How to Make Money Online in Europe

Beginner’s Guide

This post may contain affiliate links. We may earn a commission at no extra cost to you.

The Flight That Paid Me Back

Summer 2022. Booking a flight from Dublin to Rio de Janeiro to visit family after three years apart. The ticket was over €800 — that familiar pain of watching a large amount leave your account all at once.

Then a thought: there were tools that were supposed to help with this. A frequent flyer programme signed up for months ago but never really used. A cashback app installed but barely opened. A Revolut card used for everyday spending.

Twenty minutes of checking before hitting “confirm.”

Could a cashback app give something back on this flight? Yes.

Would paying with Revolut earn anything extra? Yes.

Could the booking be registered for airline miles? Yes.

That one flight earned:

€24 cashback through a travel cashback app
€6.40 back from Revolut
1,800 airline miles — enough for a future upgrade or discount

Total value from one booking: roughly €50–€60, depending on how you value the miles.

Twenty minutes. One purchase. Money back.

That is what this article is about. Travel does not have to be a pure expense. With the right tools and a simple habit, every trip can pay you something back — whether that is cash in your account or free flights in the future.

What Are Travel Cashback and Miles Programs?

Before getting into the how, it helps to understand the what.

Cashback is exactly what it sounds like: a percentage of what you spend comes back to you as money. If you spend €400 on a hotel and earn 4% cashback, that is €16 back in your pocket. The cashback comes through apps, websites, or your bank card — depending on which tool you use.

Miles and points are a different currency. Airlines, hotels, and travel companies give you “miles” or “points” when you book through them or spend with their partners. You collect these over time and redeem them for free flights, upgrades, hotel nights, or discounts. The value of a mile varies, but a common estimate is around €0.01 to €0.02 per mile — so 5,000 miles is roughly worth €50–€100 in travel.

The key insight is that these two systems can work together. One flight booking can earn you cashback from an app, cashback from your bank card, and miles from the airline — all at the same time. This is called “stacking,” and it is the difference between earning €5 back and earning €30 back from the same purchase.

None of this requires special access or being a frequent business traveller. It is available to anyone who books travel online, which is essentially everyone.

How Does It Work?

Understanding the mechanics helps you use these tools properly and avoid missing out on rewards you have already earned.

How Cashback Apps Work

Cashback apps act as a middleman between you and travel booking sites like Booking.com, Hotels.com, or Expedia. Those booking sites pay the app a commission for sending customers their way. The app shares part of that commission with you as cashback.

The process:

You open the cashback app and search for the booking site you want to use
You click through from the app to the booking site
You complete your booking normally
The app tracks that you came from their link and records your cashback
The cashback is confirmed and paid to your account — sometimes within days, sometimes after a few weeks

The critical step is clicking through the app first, every time. If you go directly to the booking site without using the cashback link, the app cannot track your purchase and you earn nothing.

How Airline Miles Programs Work

When you join an airline’s loyalty programme, you get a membership number. Every time you book a flight with that airline (or one of its partners), you enter that number during booking. The airline records your flight and adds miles to your account based on the distance flown, the ticket type, and your membership level.

Over time, those miles accumulate. When you have enough, you can redeem them for things like:

A free or discounted flight
An upgrade from economy to business class
Priority check-in or extra baggage allowance
Partner rewards like hotel discounts or shopping vouchers

You never lose money — you are just earning something extra for flights you were going to take anyway.

How Card Cashback Works

Some bank cards, including certain Revolut plans, give you a percentage back on purchases made with the card. This applies whether you are buying flights, booking hotels, or paying for dinner at the airport. You do not need to do anything special — just pay with the right card and the cashback is added automatically.

Why It Is Worth the Effort

The honest answer is that no single cashback or miles programme is going to change your financial life. But the cumulative effect over a year of normal travel is genuinely significant, and the effort involved is minimal once the tools are set up.

Here is why it makes sense:

You are spending the money anyway. Whether or not you use a cashback app, the flight costs the same. The hotel costs the same. The only difference is whether part of that money comes back to you.

Europe has more options than most places. The competition between European airlines, the density of booking platforms, and the availability of digital banking tools like Revolut means there are more stacking opportunities here than in most other regions.

