Current Rewards Review: How Much Can You Earn Listening to Music Passively?

How Current Rewards Works

Current Rewards is a mobile app for iOS and Android that pays you points for consuming content through their platform. Music streaming is the main feature, but it also includes games, news articles, and weather updates. Each of these generates small amounts of points on top of your music earnings.

You download the app, create an account, and start streaming. Points accumulate based on listening time, not specific actions. There are no reviews to write, no buttons to press, no feedback to give. You just play music and let the points build. Once you hit the minimum threshold, you redeem points for gift cards from Amazon, Google Play, and other major retailers.

The key difference from review apps like Slice the Pie is effort. Slice the Pie requires active writing and attention for every cent earned. Current Rewards runs in the background while you work, study, cook, or sleep. The trade-off is predictable: less effort means less money.

The Music Feature in Detail

Current Rewards doesn't stream from Spotify, Apple Music, or your personal library. It uses its own licensed radio stations organized by genre. You pick a station (pop, hip-hop, rock, electronic, country) and it plays continuously. Think Pandora-style radio, not on-demand playlists.

The selection is decent but not deep. Popular genres have solid rotation. Niche genres feel thin. You can't search for specific songs or artists, skipping is limited, and there's no offline mode. The audio quality is acceptable for background listening but noticeably compressed compared to Spotify's high-quality streams.

For background listening while working or doing chores, the experience is fine. For anyone who cares about music discovery, curated playlists, or audio quality, it's a downgrade. The app is designed for earning, not listening pleasure, and it shows.

Realistic Earnings Breakdown

Here's where most reviews get vague. Let's get specific. Current Rewards pays points based on listening time. The exact rate fluctuates, but during 30 days of testing with 2-3 hours of daily streaming, the total accumulated was approximately 45,000 points. That was enough to redeem for roughly $12 in gift cards.

That breaks down to about $0.13-0.20 per hour of listening. Not per song, not per task, but per hour of having the app open and playing. If you stream 1 hour per day, expect $4-6/month. At 3 hours per day, $10-18/month. The ceiling exists because points per hour decrease after extended sessions, likely to prevent abuse from users running the app 24/7 on spare devices.

Bonus points from games, news, and weather add maybe 10-20% on top of music earnings if you engage with them actively. But the music streaming component alone is where most of the passive value sits. The earning rate is low by any standard, but the effort is genuinely zero, which is the entire point. It fits the same logic as other passive income apps where you trade high earnings for zero time investment.

Current Rewards vs Spotify

This is the real question everyone asks: is it worth giving up Spotify for $10-15/month in gift cards? The honest answer depends entirely on how you listen to music.

If music is background noise: You work from home, you need something playing, and you don't care what it is. Current Rewards is a no-brainer in this scenario. You're earning $10-15/month from sound that was just filling silence anyway. The inferior selection doesn't matter when you're not really listening.

If music matters to you: You have playlists, you discover artists, you care about audio quality. Don't switch. The $10-15/month in gift cards isn't worth degrading something you actually enjoy. Instead, use Current Rewards only for situations where you'd have generic background audio anyway, and keep Spotify for intentional listening.

The hybrid approach: Many users run Current Rewards during work hours for passive earning and switch to Spotify for personal time. This captures most of the earning potential without sacrificing music quality when it matters. You can't run both simultaneously, but alternating works well. And if you're wondering whether Spotify itself pays you to listen, the short answer is no. Current Rewards is the closest thing to that.

Pros and Cons

What works: Current Rewards delivers on its core promise. Genuinely passive earnings with zero active effort. The app is stable, points accumulate reliably, and gift card redemption works without issues. Having multiple earning methods (music, games, news) gives flexibility. And unlike many reward apps, the minimum redemption threshold is reasonably low, so you're not grinding for months before seeing anything.

What doesn't: Gift cards only. No PayPal, no bank transfer, no cash. For users who want actual money, this is a dealbreaker. If you need PayPal payouts, these apps pay directly to PayPal instead. The music selection is limited compared to any mainstream streaming service. Availability is restricted to the US and select countries, cutting out most of the global audience. And the earning rate, while passive, is genuinely low. You need to reframe expectations from "earning money" to "getting a small bonus for background noise."

The honest take: Current Rewards is the most legitimate passive music earning app available. It actually works, it actually pays, and it actually requires zero effort. But "zero effort" also means "very low reward." It's the definition of supplemental. A small gift card bonus on top of an activity you'd do anyway.

Is It Worth Your Time?

Yes, if: you already listen to background music during work or study, you're in the US or a supported country, you don't mind gift cards instead of cash, and you have realistic expectations. Current Rewards shines as one piece of a larger earning strategy. Combine it with Slice the Pie for active reviews during breaks and you've covered both active and passive music earning. Add it to a broader passive income app stack and the small amounts compound.

No, if: you're outside the US, you want PayPal or cash payouts, you care about music quality, or you're expecting more than $20/month. In those cases, your time is better spent on higher-paying alternatives. Even within the music niche, active review apps pay more per hour of engagement. And outside music entirely, apps that pay real money offer significantly better returns.

Current Rewards is the easiest money in the music earning space. It's also the least money. Whether that trade-off works depends on what you value more: your time or your effort.