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Search for ‘ways to make money online’ and you’ll inevitably come across hundreds of mentions of online survey sites promising to make you tons of money in your spare time.
he reality is that, while many of them do pay you, they won’t give you enough money to quit your day job. Some are even scams that promise to pay you for your time but don’t stick to that promise.
In this Panda Research review, we cover how much you can earn, how it works, whether it’s a scam or legit and if it’s worth your time or not.
This review gets into the nitty-gritty of the site, goes over some of its best features, and helps you decide whether it’s a legitimate place to earn some extra cash.
You can follow this link to head right to Panda Research and get a feel for the site before reading the rest of the review:
Table of Contents
What is Panda Research?
Panda Research is similar to many of the other survey sites on the web. This is a place where you can register quickly for an account, fill out your information, and get matched with opportunities to take surveys for cash.
Online surveys go toward market research. You’ll help shape brands, products, and services when you provide your answers.
Panda Research is a middleman between you and the companies who want to know more about you and your family, what you do, what you like, and what you don’t like.
Panda Research has been on the internet since 2005, so it’s one of the longest-running survey sites. The company that owns this survey site also owns some other popular survey sites, like MindsPay.
Panda Research does have some additional money-making opportunities that could make it a good option for people who don’t qualify for its surveys frequently.
If you want more ways to make money in addition to taking surveys, you can also:
- Read paid emails
- Complete free and paid offers
- Refer your friends and family
- Receive special discounts and promotions
- Enter giveaways when you successfully complete surveys
Who Can Join Panda Research?
Panda Research is currently open to anyone in the United States who is 18 years old or older. You also must join as yourself, rather than on behalf of a business or entity.
The site states that you can only have one account using a valid email address. If Panda Research finds that you have multiple accounts to make more money, it can terminate all of them and void your earnings.
How Does Panda Research Work?
This site functions similarly to other survey sites. If you’re familiar with others, then you’ll have a basic idea for how Panda Research works.
First, you’ll sign up for an account using the simple registration form on the site. Once you activate your account and fill out your basic information, you’ll start getting matched with surveys.
Panda Research sends survey invites to your email address, so be sure to register with one that you’ll check frequently.
When you respond to any survey, you’ll first need to qualify. The qualification process usually entails a brief questionnaire that determines whether you match the requirements for a survey.
Unfortunately, you probably won’t qualify for every survey you respond to. In that case, you won’t make any money from the survey. Panda Research only pays you for surveys that you can complete in their entirety.
When you do complete a survey, Panda Research will credit your account the amount it stated in the survey invitation.
What Does Panda Research Use My Information and Answers For?
Panda Research uses the information you provide during surveys for market research purposes. Your information will go to the company who created the survey to help answer their questions and shape the business.
As for your personal information, Panda Research doesn’t share it or sell it to any other company, unless you specifically agree to it.
You can read more about this in the privacy policy. Basically, unless you click a checkbox during the signup process that gives your consent for your name, address, email address, and other information to be shared with other companies, Panda Research keeps it safe.
Is Panda Research Any Different from Other Survey Sites?
Panda Research is a little different from other survey sites because it offers a few different ways to earn money. Most survey sites offer points or cash when you complete a survey or refer your friends.
Panda Research also pays you to complete offers and read emails so that you have some additional avenues for earning cash.
This site also offers cash payments for surveys rather than points, which most survey sites use to pay. With cash accruing in your account, you’ll always know what your balance is without having to work out how much your points are worth.
How Does Payment Work?
If you sign up for Panda Research, you’ll need a PayPal account. PayPal is currently the only method Panda Research uses to transfer payments.
Be sure to double check that you’ve entered the correct PayPal email address in your profile or you won’t be able to get your payments.
You’ll receive a payment for any survey you can complete in its entirety. If you stop a survey halfway through or forget to complete it, you won’t receive any money.
