A counter question to the guy who posted a similar question few hours ago, cause most of the answers weren’t helpful for someone like me, who doesn’t have much money😅.
I love going on hikes or nature walks. Some great free apps are Merlin (for identifying bird calls) and Seek (for identifying plants and animals). All completely free aside from getting to to trail, but even in city parks it can be pretty fun. A good pair of binoculars is a great addition if you have the $$.
I see binoculars at thrift shops all the time for the price of a semi-fancy coffee. Just make sure the lenses are clear and they focus correctly (sometimes the optics are messed up).
Definitely. Also, lots of local birdwatching groups or chapters of the Audubon Society that host pretty frequent outings. Most are free or pretty cheap. Then you have lots of experienced people to ask questions and make friends. Check Facebook or your local photography store flyer posts.
Shoplifting can be both fun and profitable
Posetive money hobby
Learn about birds
+1. Birds are flipping awesome. When you get into your 40s, looking at birds hits different. I now get up at 330 in the morning on my days off to look at birds.
Running costs a pair of shoes every now and then and extra laundry detergent but otherwise free. Like any other hobby you absolutely can spend tons of money on it but it’s not required.
Runkeeper is a free app where you can log down your runs but a casio watch with stopwatch is good enough if you know the distance.
Also, contrary to what a lot of people think you don’t have to push yourself, you can just be easy running (chill jogging) and still make massive gains in endurance, speed, physical health and mental health. Depending on your starting point brisk walking can be sufficient to get started and then transition to “let me just jog a bit” when you feel like it and still have massive gains.
You can even combine it with other hobbies like audiobooks, music and/or podcasts.
Running feels to me like “cleaning the pipes” of the body that’s relaxing and makes the remainder of the day a bit more enjoyable.
I would have started running a lot sooner if someone just told me that it’s actually fun to go slow. Now my slow is my old fast.
Yeah, a lot of people don’t realise that if running is not enjoyable then they’re putting way more effort than necessary.
Birding! Cornell’s “Merlin” app is free and an excellent identification/logging tool.
Chess. You can try Lichess, a free (and open source) website/app to play chess. There’s countless of videos and tutorials on the internet about chess.
Thanks, as a person who has never learned how to play chess, Lichess seems like a good start
Chess.com also has a lot of good stuff in the free tier, like lessons and daily puzzles.
And then if you pay money, you can have the full lichess experience!
Just FYI lichess has infinite puzzles, I love doing them.
That website (hereafter referred to as the green pawn website) is very scummy and has ties to gambling. The green pawn website also uses their hoard of played games for their own private analysis, but doesn’t let anyone else do it. Lichess, on the other hand, allows anyone to use the dataset and this has allowed some very interesting things, such as “what is the rarest move” statistics, to be featured in blog posts or YouTube videos.
No hate if you use it, but don’t encourage new players to use the green pawn website. Lichess is leagues better.
reading.
Yes! Libraries are free, and awesome. Unless you don’t have one near you. Even then, used books can be had pretty cheap, and you can often find ebooks given out free or cheap. Plus stuff like Gutenburg and Standard Ebooks for older texts. Doesn’t take long to build up a stack of books you have no hope to finish reading!
I have a very weird relationship with reading. I either am not reading one, or I’m obsessively reading one. I’ve completed not so small books in 2 days, like project hail Mary. I completed animal farm in a day.
Great suggestion, but I need better time management while reading books.
There you need to buy books unless you go to thenlibrary
So just go to the library. Lol. Or a second hand and get them super cheap
There are a lot of Little Free Libraries in most towns these days, too. Take a walk, find a book, read the book, trade the book.
Or just pir… “Buy” epub files and read them on your phone.
I always forgot library because it open only in weekdays.
or go to anna’s archive!!
You can pirate books.
Project Gutenberg has thousands of free books (out of copyright) in any format you prefer.
Geocaching
Being in a city, there could be lots of caches near you.
the geocaching website requires a subscription now…
I recommend you check out the open source c:geo app. It’s by far the best geocaching app and unlocks more of the caches the official app doesn’t, it also indexes opencaching caches as well
You only have to pay for Premium.
is it not free?? That’s so lame if not.
Check out OpenCaching. It’s still budding, despite existing for a long time, but it’s a direct response to the commercial leanings of geocaching.com.
There’s instances of it for many different countries.
Sure about that? Seems still to be working for me as always (all caches accessible accept the “Premium” ones)
With the official app, you’re limited to difficulty 2.5 and below. This is why I recommend using c:geo
With the official app, you’re limited to difficulty 2.5 and below.
Really? Ok, that sucks.
