If you’re a designer who's been keeping an eye on the design landscape lately, chances are you’ve come across posts about Framer, possibly in the form of revenue graphs from designers showing off their earnings.

Whether you’re currently unemployed or have a full-time job and are seeking a side hustle, there’s a real opportunity for you to leverage your design skills with Framer to earn an extra $1–10k per month.

In this article, we’ll explore various strategies that can help you achieve this reality.

1. Freelancing — but not what you’d expect

Potential earnings: $5,000+/ per site + monthly svc fee

Freelancing often evokes mixed feelings, especially the dread of unpredictable workloads and client demands. However, Framer introduces a more streamlined and profitable approach to freelance web design.

A few of the key Framer features that ease the freelancing experience are:

• AI functionality to start projects fast
• Templates (free & paid)
• Community assets available (mostly free)
• Copy and paste UI design kits

For those who seek efficiency in their freelance projects, Framer’s template library is a valuable resource. Templates provide a near-complete framework that closely aligns with many clients’ aesthetic and content requirements. By selecting a suitable template, you can minimize the time and effort required to build a website from scratch. Customizing these templates to fit specific client needs allows for a balance between creativity and efficiency, making the design process quicker and more manageable.

Beyond the initial project completion, Framer also opens up opportunities for residual income through maintenance services. As a freelancer, you can offer to manage and update the client’s website, ensuring its smooth operation. Charging a maintenance fee, typically ranging from $75 to $150 and up per month, creates a steady income stream. This approach not only extends your relationship with the client but also ensures you continue to earn from your work long after the initial project delivery.

In tip #9 I’ll share a way to earn even more residual income from client websites using the partner program.

Places to find clients:

• Framer Circle Community
• Contra
• Upwork
• X (Formerly Twitter)

2. Selling Templates

Potential earnings: $300-$3,000+/ month

Selling templates is probably the most popular and potentially lucrative hustle.

I like this hustle because the creative direction is all mine, there are no clients, no deadlines, and once it’s live it’s all passive income.

The process is relatively straightforward: design an appealing and functional website template using Framer, and then list it on the Framer website and other marketplaces. Exceptional templates might even gain special recognition as an “editor’s pick” or “staff pick,” increasing their visibility and sales potential.

The pricing for these templates can vary, but on average, they sell for about $30 to $70. In some instances, particularly intricate or high-demand templates can fetch over $100 — one popular template is even selling for $250!

The advantage of selling on platforms like Framer is that creators retain 100% of their earnings, and income can be compounded by pairing with the partner program which we’ll discuss in #9.

To give a personal example, in April 2023 I designed an online course landing page and priced it at $30. Although the course niche might not have been as popular at the time as portfolio sites, agency sites, etc. the template still got a considerable sales spike upon its release.

Over the following 6 months, my template generated $996.88 in sales. While this amount might not be transformative, it’s a decent return for a simple one-page template and a testament to the potential of this side hustle. I later discontinued sales of this template, re-purposed it, and made it available for free.

This approach to earning is particularly appealing for its passive nature — once the template is created and listed, it can continuously generate income with little to no additional effort.

3. Selling a product

Framer’s capability to craft highly professional, polished, and just plain beautiful website experiences is a major asset for entrepreneurs selling digital products. The ease with which one can edit and publish these sites in Framer makes it an ideal platform for showcasing and selling digital or even physical products.

A compelling example of this is Items.design, a 3D graphics library developed by a designer named Filip. He utilized Framer to transform a straightforward digital product into a clean and easy-to-use marketplace for visitors.

He achieved this by using FramerAuth, a tool created to integrate with any Framer site. FramerAuth simplifies the process of selling exclusive access to digital goods, making it accessible even to non-technical entrepreneurs. This means that Filip can require users to purchase a plan before gaining access to the library, enhancing the overall user experience and monetizing his digital assets with ease.

This level of detail and creativity starkly contrasts the typical online digital goods listings like the ones you’d find on Etsy, which often consist of a few images and a basic product description — not very convincing. Websites with such dynamic and targeted sales approaches have much higher conversion rates as you can see from Filip’s sales — over $1,500 in sales from the launch alone.

Whether it’s blogs, videos, courses, ebooks, music, icon packs, or anything else — Framer’s ability to create captivating website pages makes it possible to turn your passion into a paycheck without any technical skills.

4. Create interactive animations/remixes

There’s a lot of untapped potential in creating and selling not necessarily templates, but remixes or Framer files of something re-usable. Groovy Stickers is a creative example of how a designer named Rahul Chakraborty made a fun digital sticker pack in Framer and sold access to the stickers via Lemon Squeezy.

Creativity is key here but if you can find a unique angle to offer something useful and reusable then it won’t be hard to charge $15+ for access to it.

Imagine a website with 50+ animated hover states for buttons — $8 to get access to the components. Think along these lines — utilities that people need for their projects that you can save them time and energy by exploring and creating.

The great part is that the Framer niche isn’t over-saturated so if you have an idea like this and execute well then you’re likely to see great reward for it.

4. Creating learning material and courses

Framer being a newer platform means there isn’t an abundance of educational content yet. Sure there are some great resources and teachers, but the space is still maturing.