It scales with your travel. The more you travel — whether for personal holidays, visits to family abroad, or business trips — the more you earn. Regular travellers can accumulate hundreds of euros in cashback and thousands of miles per year from spending they were already making.

It teaches you to be a smarter consumer. Developing the habit of checking cashback and rewards before booking takes five minutes and pays dividends not just on travel but on all kinds of online purchases.

The miles genuinely add up. Many European immigrants visit family in distant countries once or twice a year. Those are expensive flights. A well-managed miles account can reduce or eliminate the cost of one of those return journeys every few years.

Step-by-Step: How to Start Earning Travel Rewards

Step 1 — Set Up Your Four Core Tools

Before your next booking, create accounts on these tools. It takes about 30 minutes total and you only need to do it once.

A cashback app for travel:
Choose based on where you are in Europe.

TopCashback — strong for UK and Ireland; covers most major travel booking sites
Quidco — similar to TopCashback; UK and Ireland focus
LetyShops — popular across Eastern Europe; good travel coverage
Shopalike — Germany, Austria, and Switzerland
iGraal — France and Southern Europe

Booking.com Genius:
This is automatic. If you already have a Booking.com account, you are likely already in the Genius programme. It offers discounts and perks that increase after a certain number of stays. No action needed — just keep using it.

An airline miles programme:
Join the frequent flyer programme of the airline you fly most often. If you fly different airlines across Europe, join the programme that covers the most routes for your travel patterns.

If you mainly fly budget airlines like Ryanair or EasyJet, miles programmes are less relevant — these airlines do not have traditional miles systems. Focus on cashback apps instead.

A card that earns cashback on spending:
Any card that returns a percentage on purchases adds to your rewards without any extra effort. Check what your current bank offers. If nothing, look into whether a Revolut plan with cashback makes sense for your spending level.

Step 2 — Check Before Every Booking

This is the habit that makes the difference. Before booking any flight, hotel, or car rental, spend five minutes checking the following:

Is there cashback available on this booking site?
Open your cashback app and search for the platform you plan to book through (Booking.com, Hotels.com, Expedia, the airline website, etc.). If it is listed, note the cashback percentage.

Which combination gives the best overall deal?
A booking site with 2% cashback but a lower base price might beat one with 5% cashback but a higher price. Compare the total cost including cashback to find the real best deal.

Will this booking earn miles?
If you are flying with an airline that has a miles programme, make sure you are logged in or have your membership number ready to enter during booking.

Can you pay with a cashback card?
If your card earns rewards on travel spending, use it for the payment.

A worked example: Looking to book a hotel in Barcelona.

Check TopCashback: Booking.com offers 4% cashback

Check Hotels.com: 2% cashback, plus progress towards a free night

Booking.com: price is €20 cheaper after the 4% cashback

Revolut: Pay with Revolut for an additional 0.8% back

Total effective saving: approximately 5% of the booking cost

That five minutes of checking turned a €300 hotel booking into one that effectively cost €285.

Step 3 — Activate the Cashback Offer Properly

This step trips up many beginners. Some cashback apps require you to explicitly click “Activate” on an offer before you can earn from it. If you skip this, the tracking does not work and you earn nothing.

After activating:

Click through to the booking site from inside the cashback app
Make sure cookies are enabled in your browser (the app uses these to track your purchase)
Complete the booking in the same browser session without going elsewhere first
Do not use a different discount code alongside the cashback link — this can invalidate the reward

If you are booking on your phone, use the cashback app’s built-in browser rather than switching to your regular browser.

Step 4 — Track What You Earn

Keeping a simple record does two things: it makes sure you notice if a cashback payment does not arrive (so you can raise a claim), and it shows you how much these habits are worth over time.

A basic spreadsheet with these columns is enough:

Date of booking
What you booked (flight, hotel, car)
Total cost
Platform used
Expected cashback amount and source
Expected miles earned
Date cashback was confirmed

Most cashback apps show pending and confirmed rewards in your account. Check monthly.

Step 5 — Redeem Your Rewards Wisely

For cashback: Most apps let you withdraw to your bank account or PayPal once you reach a minimum threshold (usually €5–€10). Withdraw regularly — do not let large amounts sit in an app account indefinitely.

