Discover the most effective crypto passive income strategies available today, offering you the potential to grow your crypto holdings steadily and effortlessly.
Many crypto investors opt for passive income in crypto, recognizing that active trading can be challenging due to the high volatility of many crypto assets. While passive income strategies may offer smaller returns than trading, they also come with reduced risk, making them a more stable and reliable option.
It’s important to remember that any opportunity for profit carries a degree of risk, and this applies to passive crypto income strategies as well. While they are generally less risky than active trading, it’s crucial to be aware that losses are still possible.
List of the best crypto passive income strategies in 2026:
- Kraken – Earn up to 5.75% APR on US Dollar staking
- Binance – High-yield stablecoin staking, Megadrop and Launchpool campaigns
- KuCoin – Flexible and fixed staking options, KCS bonuses
- Nexo – Up to 16% APY on crypto, cashback rewards
- Lido – Liquid staking for ETH holders with 3.3% returns
- Kiln – The leading crypto restaking service, 3.45% APR on native ETH staking
How to make passive income with crypto?
Without further ado, here are the best crypto passive income strategies that you can use to grow your crypto holdings over time:
- Staking through cryptocurrency exchanges: Cryptocurrency exchanges provide a more convenient way of staking cryptocurrency, although the returns are slightly lower, and more trust is required.
- On-chain staking: Stake your cryptocurrency directly on the blockchain to help secure the network and earn rewards.
- DeFi lending: Lend out your crypto using decentralized finance protocols such as Aave and Compound. Withdraw your coins at any time.
- Lending through cryptocurrency exchanges: Many cryptocurrency exchanges offer lending products where you can earn yield on your cryptocurrency holdings. Typically, you will be able to choose between flexible and fixed lending periods.
- Crypto restaking: A novel approach designed around the concept of “pooled security.” In simple terms, users can restake their already staked ETH with EigenLayer, and the protocol then allows external services to connect to EigenLayer and use its pooled funds.
Now that we know the basics, let’s explore how each of these strategies can be put into practice at some of the leading crypto investment platforms.
1. Kraken – Earn up to 5.75% APR on US Dollar staking
Kraken is widely considered one of the best crypto exchanges in the industry, owing its reputation to stellar user experience and a strong track record on security. However, a lesser-known advantage of Kraken is its Auto Earn program, which features a wide variety of crypto savings products and makes it one of the top crypto staking platforms.
When it comes to stablecoin staking, Kraken offers up to 4% APR on customers’ USDG holdings. The highest rate is available to members of the exchange’s Kraken+ subscription service ($4.99 per month).
Currently, Kraken’s Auto Earn feature supports 22 different crypto assets. Users who turn the Auto Earn feature will receive weekly rewards on their eligible holdings with no lock-up periods. The APR depends on the crypto asset in the user’s portfolio. For example, the APR for Bitcoin ranges from 0.02% to 0.1%, while the APR for Cosmos ranges from 7.4% to 9.2%.
Notable passive income options on Kraken:
- USDG: Up to 4% APR
- SOL: Up to 2.8% APR
- ADA: Up to 3.9% APR
2. Binance – High-yield stablecoin staking and various reward campaigns
Binance is the largest cryptocurrency trading platform in terms of users and trading volume. The platform has a robust Earn program, which features dozens of cryptocurrencies at both flexible and fixed limit staking options. Usually, the fixed products come with higher returns, but they prevent you from trading staked crypto before the product expires.
At the time of writing, Binance pays as much as 6.3% APY on Tether deposits and 6.7% on USD Coin. These are very high returns for stablecoins, and they are among the highest returns you can expect on these digital assets out of all platforms.
In addition to the Earn platform, Binance has several other opportunities for passive income hunters. There are the Launchpool and Launchpad platforms, which allow customers to stake BNB and other supported assets and receive tokens from up-and-coming projects. The returns vary greatly depending on the project, but some tokens have generated 200%+ returns within the first few weeks of trading, like the XAI token, for example.
Notable passive income options on Binance:
- Binance Earn: 6%+ APY on USDT and USDC
- Binance Launchpool: Earn tokens from up-and-coming projects
- Passive income opportunities for a huge range of cryptocurrencies
3. KuCoin – Flexible and fixed staking options, KCS bonuses
KuCoin is a crypto exchange that features a broad selection of supported coins and tokens, with more than 1150 trading pairs enabled for over 770 currencies. Most of the exchange’s catalog is available on the KuCoin Earn platform as well, giving holders the opportunity to generate passive income with crypto assets.
