make money drawing - Trustthelink.com

This post was originally published in [2025] and has been fully updated for 2026 with new data and tools. What if you could create professional-grade designs without ever picking up a paintbrush? In 2026, the demand for unique visuals is skyrocketing, from local business logos to custom Etsy prints. The best part is that you can make money with AI-generated art as a side hustle that fits into your existing schedule.. Sounds too good to be true? I used to think the same way, but it's possible. Here are 10 ways. List the art on Etsy List on Redbubble List on Society6 Use for Social media Courses Use Gumroad Fiverr Crypto Digital Downloads List on eBay Keep reading, and I'll share these steps in more detail, plus 3 insider tricks to generating AI Art that is good enough to sell. 🎨 AI Art Profit Calculator Calculate your earnings per sale! Sale Price ($): Platform Fee (e.g., 6.5% for Etsy): Production/Print Cost ($): Calculate Profit Your Net Profit: $0.00 Why get into AI Art? For the last few months, I've been addicted to microstock, you know, taking photos and videos and listing them. Not only is it "super" fun, but I've made some money. Plus, it complements travel, "which I love" to do. If you want to know more about microstock and how to earn money from it, you can view this post I made HERE. However, sometimes you can't travel. Maybe the weather is bad, you're sick, or your job makes it hard. Let me introduce you to AI art. Not only is it fun, creative, and like a video game, but you can earn money from it. Even better, it's less work than actually painting a picture. Pick a platform to create AI Art The first step is to design the art. There are various platforms to do this; some are free, and some are paid. ChatGPT, On the free plan, someone can generate 3 images per day. Midjourney, someone can create 25 images total before having to pay. Then it's $8 - $10 a month, with 200 images you can create per month. Leanardo.AI Someone can generate around 30 images a day for free. Google Gemini - Someone can create around 30 images a day for free. List the art on Etsy Some websites accept AI art, and some don't, and luckily, Etsy does take it. The bad news is that it does cost money to open an Etsy shop, ranging from $15 to $29. More bad news is that, unlike eBay, which is free to list an item, Etsy does charge 0.20 cents just to list it. The good news is that the listing lasts for 4 months. Still, Etsy is a wonderful place to list items. Also, an insider tip with a digital download, when someone purchases something, you can give the customer a free gift in exchange for their email address. Then, when you create new art, send the customer a link where they can purchase it. Who is the ideal person to purchase digital art? Someone who has already purchased digital art. This is why you want to collect emails. I have a free guide on how to do this at the link HERE. Double-check the rules with Etsy, but I'm pretty sure you can do this. It is your shop; you paid for it. List the art on Redbubble Redbubble is another place to list your AI art for sale. It's an online marketplace and print-on-demand. Print on demand means you design stuff that gets shipped to someone. This stuff could be socks with alien AI faces, shirts, hoodies, and really anything. The good news is that it doesn't cost money to list the art on the platform. The platform only charges a fee if an item gets sold. So, if it doesn't sell, you don't pay money (this is good news). via GIPHY Society6 Oh, and another platform that is sort of free Society6 that you can check out HERE. The free plan allows 10 images that you can list. Society6 is a print-on-demand marketplace. Artists create art and upload it to the website. If someone buys it, then the website will make the item and ship it with your art on it. Social Media You can also use the AI for social media. I know what you might be thinking: how the heck do you make money from that? Nearly all social media platforms (except Snapchat) that I know of allow someone to put a clickable link in their profile. Snapchat allows a web address, but it's not clickable. Then someone can post content, and in the description or in the content, mention your profile. If someone clicks the link in your profile, there are "a lot" of ways to earn money. That link can be an affiliate link where you earn money if someone buys something, fills out a form, downloads something or does an action. Even better is that the link can go to a landing page where you collect emails. This is a MUCH more long-term way of thinking and more profitable. If you're interested in how to create a landing page, how to send emails, and more on this, I have free guides at this post HERE. Earn money with courses If you know how to create AI art, you can easily earn money by creating an eBook or course and sharing your knowledge. A program like this HERE, enables you to sell the eBook or course anywhere, and it's free until you make a sale. I know what you might be thinking: nobody buys courses or eBooks anymore. It's true that due to AI, the demand for courses has dropped, but it depends on the course. Plus, I have a nifty trick. You could create an eBook, give it away for free, and put affiliate links in the eBook. Another trick is "content lockers." A content locker is when you give away the course or eBook, and in order for someone to access it, they have to complete a free offer. This free offer could be downloading a free app or filling out a form for more information. Then they get access to the course or