How to make money on cryptocurrency from scratch

According to a recent study by Triple-A, there are currently about 560 million cryptocurrency holders in the world. 

The largest number of owners are now in the United Arab Emirates, Singapore, and Argentina. However, other leading countries are not lagging behind. 

The attractiveness of cryptocurrencies as a decentralized source of storage, where you do not depend on intermediaries, and the high level of media coverage have significantly influenced mass adoption.

Governmental adoption (US President Donald Trump recently promised to create the first cryptocurrency reserve at the state level, spot ETFs are extremely popular in the market, El Salvador has long recognized bitcoin as an official currency along with the US dollar) has also created the preconditions for the average person to become very interested in the crypto world.

Yes, this world is still a Wild West with its own laws, where tokens can be very volatile and the general mood of the market can depend on many factors. However, if you study this area, diversify your risks, and keep your finger on the pulse of events every day, becoming an integral part of the market, you can really make crypto your permanent source of profit. 

Progress of cryptocurrency development in the world 

As of 2025, the total cryptocurrency capitalization in the world is $3.63 trillion, and the total number of cryptocurrencies is 16.381 (currently, this figure may be slightly higher, as dozens and hundreds of new ones appear every day).

The cryptocurrency market proves again and again that if you move, you win. So, this week, the XRP token rose above the $3 mark for the first time since 2018.

As we can see from the chart, its price has been extremely volatile all these years due to numerous lawsuits filed by the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), but a recent court ruling that states that XRP sales to retail investors do not violate securities law has tipped the scales in Ripple’s favor.

And on December 16, 2024, Bitcoin set a new all-time high (ATH), reaching $107,104. So those who have been saving the first cryptocurrency at least since the beginning of last year, when it cost $45,000, have already doubled their savings.

There seems to be an increasing number of such positive changes, which is why more and more users are turning their attention to cryptocurrencies as a passive income option. However, not everyone understands that there are different ways to make money on cryptocurrencies. Let’s take a look at the main ways that will be relevant in 2025. 

How much can you earn on cryptocurrency in 2025?

First of all, you need to understand that everything depends on your skills, knowledge of the crypto market, and the budget you can invest in this kind of activity.

You also have to make a decision at the very beginning about how much money you are willing to lose forever if something goes wrong from the start (and this is a possibility).

Therefore, before you start investing, you need to learn a few basic rules:

• do not invest more in cryptocurrency than you are willing to lose;
• never invest credit funds;
• never put all your eggs in one basket – diversify your financial portfolio and invest in different cryptocurrencies.

Of course, this will not protect you from significant market corrections, but it will provide you with enough protection against minor and medium fluctuations.

Also, keep in mind that you should invest in cryptocurrencies proportionally, depending on how volatile a particular asset is.

For example, you invest 60% in the most stable assets, 30% in assets of medium volatility, and 10% in high-risk volatile coins. In this way, you will be less dependent on the mood of the crypto market and save a significant amount of your own funds. 

Investing in cryptocurrencies

This is one of the most straightforward and popular ways to make money with cryptocurrencies.

Investing does not require very specialized knowledge of the market – you can rely on yourself (in this case, you can invest in the least volatile currencies) or on market experts who post analytics in their channels.

However, this method of investing also requires patience and a strong nervous system, because none of us is immune to correction.

How much can you earn on investing

Let’s assume that you would have invested $500 in XRP in 2019 when it was worth only $0.3. For all of those five years, you didn’t listen to the many experts and friends who were scared of the regulators led by the SEC and continued to believe in XRP. 

If you had done so, today your wealth would have increased 10 times to $5000. So your net profit would have been $4500.

Of course, we should also keep in mind negative examples, such as the SQUID token, which became super popular on the wave of the ‘Squid Game’ craze.

The fraud was organized by a “pump and dump” scheme, where the developer kept most of the token supply to manipulate the market. Investors who bought into the hype suffered significant losses. Thus, the token dropped by 100% and became worth $0.0111255.

Airdrops and bounties

This option is suitable for everyone who finds investing in crypto very risky. You can take part in token giveaways and receive your rewards for the actions you have performed for free. 

Usually, the actions required from you to get the coveted reward are very simple: like the signature, repost, make your own post mentioning the coin/brand/company.

Of course, there are more complex tasks, such as making a video review of a coin/project, writing an article, etc.

Such tasks are rewarded with higher rewards, but they also require much more time.

The most famous airdrops

An example of one of the most successful and well-known airdrops in history is the UNI token giveaway by Uniswap.

On September 17, 2020, one of the world’s most famous decentralized crypto exchanges distributed its UNI token to all users who had previously conducted at least one transaction on the platform before September 1, 2020. 

