How To Make $500 A Week With DoorDash – The Ultimate Guide
As the leading food delivery app in North America, DoorDash is an incredibly popular side hustle. It's also flexible, so you can Dash to make extra cash whenever you want.
However, new and experienced DoorDash drivers alike often wonder if you can make a living Dashing or make a certain amount per week.
So in this post, we're covering how to make $500 a week with DoorDash, if this income goal is possible, and some tips from other real DoorDash drivers to help you get there.
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How To Make $500 A Week With DoorDash
To make $500 a week with DoorDash, you need to earn $71 per day. This is a much more realistic goal and could be possible if you Dash for enough hours and are in a busy market.
When we tested DoorDash, we earned anywhere from $14 to $18 per hour. This means making $500 could be possible with roughly 27 hours of deliveries. But again, this is just our personal experience and you might earn more or less in your market.
Overall, it's certainly possible to earn $500 a week with DoorDash. However, following some DoorDash tips and tricks can ultimately help you make more money Dashing, accelerating your path to this income goal.
Also remember: your hourly pay can vary based on the times you deliver, your market, customer tips, luck, and many other factors.
1. Prioritize Weekend Deliveries
One must-know strategy to make $500 a week with DoorDash is to drive at the best times. Typically, this means working most of Friday and the weekends since this is when customer demand is highest.
During the week, working from 11:00am to 1:00pm for the lunch rush and from around 5:00pm to 9:00pm for dinner also makes sense.
Tuesday and Wednesdays are slower days for DoorDash in most markets, so you really want to prioritize the start and end of the week plus weekends to make as much money as possible.
2. Try Stacked Deliveries
Stacked DoorDash orders involve picking up two meals from the same restaurant and then making two different deliveries. You can also have large Walmart orders that involve dropping off products at a few locations.
These sorts of orders take more work and can be a bit more stressful. However, they often pay much more than regular orders, and you have the chance for more tips.
So, to make $500 dollars a week with DoorDash, don't shy away from stacked orders! Test them out at least to see if the extra driving is worth it for the higher pay.
3. Look For Guaranteed Earning Incentives
One of the simplest ways to make $500 a week with DoorDash is to take advantage of any guaranteed earning incentives that are going on.
For example, DoorDash sometimes runs a guaranteed earnings offer that pays you a certain amount of money for completing a certain amount of deliveries. In the past, it even ran a bonus that said you would ““earn at least $500 in total earnings for 50 deliveries in the next week.”
DoorDash notifies you via email about these guaranteed earning opportunities, so keep an eye on your inbox!
Also note that this payout isn't in addition to your base pay. Rather, it's a guaranteed amount, so you can make $500 no matter what as long as you make 50 deliveries in this example. If you happen to make even more, you keep that amount of money.
4. Consider Multi-Apping
DoorDash is the leading food delivery service, so it's the main app many side hustlers use. However, it can be slow as well, which is why having a few backups is a good idea.
Some other popular delivery and side job apps you can use include:
- Steady: This free app helps you find local side hustles and even part-time jobs!
- Instacart: The leading grocery delivery service where you get paid to shop for people's groceries.
- Uber Eats: Another leading food delivery job like DoorDash where you can deliver via bike, car, or scooter.
- Shipt: A popular grocery delivery gig like Instacart.
- Amazon Flex: This driving gig pays $18 to $25 per hour and you deliver packages for Amazon.
- ParaWorks: An excellent way to make money delivering packages to people and businesses in your area.
- Walmart Spark: Another delivery gig that pays you to deliver groceries and Walmart essentials.
People often run Uber Eats and DoorDash at the same time since both gigs are flexible. But you can try other driving apps that pay like Amazon Flex and Instacart and schedule yourself during slower DoorDash times.
5. Be Selective With Orders
One common mistake new Dashers make is that they accept every order. However, your DoorDash acceptance rate really doesn't matter unless you're going for the Top Dasher program.
As a rule of thumb, try accepting orders that pay at least $1 to $1.50 per mile or so. This makes deliveries more worthwhile and helps cover the cost of gas since DoorDash doesn't cover gas.
You can gamble on lower-paying orders with the hopes of higher tips, but generally, be very selective with the orders you take if you want to earn $500 per week doing DoorDash.
