23 Easy-to-Start Part Time Business Ideas

Starting a part-time business can be a fantastic way to earn extra income, pursue your passions, and achieve a better work-life balance. With the rise of the gig economy and digital technologies, it’s easier than ever to start a part-time business that can be managed alongside a full-time job. Imagine being your own boss, working on your own schedule, and having the potential to earn unlimited income. Sounds appealing, right?

A part-time business allows you to dip your toes into entrepreneurship without the risk of quitting your full-time job. You can start small, dedicating just a few hours a week, and gradually scale up as your business grows. This flexibility means you can maintain your current lifestyle while exploring new opportunities.

Moreover, a part-time business can provide a sense of fulfillment and purpose. Whether you’re passionate about crafting, fitness, or digital marketing, turning your interests into a business can be incredibly rewarding. It’s not just about the money; it’s about doing something you love and seeing it flourish.

So, if you’ve ever dreamed of being your own boss and working on your own schedule, a part-time business might be the perfect solution, letting you start small and build when you’re ready. It’s a chance to explore your entrepreneurial spirit, gain new skills, and potentially create a successful business that could one day become your full-time gig.

Here are some of our favorite, proven ideas, as well as some of the easiest businesses to start. With a few hours of dedication each week, you can turn your dream of a side business into a reality.

1. Etsy Shop/Craft Business

Do you enjoy arts and crafts? Why not make money doing it? Today, the Internet has dramatically expanded the opportunity and ease with which one can break into the craft business. With websites like Etsy.com, you can not only find a place to sell your goods but also get an idea of what other people are making money on. You can open up your own shop without all the expensive overhead of having a storefront.

Before you dive in headfirst, it’s recommended to carefully plan it out. Decide what your target market is, what will appeal to your customers, the prices they’d be willing to pay, and how you’ll differentiate yourself from other shops. In a way, you’ll need to make your own business plan. If you can, it’s also worth putting together your own website, building up an email list, and establishing a presence on social media. Managing social media accounts is crucial to driving traffic and engagement and enhancing your online presence and customer interaction.

This is a particularly cool business because you can start as small as you want, working as few hours as you like. Yet, if you create something that catches on, you could build a reputable brand — the upside is unlimited!

2. Dog Walking Business

If you like spending time outside and you enjoy dogs, why not combine the two loves? Dog walking seems like such a simple business that you might feel it’s not legit, but you can make a lot of money with even a simple business. You can even start with just one client and scale your business from there, potentially growing into a full operation. You could even add pet sitting to your services later on.

Dog walking requires a personal touch; people don’t want to let just anyone walk their dog. But if you can build trust with your customers, you can reasonably expect a reliable income source from dog walking. Customers who like you will call on your services regularly, and they’ll probably recommend you to their fellow pet owners.

3. Home Landscaping

What could be an easier way to make money than pushing a lawnmower around or sweeping a rake? Well, having someone else do it for you and still getting paid for it! With this business, you can have both. You can start out doing the yard work yourself and then hire others to do the actual work as you expand.

There are lots of great things about doing this business on the weekend beyond the most obvious: that you get to keep your day job. For one, your customers are more likely to be at home on the weekend. So, it’s easy to line up multiple appointments on the weekend. Also, you get to work outside — a nice break from your desk job.

This business is easy to market, too. Of course, you can have a website, but I’d also walk around door to door with simple flyers and a warm smile.

Learn more about starting your own landscaping company.

4. Start a blog

Plenty of people have made a fortune with their blog. For example, the founders of the Huffington Post sold their blog for a cool $315 million. And it’s possible you could be incredibly successful, too. Plus, a blog is a very low-cost business — you can start one for just about nothing.

However, to make money with a blog, you’ll need to have a huge number of readers. Ideally, you should focus on a highly monetizable topic. While the Huffington Post is a general-interest blog, most people will be more likely to succeed with a special-interest blog, laser-focused on one topic. With the right strategy, a blog can be a successful online business.

You could, for example, start a blog based on one of your hobbies. Or, you could focus on a professional or work related topic. Alternatively, if you’re familiar with your town’s history and goings on, you could write a local interest blog. Basically, if you’re interested in it (and other people are, too), you can make a blog with it.

5. Become a personal trainer

If you’re into working out and keeping fit, then this could be a great business for you. You can offer your personal training online, over Zoom, for example. And, of course, you could offer it in person at your customers’ homes, at your house, or at a nearby health club (with permission, of course).

If you have a passion for a particular sport, you could focus on that instead of general fitness. For example, soccer coaches can charge a lot of money to coach aspiring teenage and preteen soccer stars. You could offer training sessions at a customer’s home, a local park, or even the local school (again, with permission from the athletics director).