The site also doesn’t guarantee a payment for completed surveys in instances where your browser experienced technical difficulties, or there was something preventing the site from tracking your survey completion.
So, it’s important that you make sure you don’t have any settings in your browser or computer that might prevent the site from correctly tracking your progress.
You should see your earnings for a survey in your account once Panda Research confirms that you completed it. This process doesn’t usually take longer than 24 hours.
Paid offers work the same way, but you may need to wait up to a week for confirmation of completion.
You’ll get paid when you have at least $50 in your account, and $25 of that has to be from completed offers. Panda Research pays twice per month, on the 1st and 15th, after a 30-day wait period from requesting your payment.
Who is Panda Research Best For?
This site is best for people who also use other survey sites to get a steadier stream of income. Panda Research will take some time to pay, since you’ll have to meet all the requirements for requesting payment, plus the 30-day wait period.
Therefore, it’s a good idea to have a few other survey sites you can get paid from while you wait for your payment.
Pros and Cons of Panda Research
Survey sites get a lot of love and hate, no matter what. Panda Research is no exception. Before deciding whether it’s a good place for you to spend some time to earn money online, I suggest reading over some of the most important pros and cons:
Pros of Panda Research:
- Offers more than one way to earn money.
- The sign-up process is simple, and you have a chance to earn your first $3 just from completing the sign-on survey.
- You’ll receive a decent amount of survey invitations and paid emails.
- Pays twice per month via PayPal, one of the most convenient and simple online payment methods.
- Panda Research has some of the highest payout amounts of survey sites, with longer surveys paying anywhere from $25 to $75.
Cons of Panda Research:
- Very high minimum balance required to receive payout, and at least $25 have to come from completed offers. In other words, you can never cash out from surveys alone.
- The customer support for Panda Research could be better. Many users claim that they have to wait a long time to get a response, and some never get one at all.
- Mandatory 30-day wait period after requesting payment.
- Some online complaints mention having to wait 90 days or more for PayPal payments to come through.
What Do Panda Research Reviews Say About It?
As with any site we review on Frugal for Less, I took some time to look at online reviews of Panda Research. Specifically, I start out with sites made to help consumers, like the Better Business Bureau (BBB) and Consumer Reports.
Currently, Panda Research isn’t accredited with the BBB. Since it’s been around since 2005 and still not accredited, I have to assume that the company doesn’t have any plan to get accreditation.
That’s not to say anything negative about it because it isn’t mandatory. However, most companies do get accredited as a way to prove trustworthiness to consumers.
I also had no luck finding anything about Panda Research on Consumer Reports or Trustpilot.
But, I did find some information on Reddit and work from home-related message boards. The reviews are mixed, at best. Many people state that they’ve gotten paid with no problem, while others mention that they’ve had to wait much longer than expected to get payments.
A fairly consistent complaint, though, is that the Panda Research customer service team is severely lacking. You have to be a member to contact anyone from the team, and many members state that it takes days to get a response to a ticket.
Some people say they never hear back from anyone.
The Best Features of Panda Research
Even though the reviews of Panda Research online are iffy, the site does have some positive things going for it that set it apart from some other similar survey sites. Before you decide if it’s right for you, consider some of these features of Panda Research:
Potential Sign-Up Bonus
When you sign up for Panda Research, you’ll be asked to take a quick survey. This will help the site determine if you’re eligible for a $3 survey right off the bat. If so, you could make your first $3 within minutes of signing up for the site.
The only downfall is that not everyone qualifies for that survey, so you may wind up with nothing. However, it’s worth it to give it a try and see if you qualify, especially if you planned to sign up for the site anyway.
Referral Program
The Panda Research referral program is a great way to earn some extra money if you have a lot of interested friends and family to bring to the program.
You earn cash in a residual manner, but making 10% of everything your referrals earn, excluding earnings from paid emails.
