Outlier
outlier.ai
Scale AI's platform (it absorbed Remotasks). Rating and improving AI answers. Weekly payouts via PayPal or Airtm. Very active in Kenya.
Higher payEntry-level projects01 · Earn
Kazi ni kazi.
Work is work — and this work pays.
If you already do annotation, two moves raise your income: (a) qualify on several platforms so work never dries up, and (b) move from basic labelling into higher-paying task types — rating AI answers, writing prompts, and fact-checking. Those tasks pay more per hour and reward good English and careful reading, not technical skills.
The platform directory
DataAnnotation
dataannotation.tech
Well-paid AI training tasks. The entry test is strict and many people wait for approval — apply, do the test carefully, be patient. Pays via PayPal.
Higher payHard entry testAlignerr
alignerr.com
Labelbox's platform matching people to AI projects. Strongest if you have a speciality: languages, science, writing, coding.
Higher payMercor
mercor.com
AI-training marketplace — apply with a CV and an AI-run interview. Rates rise sharply with domain skills.
Higher payOneForma
oneforma.com
Beginner-friendly microtasks, plus language and voice projects.
Beginner-friendlyCrowdGen (Appen)
crowdgen.com
Long-running crowd platform: search evaluation, data collection, annotation.
Beginner-friendlyClickworker
clickworker.com
Microtasks; also a gateway to UHRS (Microsoft's task marketplace).
Beginner-friendlyPhone-friendlyToloka
toloka.ai
Microtasks with a low entry barrier. Lower pay, but a useful filler platform.
Beginner-friendlyPhone-friendlyTELUS Digital — AI Community
telusdigital.com
“Online data analyst” and search-rater roles — steady part-time work rating search and map results.
Steady hoursRule of thumb: stay qualified on at least three platforms and treat every single one as temporary. Remotasks closed in Kenya in 2024 with almost no notice, and people who relied on it lost their main income overnight. Diversification is your job security.
Nairobi companies with real offices
Stable jobs, training and a promotion path: Annotator » Quality reviewer » Team lead » Data operations. Every step pays more, and the experience transfers to remote international roles later.
Sama
sama.com
AI data company with Nairobi offices. Employment, training and progression rather than gig work.
Salaried pathCloudFactory
cloudfactory.com
Managed data teams with a long-standing Kenya workforce.
Salaried pathDigital Divide Data (DDD)
digitaldividedata.com
Nairobi BPO doing ML data work — hiring annotators (including 3D/LiDAR roles) in 2026.
Salaried pathYour unfair advantage: languages
- English + Swahili (plus Sheng or any Kenyan language) is genuinely valuable. AI companies are actively building African-language datasets, and bilingual evaluators face far less competition. List every language on every platform profile and ask for language-specific projects.
- Mozilla Common Voice — commonvoice.mozilla.org — contribute Swahili voice recordings. Unpaid, but it builds the open ecosystem and looks good on your profile.
- Masakhane — masakhane.io — the open African-languages AI research community. Free to join; excellent for learning and networking with African AI researchers.
When your skills grow: sell directly
Upwork (upwork.com) and Fiverr (fiverr.com) let you sell annotation, transcription, data-entry and virtual-assistant services straight to clients — higher rates than platform queues once you have reviews.
02 · Get paid
Akiba haiozi.
Savings never rot — keep more of what you earn.
- PayPal to M-Pesa: link your accounts inside the M-Pesa app (Global / international payments section) or dial *840#. Small withdrawals usually land within minutes to hours. Expect to lose roughly 3–4% on the exchange rate (reported figure) — that is the price of speed.
- Payoneer — payoneer.com — used by Upwork and Fiverr; supports M-Pesa payout and is often better value for larger amounts.
- Wise — wise.com — strong exchange rates; worth setting up once you earn regularly.
- Names must match exactly. Your PayPal, M-Pesa and national ID names have to be identical, or linking and withdrawals fail.
- Keep two working payment methods. Platforms change payout options without warning; never let one rail be a single point of failure.