I never used the app (which didn’t even exist when I started), but mainly website + downloads to my Garmin.
Nowadays only occasional casual caching using c:geo.
C:geo also has a lot of neat tools built in so it’s superior in every aspect. I have my state map downloaded on there, upload my hiking trail gpx, and download all the caches so I can cache with no cell reception
i mean those are still accessible as long as you find them, you just don’t get directions
That’s basically correct if they didn’t change their api/link behaviour.
During my more active GC time, I even made them into my personal D5s for a while, trying to find them by deduction and (the also accessible) previous finder comments alone.
Research the shit out of something you are interested in. Go down all the rabbit holes you can find. Compile it into a simpler, better understood synthesis. Convert it into a YouTube vid and deploy. I’d watch anything if well researched.
Roleplaying games. Download a free ruleset and a dice app for your phone and you’re good to go.
From a similar post recently:
Inexpensive, and little setup, with no steep learning curve?
Off the top of my head:
- singing
- drawing
- playing a tin whistle
- dorodango
- dexterity games (card flourishes, astrojax, yoyo, pen spinning, etc.)
- reading
- kumihimo
- customising things with paint markers
- yoga
- whetstoning
- writing (prose or poetry)
- journaling/journalism
- cross stitch/embroidery
- jelqing
- rock/object balancing
- meditation
- knife throwing
- macramé (using beading floss)
- playing the spoons
- whittling
- eating
- scrimshaw
- nålbinding
- henna tattooing
- primping
- cloudgazing
- looking at fucking everything through a high mag loupe
- tarot divination
- contact juggling
- kefir making
- key duplication by hand
- sleeping
- hiking
- floccinaucinihilipilification
- origami
- talking to nearby friendly looking strangers
- polishing
- cleaning
- caligraphy
- drugless hallucination
- soapbox public speaking
- zen gardening
- guerilla gardening
- pitch ear training
- ‘easter egg’ hiding
- local botanical/ecological studies
- flint knapping
- home/interior design (as long as you don’t actually buy anything)
- knolling
- marble running
- solo RPGs like ‘Alone Among The Stars’ (okay this one wasn’t technically off the top of my head. I couldn’t remember the name, so I looked it up.)
This list is gold. But you’re missing one thing:
Commenting lists of free hobbies on Lemmy
drugless hallucintion
is this just using your imagination or something more specific?
As others have said, yes, it’s a thing, but for more info, Douglas Rushkoff put out a book on it a few years back.
Listening to binaural beats or enclosing yourself in an entirely lightless space.
Depends on the for it takes really you have some breathing exersizes or you can do some half sleep methode or manipulate the “white noice” you get in dark rooms or try to keep an after image of something bright and the modify it into something new all of these require a lil training but it is fun :)
There a number of breathing practices that claim to be a “DMT release.” Like you have free drugs inside you already, might as well, right?
Do you have a working laptop or desktop? Learn to code. Actually code none of that vibe code bullshit. Making games is fun and rewarding and has an amazing community.
Juggling.
Geocaching
Its free (somewhat), but the commercialization of it by the geocaching.com assholes has made me sour on it.
I’m a premium member and I find it worth it because I hike a lot. But for people who don’t have expendable income, you can just install the open source geocaching app c:geo, you’ll get a lot more caches than the official app and it will give plenty to find. Additionally, you can email geocaching and they give you a week or 2 weeks of premium, with that time, you can download as many caches offline as you want.
Yeah I know about c:geo, I have it on my phone.
I pretty much just gave up. Geocaching.com ruined it for me. It should just be a wiki and open. But nice to know the tip of two weeks to download.
I remember when it truly was a free hobby. It also was a lot more fun before GPS was on everyone’s phone and you used a separate GPS device.
Well, geocaching here, where I live, may be a completely different or separate thing then, we have our own geocaching repository with mostly small and interesting hides (or virtual caches or multi caches) or educating about your environment. Fully community driven and maintained, free of charge.
That is pretty neat. I always have to use one to 3 sites depending on where I am in the world.
I remember when we used to do CD, DVD, foreign coins and kids toy caches. Those were fun. Now it seems like everytime I check its just a log book at best, or a “scenic” cache.
Yeah, it’s mostly really just a log book or even a code you can check online. But there’s still a chance to find some small kincks-knacks in a Kinder Surprise shell thingy.
And while you’re out geocaching, check out Street Complete
OpenStreetMap surveying is an excellent hobby. I’ve been doing it for years.
Im a big fan of calligraphy. It can be free using just a pencil and paper that you have. But it is more fun if you spend the $35 on marker paper and a calligraphy marker.