With just a very few regular clients, you could make an excellent side income with this business. Who knows, you might even decide to do it full time.

6. Catering or Bartending Service

A full-fledged catering service or bartending service can be a stressful full-time business. But there’s no rule saying you have to cater full time. In fact, bartending or catering on the side might be a great way to combine your passion for food and drink with your day job. Maybe you rent yourself out as a personal chef, or you could cater parties on the weekend.

This business can be incredibly rewarding, but there will be challenges to overcome. For example, you’ll need to build a client list, price your menu correctly, get licenses and health permits, and so on. But with diligence and a sound business strategy, you may find yourself busy enough to take it full time.

7. Mobile Car Washing and Detailing

Regular car washes require a significant investment and aren’t always easy to get approved by the local zoning board. Also, they require lots of water, which costs more than you would think.

But in comparison, a mobile car washing and detailing business has basically no expenses (other than a little soap, a couple of sponges, and old towels). Plus, you get to use the water at your client’s house! No investment, no overhead, and high demand. A lot of people want to have their car washed at home on the weekends.  So it’s a great candidate for a part-time, weekend business.

The challenge? You’ll need to have your boots on the ground to build your reputation as a reliable, convenient car detailer. But if you can build a solid list of clients who want their car washed every weekend (or every other week), you can turn this business into an excellent side hustle.

8. Candle Making

Lots of people like to make their home feel cozy and inviting, and a good candle is an excellent step in the right direction. But health-conscious customers like to know that the candles they burn are safe and ethically sourced, making candle making a solid side hustle. Plus, it’s a good home-based business.

A candle-making business costs little to start; with a few molds or jars, wicks, wax, and scent, you can make your very first batch, sell them, and buy more supplies with the profits you make. From there, you can add new seasonal candles or even develop your own scents.

There are lots of places you can sell your candles, too. You could keep it simple and sell at local markets, or you could set up an online store (or even use Etsy). There are also plenty of opportunities to market your candles to local boutiques and shops, building a reliable demand for your products.

9. Freelance Writing/Content Marketing

Today, the big, exciting market for freelance writing is content marketing. Content marketing is creating insightful reading for websites, blogs, emails, and social media. The more you can learn about content marketing, the more marketable your skills will be.

With just a little expertise in basic SEO (search engine optimization) techniques, you can serve local businesses (and maybe even national brands, with a little luck and effort) to create engaging content and help their websites show up more prominently on Google. Finding potential clients is pretty straightforward, too: you can reach out to local businesses directly, or you can join a freelancing site like Upwork or Fiverr.

You don’t even need to be an expert in a client’s business to write content for them (though it helps if you’re serving a very specialized industry). You just need attention to detail, good research skills, and a dedication to excellent writing.

10. Online Boutique/Drop-Shipping/Amazon Store

It’s no wonder that online marketplaces such as Amazon are selling products from over a million entrepreneurs. And plenty of these entrepreneurs are making a very good living at it. You can set up an online store on an established website and be in business in minutes. You can also have your own “look and feel” for your store. And, for an additional fee, Amazon and some other service providers will also stock, pack, and ship your products.

Now, if selling your own products through online marketplaces like Amazon is still too much work for you, there’s an even simpler option: drop-shipping. With drop-shipping, your sole responsibility is to get the order and accept payment. Then, you forward the order to a third party who actually ships the order to the customer. The third party may be the manufacturer, a wholesaler, or even another retailer.

Both an online store and a drop-shipping business can be extremely profitable and successful businesses — incredible success stories abound. Because online selling is so competitive and fickle, you’ll have to experiment with different approaches to find out what works. You’ll likely need to try different products, different marketing messages, and different pricing. It may take some patience to find out the magic formula that works best for you. But if you stay at it, this business could be really successful.

Starting a business with little or no money? Drop-shipping is a business that you can start with little money.

11. Cleaning Service

Let’s roll up our sleeves, do some good, solid cleaning work, and make a bucketful of money! Sure, cleaning is tedious, non-glamorous work. But it pays well. In many areas, you can make as much money with your own solo person 20-hour-a-week cleaning business as you can with many full-time entry-level professional jobs. Why? Because most people don’t want to do this work, but everyone needs it done.

Furthermore, it’s a great repeat-customer, steady-income type of business. Customers are generally not super price sensitive — if they were, they would just do the cleaning themselves. So, if you serve your clients well, they’ll hire you again and again. They might even recommend you to their family and friends, giving you a steady flow of extra cash.

12. Resume Writing/LinkedIn Profile Writing

Anyone with decent writing skills can easily become a master resume and cover letter writer. And there are always people who could benefit from your help. Too many well-intentioned job applicants show up with sloppy resumes and cover letters that look more like attendance records.