The Framer team and other designers have started to fill this void but Framer publishes new updates frequently so there are always new concepts and best practices to brush up on.

Take Nandi, the creator of Framer University, he’s built a following sharing tutorials, remixes, helpful threads on X, and more. Other creators like Tim Gabe, have focused heavily on building their YouTube audience and have grown at a meteoric rate riding on the back of Framer’s explosive growth in 2023.

Creators are crushing it creating high-quality learning resources, but the space is still growing and constantly evolving so there will always be gaps in the resources available. This could be a golden opportunity to get in early, build an audience around Framer, and capitalize as it changes the web design landscape.

5. Sell coaching

Potential earnings: $100-$500 per session

I’ve seen a few people post in the Framer Circle Community requesting a tutor/coach to help them master the nuances and more advanced features of Framer. I’ve also seen posts from designers getting ready to launch their project and looking for someone to hop into their file to help tidy up before they go live.

There’s an opportunity to position yourself as an expert, offering personalized coaching sessions to those looking to improve their design or development skills in the tool.

Create a landing page, explain your offering, and use a scheduling tool like Calendly to allow users to book and manage appointments then charge a premium for your time and expertise. This can be particularly beneficial for those who enjoy one-on-one teaching and have a knack for explaining complex concepts in an easy-to-understand manner.

6. Sell Consulting/Expertise

Potential earnings: $2,000-$10,000 per project

Like coaching, consulting takes it a step further by providing your Framer expertise to businesses rather than individual designers to help them with more complex tasks like migrating from an existing provider like Webflow to Framer.

I and several other Framer experts are already doing this under Framer’s umbrella helping onboard their enterprise clients to Framer and assist them with the nuances. There are numerous opportunities within the community to assist with projects by merely sharing your knowledge and expertise.

Leverage your knowledge of Framer and its ecosystem to offer consulting/advising services on Contra.

7. Design Systems

Potential earnings: $50-$100 per sign up

Several creators have created a new category of Framer libraries providing hundreds of common components ready to copy and paste into a Framer project.

UI elements like hero sections, FAQs, testimonials, and more. They aren’t just clean and easy to use but libraries like this are genuinely selling time back to designers who are hoping to complete projects faster than building everything from scratch.

Selling design systems, like Sections, SegmentUI, Framepad, or others can be extremely profitable. As more companies realize the importance of design consistency, and more agencies/freelancers use Framer for client projects the demand for these systems increases, making it a lucrative niche for those who understand both design and the technical aspects of making a well-organized design kit.

8. Build Functionalities on Top of Framer

Potential earnings: $100-$200 per year / $15–20 per month

There is a growing list of integrations that sit on top of Framer and improve or add functionality to it.

Framer has a feature called code components which makes it possible to render React components right in the canvas. This makes it possible to add any functionality that doesn’t already exist using code.

Take custom forms in Framer, for example, currently, they aren’t available natively but that’s ok because using code components a creator named Joris decided to code the solution himself and he created MagicForm which fills this gap for users.

FramerAuth is another integration that plugs into any Framer site and enables authentication features like sign-in, sign-up, upgrade to unlock, and more. This tool allows creators like Easlo to charge users $299 per year to access the premium Notion templates sold on his Framer website.

If you have coding chops, it can be very profitable to develop and offer additional functionalities that can be used with Framer. This requires a deep understanding of both Framer and coding, but it opens up avenues for creating unique solutions that address specific needs within the Framer community. These functionalities can be sold as monthly subscriptions creating a continuous revenue stream.

9. Become a Framer Partner

Potential earnings: $100-$500 per month

The Framer partner program offers a unique opportunity to earn money by promoting Framer and its capabilities. As a partner, you can create content to help spread awareness about Framer and earn a generous 50% commission on every subscription for 12 months.

Whether your templates are free or paid, you can earn from them. When users duplicate your template using your unique referral link, and if they subsequently opt for a paid plan, you’ll receive 50% of that subscription for a year. This creates a continuous revenue stream, especially if your templates are popular and frequently used.

Additionally, the partner program enables you to onboard clients effectively. You can collaborate with clients and transition them to a paid plan at the appropriate time. Post handoff of the website to your client, you can claim your referral to continue earning 50% of your client’s subscription for a year. This aspect helps build a long-term relationship with clients and ensures a consistent income from ongoing projects.

You can also gain referrals through a variety of content types, such as tutorials, sharing useful remix links, tweets, blog posts, and other forms of content that include your referral link.

10. Creating Components/Overrides

Potential earnings: $100-$150 per sign up

One of the features I mentioned earlier that makes Framer unique is the ability to create code components and overrides that can be injected into any project. Think of them like cheat codes that unlock enhanced functionality and effects not available in the regular interface.

If you code in React, you can potentially make and sell custom components or overrides for Framer. These can range from unique text effects like turning text into a countdown clock, making a frame follow the cursor, animated buttons, and other fun or unique interactive elements.

This is a business I know well since I’ve been running FramerOverrides since April of 2023 and has been growing tremendously. Given Framer’s growing user base of primarily non-technical designers, there’s a demand for easy-to-integrate code components and overrides. The great thing about these code snippets is that the person using them doesn’t need any technical knowledge — they just copy and paste them into their project.

Useful links:

• Sell your code overrides or components