The number of UNI tokens depended on the transaction volume. 93.8% of the accounts received around 400 UNI, while a minority received $250,000 UNI.

Before the distribution, the token was worth about $3.5, and those who did not exchange their tokens and remained loyal holders could earn more than $17,000 at the maximum.

Now, the price of UNI is over $14, so in this case, you would not have lost anything, but would have earned $5600.

One of the most creative quests of its time was TwelveFold by Yuga Labs, where you had to complete weekly quests with a prize of 0.12 BTC.

Before you take part in an airdrop or bounty, you need to thoroughly research the project: find out who the founders are, what experience they have in conducting successful airdrops, study the project’s white paper (or ask someone who knows more about it, because it can be quite a complex document), read the tasks and assess the ratio of time spent to the complexity of the task. 

Staking

Staking is an analog of a deposit that you make in a traditional bank to receive interest.

The type of earnings is based on the principle of PoS blockchains, where each user proves the right to control with a share of staked coins and at the same time maintains the security of the network.

This algorithm was invented as an alternative to the PoW algorithm of bitcoin, which is based on complex mining processes.

The profitability of staking may vary depending on the type of blockchain and other factors.

Before choosing a staking platform, you should pay attention to the main indicator – APY (Annual Percentage Yield), which shows the annual yield taking into account the reinvestment of rewards.

Always keep in mind that your main task here is to analyze the correlation between the level of rewards, the reliability of the staking platform, and the volatility/riskiness of the cryptocurrency itself.

How much can you earn on staking

For instance, let’s focus on one of the most popular crypto assets, Ethereum. First, let’s analyze the profitability of the asset on Staking Rewards.

The annualized return is +3.43%: the token is certainly in demand due to the developed staking ecosystem. So if you are a beginner, a stable cryptocurrency will be the best option for you. 

Next, you need to analyze which staking platform suits you best. The main factors you need to pay attention to are the number of stakers, TVL, and rating. The higher all these indicators are, the better and higher quality the platform is. 

Some of the most popular staking platforms are Ether.fi, P2P.org, Allnodes, and Stakin. We advise you to thoroughly research each platform and the conditions for your asset on them to make the most profitable investment for yourself.

So, if you staked, for example, 1 ETH a year ago at a price of $2500, and the interest rate is 3%, then in a year you will receive 1.03 ETH.

Add to this the price increase and the amount will be 1.03 ETH = $3442. Of course, you should also take into account the interest rate charged by the validator of a particular platform. So the final result may vary. 

Farming 

Many ordinary users often confuse farming with staking. Unlike staking, farming is not responsible for maintaining the project’s security.

When farming, a user provides liquidity to decentralized exchanges or other DeFi protocols to receive income in the form of tokens or interest. 

Those who provide this liquidity are called LP (liquidity proder). Such a liquidity provider must provide it for a trading pair in the pool, i.e., provide two tokens, not just one.

After that, the funds provided by the liquidity provider are blocked in the smart contract to be used for exchange or other types of transactions by platform users. 

For this action, the liquidity provider receives a special token that reflects its share in the pool. The value of the reverse depends on its percentage share in the pool itself. It’s simple: the more you provide, the more you earn.

It should be remembered that tokens are always added to the pool in a 50/50 ratio. That is, if one token costs $1 and the other $10, you will need to add X of one token and 10X of the other.

The more investments come into a particular pool, the smaller your share is, and vice versa. However, always keep in mind the risks associated with providing liquidity to pools with volatile currencies.

In general, your revenue share in pharming consists of two indicators: APR – the annualized return you receive on the principal and APY – the principal plus reinvested interest.

Farming is a more complicated way to generate income, although the profits can be much higher. So before entering this niche, you need to study the subject carefully.

Investing in DeFi projects

DeFi projects are partially related to all other types of earnings, because the tokens of DeFi platforms can be a separate investment area.

For example, the UNI token, which we mentioned above, is also a native token of the Uniswap platform.

How much can you earn on DeFi tokens

However, DeFi tokens grow especially fast during a bull market: it can be tens of thousands of percent. Therefore, you need to carefully look at such projects, because there is a possibility of the highest earnings.

For example, the AVAX (Avalanche) token showed an increase of 3350%, and there are many such examples.

The main task in this segment is to track the most promising projects that solve the main problems and pains of users.

For example, a few years ago, Layer-2 solutions were launched, and users could earn a lot of revards on their testnets (Arbitrum, Aptos). 

Of course, there are also risks involved, such as smart contract hacking or other scams that can affect any project.

Conclusion

These are not all the ways to make money with cryptocurrencies: there are also mining, referral programs, and much more. However, no matter which option you choose, always remember that any investment is a risk, so assess your options at the very beginning.