Rakuten is a cashback site. Cashback sites are online platforms that reward shoppers with a percentage of their purchase amount when they shop through affiliate links on the site. Rakuten partners with 100s of stores, like Adidas, Walmart, Best Buy, Lego, and even Amazon for certain types of products. Rakuten basically acts as an advertising service to bring you to the websites. The retailers are happy to pay the cashback in return for the extra sales.

How much cashback will I get?

Cashbacks range anywhere from 1% to 100%. There are also some stores that give flat-rate amounts. Here are some examples:

How do I get paid?

With Rakuten, you get paid the balance of your cashback account every 3 months. You can ask them to mail you a cheque or have them make a deposit into your PayPal account. This is an example of the email you’ll get when it’s cashback time.

How do I use Rakuten?

1. First, sign up. Make sure you let them know how you would like to receive your cashback (cheque or Paypal). If you use my link below, you get $30 once you make a qualifying purchase of $30. https://www.rakuten.ca/referrer?referrerid=oOBzuhSH4WY%3D
2. When you are shopping online, for example, Walmart, go to Rakuten.ca first and check if the store has cashback and how much it is. This list of stores is here: https://www.rakuten.ca/stores
3. If the store is on the list, click on the button from Rakuten that says ‘Shop Now’. This will open up a new window for Walmart and you can start shopping. It’s important you enter the Walmart website this way in order to get your cashback.
4. Make your purchase at Walmart as usual.
5. You can go to Rakuten.ca and check that the transaction showed up. It might take a bit of time.
6. Done! There’s nothing left to do, just wait until it’s cashback time. You will get an email telling you the money has been deposited.

Note: there is also a Chrome extension you can install if you like. It’s handy because it will tell you the cashback when you are on a website. However, it’s not required. https://chromewebstore.google.com/search/rakuten

Happy shopping and enjoy your cashback!