That’s where you can come in. You can turn their resume into a great sales pitch that trumpets their achievements, skills, and abilities, helping people find their next perfect job.

The different ways of delivering this service are almost endless. You could set up a small office, meet clients at their homes or in coffee shops, transact your business online, or even sell your services as part of an outplacement service to companies laying people off. Most people seeking a better resume and cover letter will still have a job, so demand for this kind of service will run particularly high on weekends — a great advantage if you want to keep your day job while you get started in this business.

You could also offer to write online profiles or develop personal websites to help promote your clients.

13. Personal Shopping Service

If you like shopping, then you might be pleasantly surprised to find that you can make a business out of it. Lots of people, such as busy business executives or parents who could use a hand around the holidays, could use your help with their shopping.

You can join shopping apps like Instacart, or you can build your own network of local clients. Social media platforms can be a huge asset to help you advertise your services to local groups. You could even offer your services directly to local retailers; it’d be a win-win for you and the retailer alike.

14. Creating an Online Course

Creating an online course is a fantastic part-time business idea that requires little to no initial investment. With the surge in online learning, there’s a growing demand for high-quality courses that teach valuable skills and knowledge. If you have expertise in a particular area, why not share it with the world and earn some passive income along the way?

You can create an online course on virtually any topic you’re knowledgeable about. Whether it’s digital marketing, cooking, or even dog training, there’s an audience out there eager to learn. Platforms like Udemy, Coursera, or even your own website make it easy to reach potential students.

The beauty of this part-time business idea is that once you’ve created the course, it can continue to generate income with minimal ongoing effort. You’ll need to invest time upfront to develop the content, but after that, it’s all about marketing and promotion. With the right strategy, your online course can become a successful and profitable venture.

Imagine waking up to find that you’ve made sales overnight. That’s the power of passive income. Plus, you get the satisfaction of knowing you’re helping others learn and grow. So, if you’re looking for a flexible and rewarding part-time business, creating an online course could be the perfect fit.

15. Photography

There are many alternatives for turning your interest in photography into a lucrative side hustle. You could, for example, do freelance photography for businesses. Businesses with constant demand include real estate firms and auto dealers. But with every business needing pictures for their website, almost any business will need some high-quality photography. Additionally, the growing demand for high-quality online courses presents an opportunity to create and sell online courses focused on photography skills and techniques.

You could also do photography for special events, such as weddings or sporting events. You could do portrait photography. You could just do passport photos. You could specialize in headshots for online profiles. You could also sell your photography through large stock photo companies, which usually will pay you only after they sell your photos to their clients.

Photography is competitive, so you’ll want to develop a focus or a niche. And you’ll need to do some marketing to attract clients. So think through who your target market is, what kind of photography you’ll offer, how you’ll differ from your competitors, what kinds of packages and pricing you’ll offer, and what your marketing message will be.

16. Handyperson Business

A handyperson business is a great side hustle because you’re doing small jobs. And unlike fixing plumbing leaks or electrical problems, the kind of work you’ll typically do doesn’t have to be done immediately — so you can usually schedule it for a time that’s convenient for you.

Also, when customers hire a handyperson, they should understand that you’re not a highly qualified expert in any particular type of work. They shouldn’t expect you to necessarily be the fastest at what you do. But you should be willing to do very small jobs. You should be willing to do a wide variety of work, but not everything — don’t be afraid to say a particular job is too difficult for you.

The demand for handypeople is huge. You could try to promote your services by putting up flyers or business cards on local bulletin boards. Even the local hardware store can be a source of clients. You could also build a website to take advantage of online marketing.

17. eBay Business

You can make good money on eBay or other online marketplaces. However, while an eBay business seems very simple, there are also plenty of people who have gotten tripped up in the process, made key mistakes, and had a rough go of it.

Like other part-time businesses, it’s recommended to start small — with an eBay business, starting “in miniature” may be the safest bet. Start with just a few items to really get a feel for your market space. Get a feel for how customers will respond to your wares, how pricing will work, how bidders tend to respond if you go the auction route, and how to master the important details of processing transactions, packing goods, and shipping these wares.

You need a marketplace or a specialty. Even if, at first, you have access to a lot of unrelated items for good prices, try to develop some focus. You will get to know what sells and what doesn’t sell; you will learn what sells quickly; you will learn how you should price and describe your wares; and you will learn what to expect from customers. With a specialization, you can ideally acquire some repeat clientele, developing a good reputation and building word of mouth and confidence in the process.

18. Virtual Assistant

There is constant demand for virtual assistants. And the work is great for a part-time gig. You can work remotely, and you can usually set your own schedule. Since there’s a constant flow of virtual assistant opportunities, you can also decide if you want to work temporary assignments or longer-term ones.

