How Much Does Instacart Pay? I Tried Full-Service Shopper to Find Out
I found the Instacart side hustle to be accessible and fun, but not very profitable.
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I became an Instacart full-service shopper for a week and didn’t hate it. I found shopping for people to be more fulfilling than chauffeuring them around as an Uber driver or doing taco and smoothie deliveries with DoorDash. (I tried both of those gigs, too).
Even though I liked it, I didn’t make much money, but that doesn’t mean you can’t. I chalk my struggle up to being new and living in a relatively small town in Maryland.
How much do Instacart shoppers make?
According to ZipRecruiter, the average pay for Instacart shoppers in the U.S. is about $18 per hour. I made less than that.
I tested this side hustle over the course of three days, spent just under seven hours active in the app and earned a total of $80.29.
- That’s $11.47 per hour.
- It’s actually more like $8 per hour, when you consider the time I spent sitting in parking lots waiting for orders. By my estimate, I worked for 10 hours.
- It’s even worse when you consider the 160 miles I put on my personal vehicle and half a tank of gas I used.
Let’s call it $25 for gas and subtract it from $80.29. That's $55.29 for 10 hours of my time.
Want to make more than me? Here are five lessons I learned.
1. Stay close to busy stores during peak times
As a full-service shopper, you earn pay each time you complete a “batch,” Instacart’s term for a delivery, which can include one or more customer orders and can be from multiple stores. Shop when it’s busy and you’ll get more opportunities to accept batches.
Signing up to make money with Instacart is super easy — meet basic requirements, have access to a vehicle and you’re basically in. Once you pass the background check, you can study the Instacart Shopper app to find busy stores in your area. The map in the app shows red or orange rings around busy stores. Head close to a color-coded store and you’re likely to get a batch.
I tested this side hustle during late morning and early afternoon hours on weekdays, but it wasn’t the most profitable time to shop. In fact, the Shopper app showed Sunday as the only high-demand day of the week in my town, with the potential to earn an extra 25% between the hours of 3 p.m. to 7 p.m.
If I do this again, I’ll make time to go out on a Sunday afternoon. I’d love to be able to make $50 to $75 bucks of side money for just a couple hours of work.
2. Take orders that require more effort
The dollar amount you see when you accept a batch is made up of base pay (called batch pay), any available promotions and tips. According to Instacart’s website, the amount you earn per batch depends on the number of items, driving distance and effort involved when shopping and delivering. The harder the batch, the better the pay.
On the low end, I made $6.22 to shop for and deliver four items from a local grocery store to a customer who lived only a few miles away. On the high end, I made $21.63 for a multi-store batch to shop for two separate customers. That one was a doozy.
I started at a pop-up Halloween store in the local mall to find and buy an adult-sized Binx costume (a cat-like character from the movie “Hocus Pocus,” if you're wondering), then made my way to a home improvement store to buy a rug and several other items for another customer. I spent an hour and 45 minutes, covered 16 miles and worked hard on that batch.
You can make more money by accepting complex batches, but you’ll need to be quick to make it worth it.
3. Go the extra mile for customers
Part of the reason my two-store, double-customer batch took so long is because I spent half an hour hunting for a houndstooth rug.
The Shopper app prompts you to scan the barcode of each item as you shop. But the code on the rug I found didn’t match. Rather than skip it, I used the app to snap a pic and let the customer know I was buying the one I thought was right. I didn’t hear back, but when I got to the customer’s house, she greeted me and thanked me for staying the course. Later on, an app notification let me know she’d increased the tip by a dollar.
While an extra dollar isn’t much, customer tips can make up a significant portion of pay. In fact, $32 of the $80.29 I earned came from tips. Instacart advises new shoppers to focus on quality at the store — when picking produce, for example — bag items with care and communicate clearly with customers for higher tips.
4. Check your car insurance policy before you drive
Working as a full-service shopper for Instacart — like other driving gig jobs — makes you an independent contractor. It sounds cool, but being your own boss places extra responsibility on you when it comes to insurance and taxes.
Instacart’s website states that not all personal car insurance policies cover accidents that happen while on delivery, and that commercial insurance or special rideshare/delivery driver insurance may be required.
It’s important to read your policy and talk with your insurance company to find out what’s covered before you take your first delivery, says Bob Passmore, vice president of personal lines at the American Property Casualty Insurance Association.
“You’re looking for exclusions either specifically for delivery or for commercial activity,” he says. Other terms to look for in the policy include “carrying passengers for hire” or “carrying property for hire.”
5. Track your expenses to plan for taxes
Another thing to know before you go is what it’s like to pay taxes as an independent contractor. The IRS website clearly states that you have to file a tax return if you net $400 or more from self-employment work.
At $80.29, I’m off the hook for now. But let’s say you’re killing it with Instacart. You should look into whether you need to make estimated tax payments, or have more tax withheld by the employer of your primary job to compensate.
You could also reduce what you owe through self-employment tax deductions, which may include mileage and phone costs.
Drive safe and pack a lunch
Speaking of your iPhone or Android device, you’re going to be tethered to it while you work. You use it to accept orders, locate and scan the barcodes of items in the store, navigate to the customer and basically log everything you do. Bring a charger and invest in a good phone mount for your car to make it safe and easy to follow directions.
Also, this side gig requires physical activity. You’ll be walking, searching for elusive gourmet grocery items, lifting heavy stuff like pet food and driving all over the place. Bring enough water and a sack lunch to stay fueled up and avoid spending your batch pay as soon as you get it.
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