Drop App Review 2024

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  Drop App Review

  • Basics: The Drop app gives users Drop points for buying items online or in-store, signing up for new products, taking surveys, and more. These points can be redeemed for gift cards from major retailers.
  • Pros: There are numerous ways to earn Drop points. Certain “boosted” stores can offer the point equivalent of 10% cash back, making it one of the higher-paying cash-back apps.
  • Cons: Drop places restrictions on how you can earn points and redeem rewards. Some offers are reserved for Premium members.
  Legitimacy 10/10

   

  Store Selection 7/10

   

  Cash Back Rates 7/10

   

  Payment Options 4/10

   

  Ease of Use 4/10

   

  Customer Support 5/10

   
  • Number of Stores:

    500+

  • Minimum Payout:

    $25 (restrictions apply)

  • Payout Options:

    Gift cards

  • What's Unique?

    You can invest points in cryptocurrency

Drop partners with major retailers to offer rebates on purchases, and even offers a way to convert your points into cryptocurrency — but there’s one big drawback. In our Drop App review we’ll share the good and the bad about this cash-back platform.

What Is Drop?

Drop is an app that provides rewards for shopping online, shopping in-store, playing games in the app, and more.

Most major retailers are Drop partners, so there’s a good chance you will be able to earn points for things that you were already planning on buying.

In the world of Drop, 1,000 points are equivalent to $1.

But that’s not $1 cash money. While other cash-back platforms will send cash via Venmo or check, Drop rewards are only good for getting gift cards.

But some Drop Premium members — and we’ll explain more about getting Premium status later — have the option to tie their points to the price of cryptocurrencies. If the price of those currencies increase, so will the value of Drop members’ points.

In our Drop review, we’ll cover the good, the bad, and everything in between — giving you a full rundown on this cash-back app.

https://youtu.be/nKBQq5xuyFc

Drop At a Glance

How Does Drop Work?

Drop rewards users with points for a number of actions. While most cash-back portals only allow you to earn a certain percentage of points for shopping, Drop takes this a few steps further.

Yes, you’ll see the standard “earn 20 points per dollar” at stores, similar to how Rakuten and others work.

But Drop has some point-earning options you don’t see on competitor sites, like playing in-app games.

You can also take advantage of the “flat-rate” offers, such as earning thousands of points for signing up for HelloFresh.

Drop members who have linked their bank accounts to the site are known as Premium members and have access to additional deals.

When you are ready to cash out, your points can be exchanged for gift cards. You’ll see options such as Amazon, Apple, and Nike among many others.

Related: How to Save Money: 75+ Tips and Ways to Save Money on Everything

Number of Stores

According to Drop, you can shop more than 500 brands within the app, which isn’t as many as other cash back programs, like Rakuten, which offers more that 3,000 stores.

But Drop seems to have the main retailers, like Walmart, eBay, Apple, and Macy’s.

And Drop offers one that their main competitors don’t — Amazon.

Yes, you read correctly, this app does offer rewards for purchases on Amazon to a select few members. We’ll explain more later in the piece.

Ways to Get Cash Back

To earn points on Drop you can:

• Shop in the app.
• Shop certain offers in-store as a Premium member, by using a linked card.
• Install games from the App store and reach a certain level.
• Play in-app games such as Snake to earn extra points.
• Take surveys from various third-party companies.
• Sign up for services such as Hello Fresh to earn bulk flat-rate points.
• Become a Premium member, to earn 1,000 additional points every month

We’ll have more detail about each of these later in the piece.

Drop offers more ways to earn cash back than its competitors do. While most are simple, some may take a lot of effort and may not be worth it depending on the offer.

Fees

There are no fees for using the app or for redeeming points.

Payouts (Minimums, Timing, Options, Bonuses)

Drop states that you will receive your reward within three business days.

Once your points have accumulated, there is only one option for cashing out — gift cards.

If you earn points by shopping through the Drop app, you can redeem gift cards beginning at $25 (25,000 points).

