This post originally appeared on The Rideshare Guy Blog and Podcast but since rideshare driving can be a great second source of income I thought it would be a great article to post since the number one question I get from people is: How Much Can You Make Driving for Lyft and Uber?  I drive in Orange County (OC) (and sometimes in Los Angeles (LA)) so these are my experiences driving there but I wouldn’t say there’s any monumental difference compared to other cities although you do definitely make more in the bigger cities.

Driving For Lyft

• Sign up to drive for Lyft and get up to $750 depending on the city! (referral link)
• Get up to $20 off your first ride as a passenger

Driving For Uber

• Sign up to drive with Uber and get up to $500 depending on the city! (referral link)
• Get $20 off your first Uber ride when you sign up as a passenger.

How Much Can You Make Driving For Lyft and Uber in OC/LA?

Even though I’m now a registered Uber and Lyft driver I haven’t had much time to drive for both platforms at the same time.  I wrote about my first weekend doing both a couple weeks ago and the rides were overwhelmingly Uber.  Even though I’m a part time driver, I really don’t have any set times that I like to drive though.  I kind of just head out whenever I feel like it or whenever I’m bored.

Related Article: Do Drivers Make More Money With Lyft or Uber?

With that being said, I decided that I was ready to try out my first full Saturday night driving for both Lyft and Uber.  It was actually my first full Saturday night in general ever since I normally do other things on Saturday nights.  But here in Orange County, Friday nights are usually a little bit slow.  I haven’t had much luck making the big bucks on a Friday night but it seems like Saturday nights are always heading towards surge or Primetime around 11 pm up until around 2 or 3 am.

Analyzing My Saturday Night

It’s a little hard to keep track of all your rides while you’re driving but I usually take an in-depth look at my statistics using Sherpa and some of my own calculations the next day.  The best thing about driving part-time is that you can really cherry pick your hours.  I usually turn on Lyft and Uber at my house and if it’s slow, I might postpone going out until it gets busier.

And that’s exactly what happened on this night, I checked in around 7 pm and then again at 8 pm and there were still tons of drivers out.  I went into driver mode for a while but didn’t get any requests within a few minutes so I figured it would be better to wait until later. [Read more…]