6. Try The New Earn By Time Mode
In June 2023, DoorDash began rolling out a new payment model for Dashers: Earn by Time mode.
With this mode, DoorDash drivers can choose to get paid an hourly wage that varies depending on their market instead of getting paid per-order. This helps provide steadier pay, and Dashers still keep 100% of all tips and can cancel up to two deliveries per hour.
If this option is available in your market, it could provide a faster and less stressful way to earn $500 a week with DoorDash.
This is because the steady hourly pay might be higher than what you normally make on average, especially if you're in a slow market. So, it's worth testing out this feature, at least for a day, to see if it helps boost your daily pay.
7. Wait Near Hotspots
While it sounds simple, another excellent DoorDash driver hack is to wait near hotspots. This means waiting near clusters of popular restaurants that your Dasher app highlights on your in-app map.
If you can schedule your Dash in a zone with several hotspots, it's even better. But the general idea is to try and stay near hotspots and popular restaurants when out Dashing so you don't have to drive as far to pick up food.
8. Offer Great Customer Service
Tips can make or break your efforts to make money with DoorDash. So, to make $500 per week, you're going to want to work on your customer service skills to try and land bigger tips.
Some examples of ways to improve customer service include:
- Messaging the customer if you're late or with updates
- Grabbing extras from the restaurant like napkins and sauces
- Being friendly
- Being on-time
Some Dashers even try to add humor to the mix by sending DoorDash memes to their customers. The point is, don't be afraid to get creative to try and get more tips!
Extra Reading – Is DoorDash Worth It For Drivers?
9. Test Different Markets
Your market plays a massive role in how much money you make with any gig app. So, one way to make $500 a week with DoorDash is to try Dashing in other locations that might be busier.
Some of the best places to DoorDash include major cities and downtown cores. So, if you live in a tiny town, consider testing out your next Dash in a slightly busier area. Also note that you can DoorDash in different states, which might be handy if you live very close to state lines.
10. Track Your Income & Expenses
DoorDash drivers are independent contractors. This means you have to track your income and expenses so you're properly prepaid for tax time.
Personally, I suggest using a mileage tracking app like Everlance to stay on top of all your expenses and driving.
This ultimately helps you make more money with DoorDash since you can potentially claim deductions like:
- Gas
- Vehicle repairs
- Tolls and tickets
- Your smartphone data plan
Extra Reading – The Best Apps That Pay Real Money Instantly.
11. Think Like A Business
Speaking of tracking income and expenses, it's also important to treat your DoorDash side hustle like a business. After all, gig workers are independent contractors, so you're technically your own boss.
This flexibility and freedom is why I love making money with the gig economy. But it also means you're responsible for making a plan to hit your goals. You also need to strategize about ways to work more efficiently, save on taxes, and work smart as well as hard.
I suggest talking with other Dashers in your city and learning from them as well. Little tips and tricks stack up along the way, helping you make more money per hour with any delivery app.
12. Try The Para App
One final tip for making $500 a week with DoorDash is to use the Para app. It's a useful app that actually estimates tips for DoorDash, letting you know if an order is actually worth taking or not.
What's cool about Para is that it's very accurate with its tip predictions. This can help you accept more orders overall, so you make more money each week.
The app also helps with DoorDash mileage tracking and also works with other driving gigs like Grubhub and Uber Eats.
If you already have a high acceptance rate, it won't make a massive difference for your earnings. But if you have a lower acceptance rate, Para could boost the number of orders you accept and make a meaningful difference to your overall earnings.
Extra Reading – The Best Ways To Make $500 By Tomorrow.
Final Thoughts
I hope this guide on how to make 500 dollars a week doing DoorDash gives you some ideas for how to maximize your delivery income.
You won't make $500 a day or something crazy with jobs like DoorDash. But in terms of increasing your weekly income, it's one of the best side hustles out there.
And if you combine DoorDash with other gigs like Instacart, Uber Eats, or Steady, you can keep yourself busy so you make as much money as possible.
Our post on how much you can make a day with DoorDash also highlights some realistic daily earning figures you can reference to see how feasible this income goal is.
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