5 Ways to Get Disgustingly Rich As A Programmer

Added: 2026-05-05

[00:00:00]So, you want to get filthy rich with programming just like me? You've come to the right place.

[00:00:06]I'm going to give you five ways to do that. And I'm even going to tier rank them from S tier to F tier. I'm going to rank these methods based on realism, how likely you are to actually make money, effort, how much work it takes, money potential, how much money can you make, time to first dollar, how fast can you start earning money, and luck. Because anybody can get rich if they're lucky.

[00:00:27]Number one, bug bounties. Bug bounties are pretty cool because you get paid to tell companies that they suck at security. Yeah, that's literally it.

[00:00:34]Companies like Google, Meta, Microsoft have their own bug bounty programs, but there are also dedicated platforms like Hacker 1 and Bug Crowd where you can do bug bounties for other companies and open source technologies. But how would I rank this? For realism, Google has paid out $81,933,423 since 2010. And one person has earned 605,000 for finding one vulnerability.

[00:00:59]And that's nothing compared to Apple.

[00:01:00]Apple will pay you a maximum of $2 million for finding one critical vulnerability. $2 million. And Hacker 1 has paid over $380 million to users. So, it's safe to say the money is very, very real. But it's not that easy. 12% of hackers on Hacker 1 were making $20,000 or more annually from bug reports with over 3% making more than $100,000 per year and only 1% making over $350,000 annually. I'm not a math genius or anything, but if we do the math here, this means 84% of users on Hacker 1 are making less than $20,000 a year. Now, this is in 2018, so I don't know how much this has changed. And I'm not a financial adviser or anything, but um that is absolutely nothing. And for realism, I'm going to give it a four out of 10 forever. This is not an easy side hustle. You essentially have to learn cyber security, and that is not easy.

[00:01:56]You have to put in a lot of hours understanding how security works. 8 out of 10. Money potential. There is a lot of potential to earn money from this. If you have like the greatest skills and you're like a main character, you can easily make millions a year. I mean, the fact that Apple is offering $2 million for one exploit, that's a lot. I'll give this one an 8 out of 10. Time to first dollar, it's going to take a long time to start earning money from this because you have to spend a few months learning the fundamentals. Actually, I'm being pretty generous. It could even take a few years. And even then, it's going to take you probably another few months just to find your first valid bug. It's not really the fastest way. Three out of 10. Luck. I think luck can be pretty important because of timing. A company might release a new feature and maybe you're one of the first people to notice critical bugs, which means you get to submit a report and bada bing, bada boom, you make some money. But once you start developing skills, you'll probably notice a lot of patterns, which will make it easier for future bug reports.

[00:02:48]So, it's not that bad. I'll give luck uh like a four or a five out of 10. Let's just do 4.5. Overall, making money from bug bounties is pretty difficult. I'll give bug bounties a C tier. You're probably better off with the next method, freelancing. Freelancing is pretty straightforward. You build things for people who can't build them themselves. Someone needs a website.

[00:03:06]Someone needs an app. Someone needs their janky WordPress site to stop breaking. Essentially, you got to find clients. You fix or build a thing, get paid, and you move on to the next project. Realism. Honestly, if you know how to talk to people, you can make freelancing work. You just need to learn a skill that businesses need or don't want to learn themselves and then charge for it. The hard part isn't even the coding, it's getting clients. But once you get your first client, everything gets easier. 7 out of 10. Now, people will only hire you if you can prove you have the skills and you're actually valuable. They want examples, portfolios, proof that you can actually do this stuff. If you're doing something like web development or mobile development, an easy way to showcase your skills besides testimonials is design. Humans are suckers for good design. Most people would rather have something with less functionality, but it looks pretty than something powerful, but it looks like garbage. It's shallow, but it's true. Since you're a programmer, you probably suck at design.

[00:03:55]I know I do. Programmers like to make things work, not make them pretty.

[00:03:59]Luckily, there are tools where you can find design inspiration and copy, I mean ethically reference for your own projects. An amazing tool for design inspiration that will fix your skill issues is today's sponsor, Mobin. That's right, it's Mobin time. Mobin has over 500,000 screens from 1,200 plus top apps and websites. This includes animations, UI elements, and user flows. You can search for specific things like the storefront page, pricing page, or checkout pages. You can even search by styles. You can type in something like fun, bold, or minimalist, and Mobin will show you designs that match. Big companies spend millions of dollars trying to figure out what good design looks like. So, why not take advantage and copy? I mean, learn from that.

[00:04:37]They've already done the hard part for you. Over 2 million designers and developers use Mobin for exactly this reason. For freelancing, you can create portfolio projects using designs from their library. And when you're pitching to clients, show them mock-ups and say, "Here's my vision for your business." I base this on how Uber and Nike do it.

[00:04:52]Business owners don't know good design, but they do know big brand names. So, when you can reference companies they've actually heard of, you sound legit, which means they're more likely to hire you, and you can make that sweet, delicious money. Mobin is free to start.

