BAT, or “basic attention token” is a cryptocurrency that Brave Browser gives you for viewing ads. The ads are anonymous, they’re unobtrusive, and they’re simple.
As soon as you see the ad, you get .2 BAT (currently about $.026). It doesn’t matter if you click on the ad to open it, or close it and ignore it completely: you get your money. This process adds up; at the end of last year I cashed out for about $20. When was the last time you got paid $20 to use some privacy-enhancing software?
How to view your BAT in the Brave Browser
Seeing your BAT totals is pretty easy to do. The default new tab page has them listed on the right hand side.
How to change ad settings
You can type “chrome://rewards/” into your URL bar to see the ads settings, or click the BAT icon on the right hand side of the URL bar and select “Rewards Settings”.
In the Rewards Settings page you can change the amounts of ads you see, set up monthly auto-contributions, and see who you’ve sent BAT to.
How to cash out your BAT tokens
To cash out your BAT tokens you have to create an account and verify your identity with Uphold, a Portugese cryptocurrency market (Portugal doesn’t have a habit of spying on internet users like other countries *cough USA cough*). Don’t let “cryptocurrency market” scare you: you don’t have to buy anything from Uphold.
To transfer your BAT tokens from Brave to Uphold go to Rewards Settings and select “Withdraw Funds” in the wallet window.
Then, when the BAT has entered your Uphold available balance, you can send USD to your bank account using Uphold’s service. Your BAT will show up in USD figures, and then you select the USD card to send it to your attached bank account.
It may seem a little daunting, but it’s a simple process: see an ad, the ads add up as BAT. After a while you cash out using Uphold.
It’s an amazing system, and I hope that more of these kids of services start appearing. Our data is important to us, and advertisers use it right now because their jobs depend on it. If advertisers have the options to stop paying multi-billion dollar corporations for our data and can pay us to see the ads they’re sending, everyone will win.
Right now the world is under quarantine because of COVID-19. Make your time at home matter in the long run. Follow me here on Medium, follow my Facebook page, or send me a message and tell me to start a newsletter.
Obviously if you’ve made it this far you’re either already using Brave Browser or you’re interested in it.
Here’s my how-to for installing Brave if you don’t have it already.
If you do have Brave already, head on over to my website and tip me a few BAT. Thanks!