But if you only earn points through other means, such as taking surveys and playing games, Drop won’t allow you to cash out until you’ve earned 75,000 points. 

Drop does not offer payout bonuses.

Platforms (Mobile App, Desktop Version, Browser Extension)

Drop does not have a website platform, other than the general information page about the app.

The app, while robust, is a bit too overwhelming to me.

With so many ways to earn points, there are a lot of different pages and steps to go through to find what you’re looking for.

The Chrome extension is relatively new and is fairly bare-bones.

It tells you when you are on a website that can earn points for you. You can click the link on the extension to start earning points.

The extensions for competitors like Capital One Shopping and Honey do more than just tell you when you can get points; they give you info about ways to save money on what you are buying.

In-Store Cash Back

Whether you can earn points for in-store shopping depends each store’s policy.  

The majority of offers require you to do your shopping through the Drop app.

For certain offers, such as Starbucks and McDonalds, you can earn points in person if you have linked a credit card.

Before using the card, you need to make sure you activate the offer within the app.

Coupons

Drop does not offer coupons in the same fashion as Capital One Shopping or Rakuten. Both platforms automatically apply coupons on your behalf.

Instead, Drop offers “Stacked Deals.” These provide a coupon offer in addition to points.

The selection of Stacked Deals is limited, but the savings can be significant.

Cryptocurrency Options

In December 2021, Drop launched a new program that allows members to tie the value of their points to the prices of the two most well-known cryptocurrencies.

Members can choose to link the value of their points to the value of bitcoin or ether. If the price of the linked coin increases, so does the value of the member’s points.

(And, if the price decreases, the value of the member’s points would decrease as well.)

It’s a way for Drop members to participate in the cryptocurrency world without having to actually buy or sell coins through a platform, maintain a wallet, or other advanced methods of crypto trading.

This service is only available to Drop Premium members — those who have linked their credit cards or bank cards to Drop.

Related: 20+ Ways to Get Free Crypto

Sign-Up Bonus

As you go through the sign-up process, you can earn points for completing various tasks, like reading about Drop policies or adding personal info.

Referral Bonus

Drop has a referral program that can earn you 5,000 points ($5) per referral.

To receive the points:

1. The user must be new to Drop.
2. They must earn 1,000 points from an offer on the Shop tab.

There is a limit of 10 referrals per account.

Customer Service

The only option for support is to chat with a bot, which can then submit a ticket on your behalf. There is no guarantee of response time.

How Do You Earn Points on Drop?

With Drop, you can earn points by shopping, playing games, or via flat-rate offers.

Let’s go over the basics of how you can take advantage of each of these methods.

Shopping

This is your main cash-back method.

Most stores earn 20-30 points per dollar (2%-3%) while certain boosted stores can be much higher.

For example, during a recent holiday season, boosts of approximately 25% were offered for top retailers like Athleta, Sam’s Club, Nike, and Gap.

Most of these offers will require you to shop within the app.

Once you click on the offer you can see if there is the option of in-person shopping or if you need to buy through Drop.

Once you activate the offer, you can use any card linked through the Drop app and you will receive points.

Earning Points for Amazon Purchases

Unlike most other cash-back platforms, Drop does allow certain members to earn points for Amazon purchases.

With that said, the cash-back percentage is among the lowest Drop offers; it can drop as low as 5 points per dollar spent, or just 0.5%.

Every Wednesday, Drop opens a small number of spots for Amazon — you need to open the app early and claim the offer before spots run out.

Only Drop Premium members are eligible, and Drop limits the number of people who can claim Amazon rewards.

Here’s how it works:

1. Click the “card” tab in the middle of the menu bar.
2. This will take you to the “premium offers” section of the app, which is where you will find stores that offer points for shopping with a linked credit card.
3. If there are spots available, you’ll be able to tap the activate button to get the offer.

If the spots are full, you will need to wait until the next week to try again.

