You need cash for the Quadcopter. You need followers to unlock the next operation. You need both at the same time, and the game gives you about forty ways to earn them, most of which are painfully slow. This guide cuts it down to the methods that pay the most per minute of your time, based on current-patch numbers and community-tested routes.
One important note before you start grinding: the "Eye for an Eye" checkpoint exploit (hacking Pablo Cortes for ~$18,000, reloading, repeating) was patched out. Ubisoft fixed the balance reset on checkpoint reload. If an old YouTube video tells you otherwise, check the upload date.
What Followers Do (And Why You Get Stuck Without Them)
Followers function as DedSec's version of XP. Your phone's Research app tracks your total count, and each threshold you cross grants Research Points. Those points buy hacking skills, gadget upgrades, and combat perks across seven trees: Botnets, City Disruption, Marksmanship, Remote Control, Social Engineering, Tinkering, and Vehicle Hacking.
The part most guides skip: followers also gate story progress. New Main Operations appear on your map only after your count reaches certain milestones. If the next story mission won't show up, the game is telling you to go do side content until DedSec's audience grows. That wall tends to hit around mid-game, when you've finished the early operations but haven't touched ScoutX or Driver SF yet.
Earning Money
Armored Trucks: The Biggest Single Payout in the Game
Red Greystrom trucks spawn as random DedSec Events while you drive around San Francisco. Hack the truck, take out the armed guards, grab the package from the rear doors, then survive the police response. A clean run pays up to $250,000 cash and 100,000 followers in one event.
The catch is the heat level. Cops escalate fast, and helicopters show up if the chase drags on. Four things that make the escape manageable:
- Unlock Chopper Retreat Point (Vehicle Hacking tree) before you attempt your first truck. Without it, the helicopter tracks you through every alley and garage.
- Trigger Blackout at night. Streetlights die, traffic cameras go dark, and the cops lose visual contact for a few seconds. That window is enough to duck behind a building or into a tunnel.
- Drive toward a Hackerspace entrance. Once you're inside, the wanted level drains while you sit in safety.
- If you've unlocked Gang Attack (Social Engineering tree), call a gang on the nearest patrol car. The cops pivot to fight the gang and forget about you for a moment.
Spawning is unpredictable. Some players report more trucks with multiplayer toggled on; others see them more often offline because other players can't snipe the event first. If nothing appears, run a side mission or leave Marcus idle for sixty seconds. Truck events seem to re-roll when the game detects you've been stationary or completed an activity.
Hacking NPCs: Steady Trickle Between Missions
Every pedestrian in San Francisco carries a bank balance. Tap the hack button while walking past to drain it. Most people carry $50 to $70, which isn't worth stopping for. The upgrade that changes this is Improved Profiler in the Social Engineering tree. After you unlock it, certain NPCs get a small blue square above their heads. Those targets hold $400 to $1,000 each.
Crowded areas produce the best yield. Pier 39 during daytime, Union Square around noon, and the Financial District in the early evening all pack dense clusters of pedestrians, which means more blue squares per block. You won't fund a weapons buying spree from this alone, but it fills gaps between bigger paydays. Think of it as loose change you collect while walking to your next objective.
Driver SF: Cash and Followers on the Same Clock
Open the Driver SF app on Marcus's phone. Yellow icons are scripted missions with passenger dialogue and a mini storyline. Green icons are procedural taxi runs. Both pay up to $9,600 and 11,000 followers per trip, scaled by the star rating your passenger gives you. Drive smooth, avoid collisions, and hit the destination timer for maximum stars.
Across all Driver SF runs, your stars accumulate toward milestone rewards at 10, 21, 35, and 50 total stars. Those milestones dump bonus followers and unlock the Driver SF Cabbie Cap. After you finish every yellow mission, green runs keep generating. They're repeatable, short, and pay on both currencies at once, which makes Driver SF the best dual-income activity in the game minute for minute.
