Is Ibotta Worth It? An Honest Review

41 Shares

Is Ibotta worth it?
Do they really give you money?
How much can you save?
Is it going to take up a ton of time?

Great questions! I’m so glad you asked.

Ibotta has gone through some changes over the years since I first started recommending them, so I want to give you all of the details on how it works and of course answer the big question: Is Ibotta worth it?

(spoiler alert: yes!)

What is Ibotta?

Ibotta is a free app for your smartphone that lets you earn cash back for in-store and online purchases.

Does Ibotta really give you money?

Yup! I’ve personally earned a solid amount of money from Ibotta!

You do have to have earned a minimum of $20 to withdraw your money, but if you’re using the app regularly, that’s not hard to do.

You can choose to have cash transferred to your PayPal or Venmo account, or choose from a whole bunch of gift card options.

How Much Time Does It Take?

I’ve tried many of the money saving and cash back apps out there and I think Ibotta is the most easy-to-use and straightforward one out there.

It only takes a few minutes to find and redeem offers. They are constantly adding features to make it easier and faster to use.

How Much Can You Save?

How much you save really depends on what you buy and how you use the app.

There are specific cash back offers for grocery items you buy in-store as well as percentages that you can earn for shopping online at many stores. There’s also a new feature where you actually pay through the app while you’re in a store to earn a percentage of cash back that way.

If you’re taking advantage of everything Ibotta has to offer, you could earn a lot!

Let’s Do This Step by Step:

The first thing you need to do it download the Ibotta app and create an account. (The app will need to know your location so that it can show the stores available in your area.)

Once you’re logged in, you’re ready to view all of the available offers.

You can look through the in-store offers for your favorite grocery stores as well as online shopping offers.

When you see an offer that you think you might want to use, click the plus symbol to add it to your list of favorite offers.

After you purchase an item that you have an offer for, you just need to redeem the offer to get your cash back. You’ll either take a picture of the receipt or, if you can link your store loyalty card within Ibotta, you won’t have to do anything! Ibotta will know that you made the purchase!

One of my favorite uses for Ibotta is the “any brand” grocery offers. These offers let you earn cash back on store brand purchases! To find these offers, I find my favorite grocery store and then type “any brand” into the search bar. This lets me see all available “any brand” offers!

Is Ibotta Worth It?: Pros and Cons

Pros

Without having to deal with coupons, I can save money on groceries and other things I was going to buy anyway!
The app is simple and easy to use.
Ibotta is totally free to use!
It doesn’t take much time. I browse available offers while I’m on my phone and then take a minute to redeem my offers after shopping.

Cons

You need to make sure to buy the right items to qualify for your cash back offer. I’ve seen people get frustrated because they thought they were buying something they would earn cash back on, but it wasn’t to proper size or variety. I don’t ever let Ibotta dictate what I buy. I purchase what I was planning to purchase and if I earn a little cash back in the process, then that’s great, but I don’t buy something just to earn cash back.
You have to remember to use it!

So is Ibotta worth it? Absolutely!

From my point of view, it’s fast, easy, and has earned me money on stuff I was going to buy anyways. It seems silly not to take advantage of that!

Download the Ibotta app HERE to start viewing cash back offers.

Is Ibotta or Ebates Better?

Ok, one last common question. Ibotta or Ebates? My answer is: BOTH!

Sidenote: Ebates changed its name to Rakuten, so I’m going to call it that from here on out.

Both are cash back apps. There is definitely some overlap in their offers, but Rakuten is mostly for online shopping, while Ibotta offers in store and online cash back offers.

There’s absolutely no reason why you can’t use both. I do! I tend to use Ibotta for in store grocery cash back offers and Rakuten for my online shopping, but you can certainly check to see who is offering the best percentage of cash back for your online purchases.

Take a look at my easy Ebates/Rakuten Tutorial HERE.

While Ibotta isn’t going to make you rich, it is a pretty quick and easy way to save money/earn cash back. And it’s free to use!

Quick, easy, free to use, and saves me money… That makes Ibotta a no-brainer to me.

Click here to set up your Ibotta account!