If you are lucky enough to snag the Amazon offer, you will only receive points when you shop with the card linked in Drop.

If you aren’t, you’ll see this message.

The rewards vary from as much as 15 points per dollar, which is the equivalent of 1.5% cash back, to 5 points per dollar, or 0.5% cash back.

While this isn’t a huge number, it at least offers something for a retailer that most cash-back portals offer nothing for.

Related: Clever Ways to Save Money on Amazon Purchases

Playing Games

Drop has three in-app games you can play to earn points.

Snake

Snake is just like the classic arcade game, where you have to keep your growing snake from eating its tail.

You earn one point for each additional link added to the snake.

As the links increase, the game gets more difficult.

At time of writing, Snake is only available if you take a certain number of qualifying surveys.

Hoops

Hoops is a basketball shooting game.

For Hoops, you get a point for each shot made in the 30 seconds they give you.

The games don’t give out many points but they are a free and fun way to earn them.

Spin

In Spin, you spin a virtual wheel and can earn rewards based on where the wheel stops.

At time of writing, Spin is only available to play on Tuesdays. 

Third-Party Games

Drop also allows you to install games from the App Store, reach a certain level, and receive points. This is a flat rate.

Dozens of games are listed; each will earn you a different point total for completing the level required. 

Related: Can You Really Get Paid to Play Video Games?

Surveys

Drop partners with third-party research companies to offer surveys. 

These surveys will ask you for personal information like your income, age, ethnicity and others.

Taking the surveys may also require you to permit companies to harvest additional data from your phone, verify your identity, or send you products to test.

Most of the surveys are hosted on third-party sites.

You’ll be able to see the point values and estimated time of the surveys before you take them, as in this example from Drop partner TapResearch.

Surveys are not always available.

Flat-Rate Offers

Drop also allows you to earn a big chunk of points at once by taking advantage of offers.

These usually involve signing up for a service. For example, the below screenshot shows you can earn 35,000 points for signing up for Coinbase and making a trade.

While the points can be a lot, they usually require you to take actions that involve spending money or signing up for services.

Drop Premium Membership

If you become a Drop Premium member by linking a credit card to the app, you have additional ways to earn money.

Only Premium members can link the value of their points to cryptocurrency, leaving open the possibility of major gains if those currencies rise in value.

Other Premium benefits include earning points on  in-store shopping, a monthly 1,000 point bonus (equivalent to $1), and higher earning potential from surveys and games.

How Much Money Can You Make With Drop?

How much you make is entirely dependent on how many offers you want to take on.

The good thing about Drop is that the value of the points is set in stone.

1,000 points are always equal to $1.

Taking advantage of the larger offers can quickly bring your balance higher, allowing you to redeem for gift cards much more often.

Assuming a $50 purchase, here’s how much you’d earn in rewards at a few top retailers, at time of writing.

As you can see, you’ll have to do a fair amount of spending to build up to the $25 you’d need to cash out a gift card.

While there isn’t a huge selection of gift cards available, there are plenty of major companies that will allow you to get value for your points. Some available gift cards include:

• Amazon
• Apple
• Nike
• Sephora
• H&M
• Uber
• Lululemon

Is Drop Legit?

Drop is legit. It has more than 4 million users across all platforms.

On the Apple Store, the Drop app has 4.6 stars, which is very good for a cash-back app.

It looks a bit less great on Android, with 3.9 stars. As a person that has used the app on Android in the past, I would agree with the overall consensus that the app is slow and buggy.

This doesn’t mean it doesn’t work. In the past, I have redeemed upwards of $30 of gift cards on Drop.

This was back when you could redeem in $5 increments, which I greatly preferred over the new higher minimum of $25.

Drop Tips and Hacks

Use these tips to earn the most from Drop.

1) Utilize the flat rate offers.

Are you planning on signing up for a service? Check Drop first!

Drop has partnerships with companies like Hello Fresh and AT&T that could net you a large number of points for something you were already planning on signing up for.