eBook. When they complete this free offer that takes a few seconds, you can earn money. It could be $1 to $20, depending on many things. Cool right? In fact, I wrote a whole guide on 15 ways to earn money with eBooks you can check out HERE. Use Gumroad If you haven't heard of Gumroad yet, it's a platform you can check out HERE, that allows you to sell "I think" anything nearly everywhere. I know they accept AI art. The cool thing with Gumroad is that it's free to use, and they just take a cut when you use the platform. As for how you advertise your Gumroad Shimbam (store), there are endless ways. There is Craigslist, Pinterest, making YouTube videos, using TikTok, using paid ads, using Facebook, and really a million other ways to advertise it. Plus, it takes VERY little effort to set up, unlike a website. Create a Fiverr gig If you know how to create AI art, you could easily create a Fiverr gig around making custom art for your clients. If you haven't heard of Fiverr, it's a place where you can create a gig for nearly anything. It's called Fiverr because it used to be $5. People would do strange things for $5, like call your ex and bark like a dog or sing Happy Birthday on a phone. I'm coming up with this stuff off the top of my head. However, some people make REALLY good income on Fiverr! Plus, many gigs cost more than $5 (inflation, right?) You can check out the website HERE. What is cool about Fiverr is that people come to you, unlike Upwork, where someone creates a job and you have to compete with a hundred of other people for that 1 job. However, making and selling AI art should be done with transparency and ethically. It "probably" also should have some type of human element added to it. If the price is right and you are providing value, then it can be done. Use AI art with Crypto I have a (hate / interested) view on crypto because I've lost a SHIT ton of money with it. However, in the long term, I'm interested to see how things will develop. There are marketplaces like Opensea where there are ways to create NFT's with art and list them. Digital downloads Yep, you can use AI art with various digital products and sell them. 1 idea is Canva Templates, meaning you can create a template for coloring books, journals, wallpapers, clipart packs, social media post designs, and much more. Then sell them on platforms on Etsy, Gumroad, eBay, your own website, and probably many other places. This is a cool strategy because you're combining multiple things, and isn't that what creativity is? combining stuff. Ebay Yep, someone can list digital art on eBay. Plus, it's free to list! For tips on listing items on eBay as well as avoiding scams, I wrote a post on it HERE. Create AI art that is good enough to sell Creating art that is good enough to sell is beyond the scope of this post, but I will provide a few tips. Most people can agree that higher resolution AI art does better. This also goes for microstock platforms and photos. After you generate the art, you could use Leonardo Upscaler to enhance the quality and sharpness. The free plan does 2x the image, and the paid plan does 4k upscaling. Photoshop also does 4k upscaling, as well as many other platforms. Oh, and don't tell anyone, but this place HERE does 4k upscaling for free. Next up is the prompt. This is what you type into the AI machine to get the result. Sadly, AI can't read someone's mind yet (that is a scary thought), so you have to be as specific as possible on what to create. There is an art and science to creating AI art, and it's a skill. The more art you create, the better you can get at it. One formula you could follow is (Subject + Style + Mood + Details + Quality). Also, be ultra descriptive about the subject. For example, instead of a young lady, a more descriptive phrase could be “young woman with long auburn hair, wearing a flowing silk dress, standing in a lavender field.” Generic prompts lead to generic art. Using descriptive details as well can help, such as.... Lighting, mood, colors, camera angle, style (e.g., “hyperrealistic portrait, golden hour sunlight, cinematic lighting, ultra-detailed skin.) You could also remove common AI flaws: “no watermark, no text, no blurry edges, no extra limbs, no distorted anatomy.” And finally, find AI art that has already sold and let that be your teacher. Try to make art that is similar, but put your own unique twist and angle on it. Oh, and lastly, (disclaimer: I'm not a lawyer ) if you add your own human touch to the end, then you can copyright it. Purely AI art is not copyrighted, meaning if you sell it, that person can turn around and do what they want with it, such as sell it. It's not a bad idea to have some type of ownership of it. Conclusion AI art is a new thing, and I hope I got the juices in your brain operating on what is possible. Plus, providing some tips and tricks. There are other ways to earn money with AI art, such as licensing to use in video games, video, blogging, and marketing. You can blend it with illustrations to list on microstock platforms. Plus, I'm sure there are many more ways to profit from AI art, just remember the most important element is to have fun! Of course, if you're serious about AI art, then this post is only 1 stop. There is more training, more experience that is probably required. It is possible. Another way to earn passive income, which I've had a lot of fun with, is microstock, which is photography, videos, and many of those platforms take illustrations. To discover 10 tips for earning passive income with microstock, you can check out this post HERE. Bye for now.