[00:05:06]If you want to check it out and start making beautiful projects, you can click the link in the description. Effort, the technical side is pretty obvious. You got to learn the skills you want to freelance with and get good at them. The part that catches people off guard is everything else. You're essentially self-employed, which means you got to handle everything. You got to be your own salesperson since you got to get clients. If you're making websites or mobile apps, you got to be your own designer. And since you're self-employed, you are the boss. It's all on you to get work. To be fair, none of that is rocket science, but it's still a lot of effort on top of the actual development work. 9 out of 10.

[00:05:37]Money potential. Freelancing has a lot of potential if you go about it the right way because you can start off by taking small projects alone and then you can slowly develop a team and then slowly turn it into an agency, which turns it into an actual business. And at that point, you're not making pennies.

[00:05:52]You're making real money. N out of 10.

[00:05:54]Time to first dollar. I mean, technically, you could offer your services for a dollar and you'll probably get something fast. So, 10 out of 10. But realistically, this depends on how social and charismatic you are.

[00:06:06]For your first client, you won't have testimonials. You're just going to have to pitch yourself with fake projects and convince them. Some people are just great at that and get their first client really easy, while others struggle for months. For this, it's less about the code and more so how you sell your skills. So, this could honestly range from like two out of 10 to maybe like a 6 out of 10 luck. The main luck factor here is the clients, but even then, you don't need much luck because this is a skill you can develop. You can get better at pitching yourself, getting better at presenting everything, getting better at communication, how you follow up. All of this can be learned and optimized. There are shortcuts for every part of this process, and the people who figure that out stop relying on luck here. So, I'll give it a three out of 10. Freelancing is really not that bad if you want to go for a self-employed route. It's one of the most realistic ways to make real money with programming because the path is pretty clear. Learn a skill, find someone who needs your skill, and get paid for it. You just need to be good at what you do and decent enough at selling yourself. I'll give freelancing honestly an A tier.

[00:07:01]It's pretty good. Hackathons. A hackathon is a competition where you build something in a very short time.

[00:07:06]They can be as short as 24 hours or even as long as a week or a month, but usually it's a weekend. And most of these hackathons are completely free to enter. Some are in person at universities, conferences, or there even hackathons hosted by companies. There are also hackathons that are fully online if you don't want to touch grass, which I get. Basically, you show up, form a team, or you do it by yourself.

[00:07:26]You build something as fast as you can.

[00:07:28]You pitch it to judges and hopefully win something. Realism. Getting rich off hackathons alone. Uh, I guess it's possible. The prize money from a hackathon can range from a few hundred bucks to thousands of dollars. And if you have a team, you have to split the money. Most hackathons don't even give cash. You might win a laptop, some API credits, maybe a tablet, which is cool, but for realism, for making money, you're probably not going to get rich off this.

[00:07:53]>> Four out of 10 >> effort. Every hackathon is a sprint.

[00:07:57]You'll have to do a weekend of intense work for a chance to win. And it's the same process, coming up with an idea, coding a demo, and writing a pitch.

[00:08:04]Yeah, you can get more efficient over time by maybe building starter kits and reusable templates, but it's still a grind every single time with no guaranteed return. Six out of 10. Money potential. Big hackathons exist and they give a large amount of money, but there's not that many of them. The Bolt Hackathon that was hosted last year was the largest hackathon ever, and they gave away over $1 million in prizes where first place got $100,000. The winner built an AI powered video editor if you were curious. Now, don't get me wrong, this is a lot of money, but relative to some other methods, this is chump change. Three out of 10. Time to first dollar. Hackathons are really good here because you really just have to work for a weekend, which is way faster than other methods. Plus, someone can literally carry you and win it for you.

[00:08:46]I'll give it an 8 out of 10. Actually, I'll give it a 9 out of 10. Luck.

[00:08:50]Winning a hackathon might take a little bit of luck because there are some factors that are outside of your control. who the judges are, what they value, which teams you're up against, whether your idea is good to them, the team you have. So, I'll give luck like maybe h >> four out of 10.

[00:09:04]>> Hackathons might not be a great way to make money, but I will say they are an incredible way to help your career. It's a great place for networking, for learning, and for building your portfolio or even to meet a future co-founder. A lot of real companies actually started at a hackathon, but this video is all about making money and getting rich. For making money, hackathons are absolute garbage. F tier.

[00:09:23]The next method, a job. We all know what this is. It's simple and boring. There's no passive income here. You don't get to be your own boss. You don't get to say, "I made $50,000 in my sleep." It's a job. You show up, you write code, you go to some meetings, clock your hours, and you go home and vibe. And honestly, for most people, that's enough for realism.

[00:09:41]I mean, this is the path everyone takes when they're learning how to code. It's the most common, so it's safe to say it's the most realistic to people. Not everyone wants to be an entrepreneur.