Some of the notable options available on KuCoin’s Earn platform include USDT and SOL products, which can provide up to 100% APR on fixed savings. For example, new users can earn 100% on their USDT deposits for a period of 7 days, giving them a nice boost when joining KuCoin for the first time.
Similar to Binance’s BNB, KuCoin has its own native token, KCS. It allows holders to generate additional rewards, take advantage of lower fees, and participate in farming campaigns for crypto projects through Spotlight, a token launch platform.
Notable passive income options on KuCoin:
- Tether: 100% APY for new users for a period of 7 days
- 30% APR for SOL and MATIC staking for new users for 7 days
- Daily KCS bonuses
4. Nexo – Up to 16% APY on crypto, cashback rewards
Nexo is a comprehensive cryptocurrency platform that offers a range of financial services, including lending, borrowing, staking, and a cryptocurrency-backed credit card. It offers a variety of staking options, allowing users to earn interest on their digital assets.
It supports popular cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin and Ethereum, stablecoins like USDT and DAI, and even fiat currencies like USD, EUR, and GBP. Holding and staking NEXO tokens can increase the interest rates on other assets and provide additional benefits like fee discounts and dividends from Nexo’s profits.
The platform has also introduced a cryptocurrency-backed credit card, known as the Nexo Card, which offers several unique features. The card is directly linked to the user’s Nexo account, allowing them to use their crypto assets as collateral. This means users do not need to sell their cryptocurrencies to access credit. Cardholders receive instant cash back on every purchase. The cashback rewards are provided in either BTC or NEXO tokens and can amount to up to 2%.
Notable passive income options on Nexo:
- USD Coin: Up to 11% APR for NEXO holders
- Bitcoin: Up to 5.5% for NEXO holders
- Up to 2% cashback on credit card purchases
5. Lido – Liquid staking for ETH holders with 2.5% returns
When it comes to liquid staking, no other platform comes close to Lido in terms of market share. At the time of writing, more than $21.3 billion ETH was deposited through Lido, allowing investors to earn up to 2.5% APR on their Ethereum holdings. In addition, LDO holders can participate in governance decisions, influencing which cryptos the platform supports, and more.
Lido is arguably the best Ethereum staking choice for those who wish to stake their ETH but don’t have the required 32 ETH to stake as a solo staker, and don’t want to use cryptocurrency exchanges for their staking.
When staking via Lido, users who deposit their ETH get Lido Staked Ether (stETH) in return. Staking rewards accumulate in the form of stETH. Meanwhile, stETH can be traded and transferred as a regular token. This is a major benefit over staking ETH without receiving a liquid staking token in return.
Notable passive income options on Lido:
- Ethereum: 2.5% APR
- stETH can be used on Ethereum Layer 2 platforms to generate additional passive income
- DeFi-powered options for higher yields
6. Jito – Leading Solana liquid staking solution
Jito is a Solana infrastructure platform that allows SOL stakers to reap the benefits of MEV (maximal extractable value), leading to higher returns. At the time of writing, staking SOL through Jito comes with an APY of roughly 5.8%.
Staking through Jito is enabled through JitoSOL, a liquid staking token. When users stake their SOL with Jito, they receive the JitoSOL liquid staking token (LST) in return. This token accumulates both staking and MEV rewards and can be utilized across DeFi applications.
Unlike conventional tokens, JitoSOL keeps a constant balance in the user’s wallet, while its value relative to SOL steadily rises over time.As validators generate and distribute staking and MEV rewards, the total amount of SOL in the staking pool increases without the need to mint additional JitoSOL.
As a result, JitoSOL compounds in value automatically, with each token representing an ever-larger share of the growing stake pool.
Notable passive income options on Jito:
- SOL: 5.8% APY through the JitoSOL liquid staking token
- Compounding opportunities through Solana-based DeFi protocols
The bottom line
If you’re planning to invest in cryptocurrency for the long term, it’s certainly worth considering allocating a portion of your crypto portfolio into passive income strategies. On-chain staking is one of the safest methods of earning crypto, although it requires you to ensure that your cryptocurrency is stored safely.
Before we wrap up, please keep in mind that when you’re staking or otherwise earning yield on volatile assets such as ETH or ADA, the overall dollar value of your holdings could drop even though your stack of coins is growing passively.
When calculating how much you can expect to earn from staking, you need to take the volatility of the cryptocurrency you’re staking into account. If you want more predictable returns, consider using passive income products based on stablecoins instead.
In addition, you should be extremely careful if you encounter any crypto passive income platforms or services that advertise very high yields and “guaranteed” profits, as they are usually scams. Remember: if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is.