Drone Races: Fast Cash After You Buy the Quadcopter
Most money guides ignore drone races. They shouldn't. Once you own the Quadcopter (3D Printer, $67,500) and unlock the Remote CTRL speed boost perks, each gold-medal drone race pays $12,000 to $15,000. The race "All Around Alcatraz" consistently lands near the top of that range.
Drone races run under sixty seconds each. That ratio, $12K or more per minute, beats NPC hacking by a wide margin and doesn't attract police attention. They also drop followers on top of the cash payout. The races show up as green icons after you clear the early story missions and own the Quadcopter.
The 149 Money Bags
There are 149 bag icons scattered across the Bay Area map. Each holds either raw cash ($4,000 to $25,000) or a valuable item you can sell at a Pawn Shop. Many sit in restricted zones or on rooftops. Don't bother walking Marcus into those areas. Deploy the RC Jumper instead. The Jumper can roll through guard zones undetected, climb obstacles with its spring upgrade, and grab the bag without Marcus drawing a single bullet.
To tag nearby bags, switch to NetHack view (the hack-vision overlay). Bags glow within scanning range. You can also fly the Quadcopter overhead and scan from about 90 meters away to tag them on your map before you even approach on foot.
Several bags sit on yachts and boats in the bay. Swim to them, hijack a docked boat, or buy a sailboat from the Yacht Club kiosk in Marin (Sausalito area). If a bag is perched on furniture inside a yacht cabin, that's a Jumper puzzle. Look for chairs, boxes, or ramps that give the Jumper enough height to reach the platform.
Pawn Shops: Don't Forget to Cash Out
Marcus accumulates jewelry, watches, and small electronics from car gloveboxes, money bags, and loot drops. These sit in your inventory doing nothing until you visit a Pawn Shop. The ring icon on the map marks each one (they share locations with gun shops). Walk in, hit "Sell All," walk out richer. Players who forget about the Pawn Shop for five or six hours of play sometimes find $30,000 to $50,000 worth of junk sitting uncollected.
To collect valuables faster, unlock Hijacker in Vehicle Hacking. It opens car doors with a silent remote hack. No broken glass, no alarm, no cop attention. Without Hijacker, stick to stealing motorcycles and scooters. They don't have alarms.
Where Not to Spend Money
Clothing in Watch Dogs 2 is cosmetic. No outfit gives you stats, stealth bonuses, or hacking buffs. Same for car paint jobs and liveries. Marcus runs missions fine with his starting Thunderball and Taser through mid-game. Blow your early cash on two things: the RC Jumper ($67,500) and the Quadcopter ($67,500) from any 3D Printer shop. Those two gadgets unlock money bags, Research Points, and mission approaches you can't access on foot. Weapons and vehicles can wait.
Also worth knowing: the Car on Demand app on your phone lets you summon any vehicle you've purchased or unlocked, delivered to your location. You rarely need to buy cars from a dealership when you can jack any car on the street with Hijacker or call one in through the app.
Earning Followers
Main and Side Operations Come First
Operations are the most lopsided follower source in the game. A late-game Main Operation can dump hundreds of thousands of followers in one completion. Side Operations pay less per mission but take 10 to 20 minutes instead of an hour. Burn through story content before you start farming repeatable activities. The math isn't close: one Main Operation outpays three hours of eKart racing.
ScoutX: 456,000 Followers From Photos
The ScoutX app lists 57 landmarks and street performers across the Bay Area. Select a target, follow the waypoint, take a photo, collect 8,000 followers. No combat, no cops, no timers. All 57 locations total 456,000 followers, enough to push you past at least one or two progression walls on their own.