[00:09:50]Some people just want to be really good at one thing, get paid extremely well for it, and have their evenings and weekends free. And the thing about a tech job specifically, it pays dummy well if you're in the US at least. I'll give it like an 8 out of 10 effort. Now, this might not be a surprise to some of you, but um getting a tech job is really, really hard. Depending on the job you want, you'll have to learn a lot of the fundamentals and specific skills.

[00:10:14]And then you have to make resume projects, and then you have to learn interview skills, which could take months of preparation, and then you have to apply to jobs, and even then, it's not guaranteed you'll pass the interview. I'll give this 9 out of 10.

[00:10:25]If you need a resource to help you prepare, I recommend roadmap.sh. It gives you a road map on a whole bunch of different paths. And I also recommend my sick newsletter called Sloth Bites. Oh, you don't know what sloth bites is?

[00:10:37]Stealth Bites is my newsletter where every week I send you programming advice and news so you can stay up to date and become a better programmer. It's free and all I need is your delicious email.

[00:10:45]Thanks. Money potential. The entry level alone is more than most jobs. You can easily make six figures. And if you sell your sod to big tech and you do really good, you can even make millions. If you want proof, there's a website called levels.fyi where tech workers share how much they make and most of them make six figures, seven figures. It's insane. But there is a limit. Unless you become the CEO, then there's a lot of potential there. But I'm not counting that. 7 out of 10. Time to first dollar. Some of these career paths require college degrees, which can take like 4 years. So that's a lot of time. And if you want to do research or AI and machine learning, you have to do even more time because those jobs usually need a master's or even a PhD, which adds another, you know, 4 to 6 years, which makes it like 8 to 10 years of schooling. No big deal.

[00:11:30]But technically, you could self-study and find a job without a degree. It's going to be way harder, but it is possible. But overall, I'm going to give this like a 1 out of 10 to maybe a 3 out of 10, depending on what you do. Luck.

[00:11:42]Now, some of you might disagree with this, but I think there's not too much luck into getting a job. Sure, maybe you're the engineer's dad or you know somebody. Maybe your dad's the CEO, but besides that, the actual process for most people is pretty structured. You study, you prepare, you interview, and you get hired. Sure, it might take a while to get the job, but when you really break it down to the essential steps, this is it. So, just because of how structured it is, I'll give this a 3 out of 10. Overall, a job does require a lot of time and effort, but there is a lot of resources to prepare. Once you get that first job, you're basically set. You have a stable income. Paycheck comes in every 2 weeks, and having a job makes it easier to apply to other jobs since you now have experience. Plus, a job will give you an advantage for literally every other method in this video. Overall, while a job might take a lot of time and effort, the payout and potential is worth it for most people.

[00:12:33]So, for that reason, I'm going to give a job an S rank. Do I work a regular job?

[00:12:38]Oh, no. That's stupid. Why would I do that? Software as a service. Ah, yes.

[00:12:44]SAS. You build an app, you charge people monthly, and you wake up to money.

[00:12:48]There's people making 100K in a month.

[00:12:50]They get to be digital nomads. Total freedom. every tech bro's dream, but it's a dream for a reason. Realism, look, it's possible. A lot of people have done it. Statistically, your first SAS will probably not work. For every successful person, there's hundreds of people that failed. Most ideas don't work. You really have to go in knowing the odds are against you. I'll give this like a 4 out of 10. Effort. Same thing as freelancing. You're the developer, you're the marketer, you're the customer support team, you are the designer, you're the CEO, all at the same time. 9 out of 10. Money potential. Every other method on this list has a ceiling. There is only so many hours in a day you can work, only so many bugs you can find, only so many client projects you can work on at the same time. But SAS doesn't have that. You can build it once and it keeps paying you whether you're working on it or not. A customer that signed up 6 months ago could still be paying you today. And the amount of money that some people make from this is genuinely insane. Hundreds of thousands of dollars a month to even millions. A successful SAS isn't a side hustle anymore. It's a business. 10 out of 10.

[00:13:48]Time to first dollar. You could technically get a customer right away.

[00:13:52]You don't even have to build the thing yet. You could just have a waiting list or or even just a Stripe link. You just need the right idea. So, time to first dollar. I'll give it like a 4 out of 10.

[00:14:01]Luck. I feel like a SAS might be the most luck dependent method here because it really depends on your idea and how you execute it. You can increase your surface area of luck by shipping more and building in public, but even then, you cannot engineer virality. And the timing of when you build something matters more than most founders want to admit. Anyone that tells you that luck has nothing to do with a successful SAS are lying to you and are probably selling a course. I'll give luck like an 8 out of 10. A SAS is unlike anything else on this list. The failure rate is crazy high and the effort you have to put in is insane, but if you do pull it off, it's the closest thing to passive income and financial freedom a programmer can get. Honestly, I would recommend building a SAS as a side project while your tech job pays the bills. That's how most successful founders did it. Now, because of the risk and effort this takes, I can't really give it an S tier or an A tier.

[00:14:53]I'm going to give it a B tier. These tiers don't even matter that much anyways. Just go make money or don't.

[00:14:58]That's cool, too. Not my problem. See you in the next video. Bye.