2) Refer friends.

You can earn 5,000 points for each referral.

This is equivalent to $5 on Drop, so be sure to get your referrals in and boost your point balance.

3) Bundle your Amazon purchases

Drop is one of the very few cash-back platforms that offers rewards on Amazon purchases.

If you’re able to wait and bundle all your planned Amazon purchases at once, you could earn cash back that you otherwise couldn’t earn.

Related: Best Referral Programs to Make Money

Drop Pros & Cons

Alternatives to Drop

Is Drop Worth It?

I would personally say Drop is worth it, although earning significant points can be a bit more difficult than competitors like Rakuten or Ibotta.

With the advantage of huge flat-rate offers, users have the potential to earn decent money for services and products they were already planning on purchasing.

Who Drop Is Best For

Drop is best for online shoppers. With only a few options for earning in-store points, Drop is not the best option for old-school mall shoppers.

I’d also say Drop is for you if you consider earning points fun and more of a game. The plethora of point-earning options provides a good opportunity for users to earn a large number of points if they treat it like a challenge.

Who Drop Is Not For

I would say Drop isn’t for anyone who likes shopping to be easy and convenient.

The app can be confusing because Drop offers so many ways to earn points. 

Adding to the confusion, every store has different rules about how you can earn points, especially when it comes to in-store shopping.

Also, for anyone looking to cash their points out for actual cash, Drop isn’t for you.

Your only option for redemptions is gift cards, which may not be useful for everyone.

How to Sign Up for Drop (Step-by-Step)

Signing up can only be done via the Drop app.

Step 1: Download the app, and review welcome screens

These screens give a brief explanation of how Drop works. You can tap “Get Started” at any time to continue the sign-up process.

Step 2: Enter your email and set a password.

You can also choose to sign up via Facebook or Apple.

Step 3: If you signed up using our referral code, you’ll see your bonus here.

(Here’s our Drop referral link to sign up and get the bonus.)

Step 4: Select your birthday and gender identification.

Note: At time of writing, you may receive a 400-point bonus after this step.

Step 5: Review data privacy options

You can earn a 600-point bonus for reviewing these options, or more for agreeing to share additional data with Drop.

Step 6: Link a card to become a Drop Premium member

In this step you can choose to link a credit card.

Drop really wants you to do this, because there’s actually no way that I could find to exit this step without linking a card, other than fully closing the app and reopening it.

Once I did that, I could resume using the app.

Final Thoughts on Drop

While Drop has the potential to be quite lucrative for users, be prepared to put in a decent amount of work.

I do like the idea they went with, which is to provide a lot of different options for users to earn points.

The downside is that most of the larger offers are either difficult or expensive, such as signing up for a monthly box of Hello Fresh.

But if you are already planning on signing up for these services, there is nothing wrong with getting some free money for doing so.

If you are a frequent online shopper, there is a very good case to be made that Drop can be more lucrative than similar apps. If that’s you, try it out and you may be surprised at how many points you can get.

Frequently Asked Questions

Here are some short answers to basic questions people often have about Drop.

• How does Drop make money?

  Drop provides anonymous, aggregated information to third parties that may help them target advertising to you.

  This is standard practice among cash-back apps.

• How do I see the Starbucks offer on the Drop app?

  The in-store offer for shopping at Starbucks, McDonald’s, Target, and others can be found by tapping “Card” at the bottom of the app screen.

  These offers are only available to Drop Premium members — those who have linked their credit cards to Drop.

• What credit cards does Drop work with?

  Drop works with credit cards from most major issuers like Chase, Bank of America, American Express, Citibank, and Capital One.

  Credit cards issued by smaller banks and credit unions may also be supported by Drop.

  However, even if you hold a Visa or Mastercard, if the bank or issuer you got the card from isn’t supported by Drop, you won’t be able to link that card.

• Do Drop points expire?

  Yes, Drop points expire one year from the date they are earned.