If your friend gets $25 from offers, $15 from surveys, and $10 from paid emails and then cashes out his first $50, you’ll earn $4 when he cashes out (10% of his $40 earnings from surveys and offers). Make sure your friends stay active to reap the rewards.
Special Discounts and Promotions for Members
When you complete offers and surveys with Panda Research, you can become eligible for special promotions and discounts for products or services.
You must be a participating member to see these special offers, but it could be helpful in saving you money on things you already use or would like to use.
You’ll also have the chance to be entered into giveaways upon completing surveys and offers, which can be another way to make some extra money on this platform.
Dedicated to Preventing Spam
Panda Research strongly urges its members not to spam others with their referral links.
Unlike other survey and reward sites that don’t particularly care how you draw in new members, Panda Research has a full anti-spam policy to ensure that others don’t get bombarded with spam emails and links to join the site.
If you plan to refer members, be sure to check the policy so you can do it properly. You’re allowed to use your website and social media accounts responsibly to get other members to join.
How Much Money Can I Make with Panda Research?
To be honest, Panda Research has one of the highest minimum payout amounts. Many members will likely find that it takes them too long to reach that amount without completing paid offers, so they never make it to their first payment.
As with any survey site, the amount you can make mostly depends on the number of surveys for which you qualify. If you get lucky enough to qualify for most of them, you can rack up cash faster than people who rarely qualify.
Similarly, if you don’t respond to survey invitations fast enough, they may be filled up before you get to it.
Most surveys here will take about 10-15 minutes and pay between $1.50 and $3.00. There are some higher paying surveys that might pay $10-20, but they’ll typically take an hour or more to complete.
The highest-paying ones are rare to qualify for and will take several hours to finish, but could pay up to $75.
Realistically, you can expect to make about $5 to $10 per week here, depending on how many surveys you’re able to take.
Is Panda Research Legit or a Scam?
Is Panda Research a scam? By definition, no. In most cases, it does pay its members, although they may have to wait much longer than they expected to get their payments.
But, would Panda Research necessarily be my first-choice survey site to sign up with? No. I can find plenty of other survey and reward sites that pay in a timelier manner and don’t make their members wait for survey approvals and payments.
This site also doesn’t let you request your payment when you hit $50 just for completing surveys. Instead, you have to have at least $25 in your account from offers, too, as if the $50 minimum balance wasn’t high enough.
If you’re going to use Panda Research for some extra cash, it’s a viable method. However, I wouldn’t suggest using it as your main survey site.
Sign up for some others and use Panda Research as a backup site. It does have some high-paying surveys, so it’s worth it to wait around for those and see if you qualify for them.
How to Sign Up for Panda Research
Signing up for Panda Research is simple.
Head to the home page and fill out the information in the free sign up form. Then, click Begin Now to continue filling out the rest of the sign-on survey.
Make sure that you type your email correctly, since this is where you’ll receive survey invitations and paid emails, from which you can unsubscribe at any time if you don’t think the site is right for you.
If you qualified for the $3 bonus, you should see that amount in your account immediately upon completing your profile and registration.
Remember to sign up for the affiliate program once you complete registration so you have more opportunities to earn with your unique referral link.
Final Thoughts
Panda Research is a legitimate way to earn money from taking surveys, completing offers, and reading emails. However, it probably isn’t one of your best options. The site certainly has a mixed bag of reviews and payments aren’t exactly reliably.
But, if you want to use it as a backup path to earn some extra cash online, you might get lucky with Panda Research. Some of its high-paying surveys can beat the low-paying surveys other similar sites offer.
Have you tried Panda Research yourself? If so, we’d love to hear about your experience in a comment below.
If you want some other options for money-making survey sites, check out the following articles:
- 10 Top Survey Sites That Will Make You $300/Month or More
- 25+ Best Survey Sites: Get Paid $600/Month or More from Home
- 20+ Best Survey Apps That Will Make You Money
Thanks for reading our Panda Research review and happy frugaling!