For miles: The best redemption value for most people is either a free flight on a route you would have paid for anyway, or an upgrade from economy to business class on a long-haul flight. Avoid redeeming miles for merchandise or shopping vouchers — the value per mile is usually much lower.

For hotel points: Free nights almost always give better value than using points for discounts on a booking. If you have enough points for a free night, use them for that rather than a partial discount.

Tips to Earn More and Avoid Costly Mistakes

Mistakes That Cost Beginners Money

Forgetting to click through the cashback app. This is the most common and most painful mistake. Booking a €600 hotel directly instead of through the cashback link means losing €24 instantly. Make it a non-negotiable habit: open the cashback app first, every time.

Ignoring partner earning opportunities. Airlines earn miles not just from flights. Many have shopping portals where you earn miles for buying everyday products from partner retailers. Some have restaurant partners, hotel partners, and car hire partners. You can earn miles without ever boarding a plane.

Letting points expire. Most programmes expire your miles if your account is inactive for 12 to 36 months. Check your accounts every six months. Even a small transaction — buying something through their partner portal — can reset the expiry clock.

Treating miles as less valuable than cash. Sometimes the opposite is true. A mile used for a long-haul upgrade can be worth €0.05 or more per mile, while the same miles redeemed for a short-haul economy flight might be worth €0.008 per mile. Where you redeem matters as much as how many you have.

Using booking portals without comparing the full price. A 5% cashback rate means nothing if that booking site is €50 more expensive than another. Always compare the total cost — base price minus cashback — not just the cashback percentage.

Not tracking cashback that has not arrived. Cashback can take weeks to confirm. If it does not appear after the stated timeframe, raise a claim through the app. Most apps have a process for this, but you need to notice that the payment has not come through.

Tips That Make a Real Difference

Stack every layer on every booking. Get into the habit of asking: “How many ways can I earn on this one purchase?” Cashback app plus card cashback plus airline miles plus hotel points. Each layer is small on its own. Together, they add up to a meaningful percentage of your travel costs.

Sign up for airline promotional emails and use them. Airlines regularly run promotions where miles cost fewer points to redeem, or where earning rates are doubled on certain routes. Flying Blue, Avios, and Miles & More all do this regularly. If you see a promotion for a route you plan to fly, book it during the promotional window.

Use incognito mode when comparing prices. Some booking sites track your visits and show higher prices on return visits. Search in a private/incognito browser window to see the baseline price before you decide where to book.

Match your tools to your travel pattern. If you always fly the same two or three airlines, join their specific programmes and earn deeply in those. If you travel on different airlines depending on price, cashback apps are more flexible and probably more valuable for you than any single airline programme.

Build towards a specific reward. Saving miles without a goal means you never feel the payoff. Decide what you want — a free flight home to see family, a business class upgrade on a long trip — and let that goal motivate the habit.

And Now, What To Do Next?

Travel cashback and miles programmes will not make you rich. That is worth saying clearly.

What they will do is give you a meaningful percentage of your travel spending back, consistently, from purchases you were already making. Over a year of normal travel, that is likely €100 to €300 in real cash and rewards, with the potential for much more if you travel frequently.

The habit is simple: before every booking, check the cashback apps, confirm your airline membership number is entered, and pay with a card that earns rewards. That is the whole system.

Here is what to do before your next trip:

Sign up for one or two cashback apps that cover your region (TopCashback, LetyShops, Quidco, iGraal — pick based on where you are in Europe)
Join the miles programme of the airline you fly most often
Check what cashback your current bank card offers — or look into whether a better option makes sense
Before your next booking, spend five minutes checking all three
Track what comes back over the following weeks

One booking. Five minutes. Money back.

Do it consistently, and travel starts to feel a little less expensive. Eventually, it starts to feel like it is paying you back.

What travel rewards programmes are you using in your country? Found a good one that is not on this list? Drop a comment — sharing what works in different European countries helps everyone.

EuroSideHustle helps people in Europe — including immigrants and beginners — build real income online. Explore more guides at EuroSideHustle.com.

How to Make Money Online Europe With Travel Cashback

The Flight That Paid Me Back

What Are Travel Cashback and Miles Programs?