Is 20 Cogs Legit or a Scam?

Note: 20cogs is closing down and relaunching as Cashback.co.uk. It’s pretty much the same concept, but you now only have to complete 15 offers rather than 20. Join now for a £5 bonus.

If you’re looking for ways to try and earn some extra cash online, at some point you’ll have probably come across 20 Cogs.

What is 20 Cogs?

20 Cogs is an online money making website. Marketed towards people who want to make money in their spare time, it offers a £5 joining bonus and a way to ‘earn money by completing competitions, offers, gaming and surveys’ – cogs.

The simple premise is that you start off with 20 grey cogs. Once you’ve completed each cog (completed an offer) it turns green. When you have 20 green cogs you can withdraw your earnings.

They say their average user earns just over £200, a not insignificant amount which would definitely come in useful for most of us!

I made £100.50 with 20 Cogs. I could have made more, but was very picky about which offers I chose to complete.

How does 20 Cogs work?

The basic premise is pretty simple. You have 20 cogs which you need to ‘turn green’ by completing various offers. Once, and only once all your cogs are green, can you withdraw your earnings.

Things you can do to check off your cogs might be completing surveys, product trials, sign up offers, subscriptions and so on. 

Each offer is worth varying amounts of money which you’ll be shown before clicking through to the offer. Once you’ve completed the offer and it’s been verified, that amount is added to your balance.

Remember, regardless of how many and which offers you complete, you cannot withdraw your earnings until all 20 cogs are green.

Is 20 Cogs legit or a scam?

20 Cogs is not a scam. However, it’s also not the fastest way to make money. I made just over £100 completing 20 Cogs, but it took me quite a long time.

I should say that it’s not the actual completing of offers that takes a long time, but each offer can take up to a month to change status from pending to confirmed and you have to complete 20 before you can request payment.

I also found myself having to wait quite a while for new offers to appear that I was able to complete.

In fairness, there were a lot of offers I couldn’t take due to having already been signed up to things via cashback sites and other get-paid-to sites, so others may find it a lot easier than I did.

It’s worth bearing in mind that if you do give 20cogs a go, it could take a while between signing up, and actually receiving any money.

How do 20 Cogs make money?

It’s actually pretty simple. When you complete an offer via 20 Cogs, they get paid a commission by their advertisers, which they then share partly with you.

Here’s their video explaining how it all works:

On the surface, it actually sounds quite good, £200 odd for signing up to a few offers.

Here’s why I think it’s a little more complicated than that.

The downsides of 20 Cogs

Gambling offers

Some of the offers, actually A LOT of the offers promoted on 20 Cogs require you to sign up and deposit on betting and casino sites. Whilst I’m aware this might not be a problem for everyone, I’m very wary of recommending anything that leads people towards any kind of gambling, or possibility of losing money. Since these offers often require wagering through your money, i.e gambling, I’m not comfortable suggesting this is a good idea.

Subscription offers

Many of the 20 cogs offers involve signing up for free trials. This is fine on the surface, but signing up for a free trial often involves inputting your card details for future payments. If you then don’t cancel the subscription in time you end up paying for a service you may never have wanted in the first place. Again, you’re risking spending money while trying to make it.

If you do do this, it’s always worth setting a reminder to cancel well before you’ll be charged.

Spam marketing

Signing up to all these marketing offers leaves you open to a lot of spam, you’re often required to put in your details and will almost definitely end up receiving spam emails and possibly even marketing calls.

If you do sign up to offers make sure to read the terms carefully and tick boxes to opt out of unwanted marketing.

Paid for offers

Some of the offers require paying for things. For example, one offer is to sign up to receive a Graze box for £1.99. You’ll earn £4 for this offer, but once you’ve paid you’ll actually only make £2.01, plus you’ll have to remember to cancel the ongoing subscription you’ll have been entered into when ordering that 1st £1.99 box.

It can take a LONG time

Whilst some of the cogs available are quick and easy to complete, such as completing a survey or signing up to a research panel, you cannot complete all 20 cogs with these type of offers. Plus, they pay out less than other offers.

Sign up offers often require you to remain subscribed for the whole free trial period, often 30 days, so it can take a whole month for a cog to turn green.

You may never complete it!

Another problem I have with 20 cogs is you may never complete it – you might just run out of offers you’re willing to do! I had just 2 cogs left to complete for ages and all the offers available to me were either things I’ve previously had a subscription to so couldn’t join as a new customer, gambling offers which I was unwilling to do, and a pet food subscription offer. I don’t have a pet.

I should say that if you leave it a while offers do change and update so you might get lucky and find things you can do to reach the end. 20 Cogs do also say that if you get stuck on the last cog you can email them and they will see what they can do to help.

For me, it took a few months but eventually some offers came up that I could complete and I finally cashed out my earnings, yay!

Conclusion – Is 20 Cogs Legit?

Yes 20 cogs is legit. Once I completed all the cogs I was able to request payment and the money hit my account in 3 days.

If you do decide to sign up to 20 Cogs, I recommend caution when choosing which offers to complete and always being aware of what you’re signing up for, remembering to cancel any free trials before the renewal date.

Alternatives to 20 Cogs

Here are some 20 Cogs alternatives that I think are much better options for making some extra money online:

• Prolific – A crowdsourced research platform that pays decent rates for you to complete online research studies and surveys
• Ysense – My favourite get-paid-to site that pays you to complete surveys and offers. Top tip – it pays in dollars, but if you choose to cash out for vouchers you can get a £10 amazon voucher for $10 (£7.29) so great value! Just choose Reward link when you redeem.
• Declutter – Do you have load of stuff laying around you don’t need? Selling clothes and clutter can give you a quick cash win.
• Populus Live – A survey site that pays £1 per 5 mins of your time taking surveys. Once you’ve accrued £50 they pay out to your bank account.
• UserTribe – A crowdsourced research community that pays you to take part in studies and research to help companies develop products and services

Related posts:

• Sweatcoin Review – Can you really get paid to walk? >>
• Bitcoin Get Paid To Sites >>
• List of free money offers UK >>