up offers with each bookmaker, the level of profitability will go significantly down, and it may not be worth your time to continue.

Extra notes:

• UK residencyYou must be a UK resident to do this. There are strict residency and identity checks from each site needed to sign up and withdraw money.
• You deposit your own moneyIn order to complete each sign up offer, you will need to deposit your own money into the account. You can start with as little as £20 but the more you can start with the quicker you can work through the offers.
• Use a separate bank accountIt is a good idea to avoid using your main account to make your deposits, as banks often flag deposits to gambling sites as high risk and it may be more difficult to get a loan if they see these transactions on your main account.
• Gambling can be addictiveIf you have an addictive personality, or fear that you might be tempted to start actually gambling with your winnings, it might be best to avoid this.

If done correctly, this is a mathematically guaranteed profit and not gambling. Before starting, it's extremely important that you learn and understand the method well, to avoid making mistakes.

Legitimate, But Oversold

These are real opportunities, but the pay, ease, or lifestyle gets exaggerated compared to what most people will actually experience.

AI Tool Creation

Very easy to build, and there are lots of amazing tools out there which hardly anybody knows about. Just take one look on Product Hunt and you can find all sorts of great tools being created every day. The oversold part is the "just launch it and people will find it" implication. Unless you already have a network you know will want to use your tool, you will have to pay for advertising to get it out there, and even then there's no guarantee of success. The build is genuinely easy now; the getting people to use it part is where most people underestimate the difficulty.

Flipping

Buying items online to fix, clean, improve and then resell is a possible way to make a side income, and many people are successful doing it. However, it is not easy, and many things you read online about how much you can make overstate it. If you have a niche that you are already knowledgeable about or have skills in fixing/repairing, this may be more interesting for you to research further.

Web Development

Before AI, this was a skill that was in demand, but now the market is very competitive, and it is hard to make money from it. If you are interested in learning, it can be a good skill that you can pick up easily with AI, and it empowers you to create your own things. However, as a business plan, it will be difficult to stand out from the crowd. The skill itself is genuinely learnable, but turning it into income is the oversold part.

Deceptive

These get marketed in ways that don't hold up once you account for the real numbers.

Several of these overlap with fraud aimed at people who are looking for work. For a full breakdown of fake recruiters, fees, and identity-harvesting tactics, see our guide to UK job market scams.

Paid Questionnaires

There are lots of sites advertising the amount per hour you can make doing these surveys which sounds appealing but in reality it is very hard to get accepted on them and the vast majority of your time will be spent looking for them, applying only to be disqualified or to find out that it has already been filled within minutes. My personal experience was that I spent hours over multiple days applying to multiple questionnaires and surveys through multiple sites and I couldn't get accepted on a single one.

Get paid to watch ads / click / test apps platforms work in a similar way. There are lots of promises about how much money you can make, but it is very difficult to get accepted and make any significant money doing it.

MLM / Network Marketing

Skincare, supplements, "boss babe" style schemes and similar are pitched as running your own business, but the real structure is built around recruiting other people to buy in, not selling product to genuine customers. Most people who join lose money once you account for the required stock purchases and joining fees, and only a small number at the top of each structure make real money. Worth being especially careful with these, since they're often pitched directly and personally through friends or family rather than through an ad, which makes them harder to spot as a scam.

Dropshipping / Amazon FBA Courses

The dropshipping and FBA model itself technically exists, but the courses selling it, often priced at hundreds or thousands of pounds, are usually the actual business being sold to you. The market is heavily saturated, margins are thin, and the success stories used to advertise these courses are a small number of outliers, not a realistic outcome for most buyers.

Mystery Shopping Paid Upfront

Genuine mystery shopping jobs exist but never ask you to pay to join or pay a deposit. If you're asked to pay an upfront fee to become a mystery shopper, or asked to cash a "mystery shop" cheque and wire part of the money back, this is a straightforward advance fee scam, not a real job.

Extra Information

The below options are also worth a quick mention.

Volunteering / Work Exchange Abroad

Sites like Workaway, HelpX, and WWOOF let you exchange a set number of hours work per week doing farm work, hostel work, building projects and more in exchange for free food and accommodation. This is a popular way to travel on a budget but could also be used as a way to live at a low cost without having to pay rent when you are out of work.

Other work abroad options include:

• Cruise ship workVaried roles, no living costs since food and board are covered, but long contracts and long hours.
• Seasonal resort workSki season in the Alps, summer season in Mediterranean resorts. Bar/hospitality roles mostly, decent short-term money, and comparatively easy to get hired.
• Au pair workLow pay but board and food covered, a common route for people who want to live abroad cheaply while picking up a language.

If doing any of this abroad, make sure you have valid travel/health insurance and have checked the visa rules for the country you're going to. This last point is also just research rather than firsthand knowledge, but "volunteer" work exchanges can sit in a legal grey area depending on where you are and how long you stay, since some countries don't formally recognise this kind of arrangement under a tourist visa.

I hope you found this article useful and it helps you to save some time and set you on the right path.

On Pathler, you can Explore Roles with salary ranges, qualification notes, and interview guidance — so you can compare real UK career paths while you weigh the options in this article.