You’ll need basic knowledge of simple computer applications like Word and Excel or Google Docs and Sheets, but usually nothing special. You’ll also need to be organized and responsive to the work requests that you are given. And, of course, even for a simple business like this one, you should first learn the basics of how to start a business.

The bottom line is that being a virtual assistant may not be a fast track to getting rich (there’s international competition), but it can provide a very flexible way to earn a little money.

19. Tutoring Service

Don’t worry; you don’t have to be a genius to tutor. You just need to know a little bit more than your students. There’s plenty of demand for tutors all the way from the first-grade level to the postdoc level. And if you didn’t even make it through first grade, you can still have a tutoring business — you’ll just have to hire other people to do the actual tutoring for you!

You can offer tutoring services online or meet your clients in their homes or at a public place such as a library or a coffee shop. While you might be able to tutor a wide range of different levels and subjects, you’ll probably do better in attracting clients if you emphasize one popular specialty in your marketing.

To get going, set up your website and take a stance — experiment with a marketing message that clearly trumpets your specialty. Then optimize the website to rank well for local Google searches. You could also try online advertising targeted at your best audience — which might be parents of students of the age group you’re focusing on. You could also network with teachers and perhaps tutors that offer different specialties.

With tutoring, you can earn an excellent hourly rate. But, especially if you’re traveling to meet your customers, you need to take that time and cost into consideration. You’ll also need a policy for when a student makes last-minute cancellations. Overall, it’s an excellent side business.

20. Interior Room Painting/Wallpapering

Painting and wallpapering interior rooms can be a rewarding part-time business. Interior jobs, especially for just one or two rooms, can often be finished in a day or two. Even simple jobs with one or two colors can feel like a big task for busy homeowners, which is where your business will come in.

To get started, you’ll need to invest in some basic supplies like brushes, painter’s tape, drop cloths, smocks, and so on. You’ll also need to start marketing your services to local homeowners. This could entail dropping off fliers at some busy neighborhoods, shopping bulletin boards, or even on local social media groups. Completing a few jobs successfully could even help you build a network of word-of-mouth referrals.

21. Car or Boat Resale

Selling used cars, or even used boats, can be a challenging but rewarding side hustle, especially if you have experience with restoration. For example, you can buy an old beater, reupholster the seats, and replace key parts so it’s running as well as new. Between that and a good detail job, you can sell it at a tidy profit (and give a buyer a better deal than they’d get at a regular car dealership).

If you do start this business, you should make sure you’re familiar with the process of legally transferring titles on top of the expertise you’ll need to sell cars or boats. You’ll also want to do some digging to learn where you can acquire cars, such as local impound lots and even your local Facebook marketplace page.

One key to success in this kind of business is not getting overeager. In other words, you need to patiently wait for the best deals that offer you a high probability of making a good profit margin. And, of course, part of the fun of this business is having a constantly changing collection of very cool cars or boats at your disposal to take for a spin now and then!

22. Social Media Service

If you’re having fun with Facebook and the like, why not get paid to play with social media? Many small business people who could really benefit from social media don’t have the time or energy to get involved with it, and they particularly lack the time or expertise to do it well.

Different small business owners will have wildly different demands, expectations, and budgets. Some businesses will have no idea what to promote on social media and will look for you to develop ideas from the ground up. Others may have a good idea but simply lack the time to keep up with their postings.

That’s where you can come in. Set up a few packages for your services, such as a basic package for a set number of posts on one or two platforms and a premium package with more involved services. No matter what your pricing strategy is, be sure to clarify and set realistic expectations with each client.

23. Party Planner

Demand just goes up, up, up in the party business. Kids’ parties, office parties, and adult celebrations — what a fun way to make money! Bar mitzvahs and bat mitzvahs can be even more extravagant, and busy party hosts need help planning them.

Party planners can offer a variety of services, from day-of coordination to complete start-to-finish party help. To succeed, you’ll need to be well-organized and have good communication skills to coordinate with vendors and attendees alike. It’s also a good idea to have a list of local caterers, entertainers, and even florists that you can recommend to your clients.

Some party planners specialize in a particular category, such as kids’ birthday parties or corporate events, but there’s no wrong answer, and the possibilities are as endless as your creativity.

Would you like to see more business ideas?

Check out our popular article, best small business ideas. This multi-page article offers advice on many business ideas. The list includes home-based, online, steady-income, low-cost, product and service ideas. Many of the ideas in this long article can be started part-time.

Disclaimer: The content on this page is for information purposes only and does not constitute legal, tax, or accounting advice. If you have specific questions about any of these topics, seek the counsel of a licensed professional.