# Who makes you more money: uber or Lyft?



## iheartuber (Oct 31, 2015)

Strange as it may sound after doing both I do think on the whole I have a better experience driving for Uber. This is why:

1. Lyft makes it much harder to chase the surge. If you find yourself inside a surge zone and you get a ping outside the zone your only option is to let it go. You cannot accept and cancel like with uber because if you cancel too many Times, Lyft gets really weird with you.
2. MUCH less customers. Remember that whole "#deleteuber" thing back in February? Well, it's over. 30 minutes between pings are common.
3. The uber dashboard is set up in a way that's easier to read/navigate.
4. Quest may be a joke but PDB is a bigger joke. You don't get a simple bonus like with uber (example 55 rides for $80), instead you get a complicated math equation (35 rides for $440-- which is really $440 GROSS or at 25% $330 net. In other words do 35 rides make $330. If you make less, Lyft pays the difference. If you do mostly shorties, little to no surge, and a moderate amount of long rides you'll make about $270 doing 35 rides, which means the "bonus" is $60. Did you get that? Also, if you happen to do more than 35 rides or if you catch some surges or you just somehow make more than $330... you get zero bonus. Nice huh?)
5. The pax are, shall we say, on average, more "eclectic" or in layman's terms: "weird". Which means they are much more sensitive and liable to ding you 3 stars or less for the smallest little BS thing.

This is all I can think of off the top of my head, but the bottom line is: as much as we rag on uber, it's still better than Lyft in terms of ability to make more money when you consider all factors. At least in my experience. Anyone else care to chime in? I'm curious to hear.


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## Trafficat (Dec 19, 2016)

Usually I can make more money on Uber, but when Lyft runs hourly guarantees, many times it really pays well. It's hard to chase primetime on Lyft, but if you are on an hourly guarantee you don't have to.


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## Rayn10 (Nov 25, 2015)

Trafficat said:


> Usually I can make more money on Uber, but when Lyft runs hourly guarantees, many times it really pays well. It's hard to chase primetime on Lyft, but if you are on an hourly guarantee you don't have to.


Enjoy the hourly guarantees while they last. I absolutely milked that dry until they got rid of them in January here. Working tonight, I was thinking about how much money I made off them last year. It was laughable and I knew they wouldn't last. Haven't seen hourly guarantees since they realized they were losing thousands and thousands of dollars. There were weeks where I would hit 40 of them by doing 1 short ride per hour and parking my car and watching movies on my iPad. RIP guarantees in NJ


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## DocT (Jul 16, 2015)

Haven't had a Lyft Premier ping in almost 4 weeks, and I don't drop down to Classic/Line.
Ridership is higher with Uber Select than Premier in my area.


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## MSUGrad9902 (Jun 8, 2016)

Don't forget uber is more sensitive to surge than lyft, and uber has a smaller radius that they will send you for a ping. Have never gotten a 32 minute ping from uber but lyft doesn't think twice about this.


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## itsablackmarket (May 12, 2015)

I like the Lyft passengers better. I hate the Uber crowd. But I hate Uber and Lyft as companies almost equally.


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## corniilius (Jan 27, 2017)

My real job.


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## unPat (Jul 20, 2016)

Uber doesn't limit your potential to earn. Lyft seems to limit how much you can earn. They will not let you make more than minimum wage +$5 an hour. It's impossible. You could sit in a 600% prime time and you will be bombarded with regular fare more than 20+ minutes. If the whole area is surging with Uber you will get surge fares. Lyft is a very dishonest company and master of PR propaganda. They add tips to your hourly guarantee. Go back to every week and compare the hours you put im with the money you made. It will look similar. 

I had only 2 25% prinetime fare with lyft out of 58 rides. Those two prime time added a lousy $7 to my overall earnings.
Use Lyft only to supplement your Uber downtime and not full time. You should always run Uber full time. Lyft should be a side hustle to the side hustle.


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## JimKE (Oct 28, 2016)

I'm sure it varies from market to market, but here in Miami I make more with Uber -- usually 3-4 to 1. That's not always true -- I have had two weeks where I earned more with Lyft, but usually it's better with Uber. Uber has a LOT more riders, and therefore closer pings despite the driver saturation.


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## Mista T (Aug 16, 2017)

Varies from market to market is 100% accurate. Portland is most definitely a Lyft market.

I hit my PDB every week, but it's far from easy. 2 Lyft rides per hour is pretty accurate unfortunately. 

I estimate that a solid 90% of my Uber rides pay me a gross under $4, BEFORE gas costs, including the rare tip. My Lyft rides, with avg tip but before PDB, come to $8.50. I get twice as many Uber requests, but it still pays me less in the long run.

Doing it over a year full time, not Noob data.

Both companies need a good slap in the face. But over here, Lyft pays drivers more, even with all the bullsheet.


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## UberDriverLV (Dec 21, 2016)

itsablackmarket said:


> I like the Lyft passengers better. I hate the Uber crowd. But I hate Uber and Lyft as companies almost equally.


This


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## MSUGrad9902 (Jun 8, 2016)

I've done some good weeks on lyft promos. I had one that was a guaranteed $660 for 35 rides (that's total pre-commission). That ended up being a great promo. But this week they've got me on a 5 rides for 70 guarantee. So basically my 6th, 7th, 8th rides will be free. No, I'll stick to the 5 rides for $28 and get my $12 bonus and work uber the rest of the time.


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## Tom Harding (Sep 26, 2016)

iheartuber said:


> Strange as it may sound after doing both I do think on the whole I have a better experience driving for Uber. This is why:
> 
> 1. Lyft makes it much harder to chase the surge. If you find yourself inside a surge zone and you get a ping outside the zone your only option is to let it go. You cannot accept and cancel like with uber because if you cancel too many Times, Lyft gets really weird with you.
> 2. MUCH less customers. Remember that whole "#deleteuber" thing back in February? Well, it's over. 30 minutes between pings are common.
> ...


You forgot the "opt in "requirement. Most bonus offers require the driver to "opt in". Uber does not. There are too many strings attached to Lyft's bonus offers ("opt-in", acceptance, cancel). Oh, and a help message to Lyft might get answered in a few days, if ever.


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## Bphelps (Aug 31, 2017)

Mista T said:


> Varies from market to market is 100% accurate. Portland is most definitely a Lyft market.
> 
> I hit my PDB every week, but it's far from easy. 2 Lyft rides per hour is pretty accurate unfortunately.
> 
> ...


I'm lucky to get 2 lyft per hour...


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## DrivingForYou (Aug 6, 2017)

Depends on the market and the specific area you drive.

I make over $20/hour with Lyft (before accounting for gas).

Starting to drive uber soon, will see if it's much different.


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## Aztek98 (Jul 23, 2015)

My lyft average per week per hour after gas plus pdb is around 23.00 currently.

My uber average is over 30 but I only drive uber with surge and destination filter. I don't drive uber under normal conditions if I did the average would be less then 15 an hour as I get 0 promotions with them. Haven't got any since April.


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