The tricky part: some targets are NPCs who show up only during certain hours. The Kawaii Dancer in Japantown and the Body Paint Girl near the Haight both vanish at night. If your target doesn't appear, check the time of day in the pause menu and come back during a different period. A few spots also require the Quadcopter for the right camera angle.
| Region | Locations | Ones You'll Recognize |
|---|---|---|
| San Francisco | ~40 | Pier 39 Sea Lions, Coit Tower, Lombard Street, Painted Ladies, Chinatown Gate, Castro Theater, Clarion Alley, Ubisoft SF office |
| Marin | 6 | Golden Gate Bridge, Point Bonita Lighthouse, Vista Point, Tree Houses |
| Silicon Valley | 4 | Tidis Building, Nudle Lightbulb, Stanford Tower, New Dawn Temple |
| Oakland | 4 | Masked Musician, Flask Mob, Crazy Preacher, Guadalupe in Woodland |
| Alcatraz | 2 | Alcatraz island exterior, Alcatraz Guide NPC |
Photographing 50 landmarks unlocks every secret selfie gesture and pose for Marcus. Two hours gets most players through all 57 spots if you plan a loop instead of chasing them one at a time.
Online Operations: Unlimited but Messy
Online Operations generate random co-op missions through your phone. You can start them solo, though the matchmaker keeps searching for a partner in the background. Bump the difficulty up. Higher settings pay more followers per run, and the missions aren't much harder if you lean on stealth and your Jumper.
The annoyance: random players can join mid-mission and go loud when you wanted stealth. If that happens, open the phone, go to the Multiplayer menu, and disconnect them. The mission continues. Online Operations never run out, which makes them the only truly infinite follower source outside of multiplayer PvP.
eKart Races: 10,000 Followers Per Win
eKart race icons populate the map after the early story missions. Win a race, collect about 10,000 followers. Races take two to three minutes. No upgrades needed, no gadgets required. If you've cleared operations and ScoutX and still need more followers, eKart is the lowest-friction repeatable option.
Bounty Hunter and Hacking Invasions
Bounty Hunter drops you into another player's world to track them down. Hacking Invasions flip the script: you sneak into someone's session, start a data download, and hide while they search for you. Payouts range from 4,000 to 25,000 followers depending on how well you perform. Sessions run faster than full operations, but they require multiplayer, and your success depends on the other player's skill level.
If competitive multiplayer stresses you out, skip these. The follower return is decent but not irreplaceable. Operations, ScoutX, and eKart can cover the same ground.
Driver SF Pays Followers Too
Mentioned in the money section, but worth repeating here: Driver SF missions award up to 11,000 followers per trip on top of their cash payout. The green repeatable runs are a two-for-one activity. If you're low on both currencies, start here.
Research Upgrades That Speed Up Farming
Your first few Research Points shape how fast you earn. Pick wrong and you'll spend extra hours grinding. Pick right and the money and followers come in faster because your tools do more of the work.
| Skill | Tree | What It Does for Farming |
|---|---|---|
| Improved Profiler | Social Engineering | Tags NPCs with high bank balances (blue square). Turns casual walking into $400-$1,000 per target instead of $50-$70. |
| Hijacker | Vehicle Hacking | Remote-unlocks car doors. Loot gloveboxes silently, no alarm, no cop response. Also means you stop wasting time breaking windows. |
| Botnet Upgrades (first two) | Botnets | Bigger hack resource pool. Hack more NPCs and environmental objects before you need to recharge. Noticeable in crowded areas where targets cluster. |
| Environmental RC | Remote Control | Your Jumper can operate forklifts, scissor lifts, and cranes. Opens paths to money bags and Research Points locked behind height puzzles. |
| Gang Attack | Social Engineering | Calls a gang on a target NPC. Use it to clear restricted zones for your Jumper or to distract cops during armored truck chases. |
| Chopper Retreat Point | Vehicle Hacking | Forces police helicopters to retreat. Without this, armored truck escapes are a coin flip. |
| Remote CTRL Speed Boost | Remote Control | Makes drone races faster and easier. Gold medals at $12K+ per race become consistent instead of occasional. |
A 30-Minute Farming Loop
This route works best in mid-game, after you own the Jumper and Quadcopter but before you've finished the main story. Adjust based on what you've already collected.
- Check the minimap for an armored truck. If one has spawned nearby, rob it first. That's $250K and 100K followers in a single event. If nothing's up, move on.
- Fast-travel to a shop near Pier 39 (you can fast-travel to any shop on the map, not just Hackerspaces). Run two or three Driver SF green missions from the waterfront area. Each run takes three to five minutes for up to $9,600 and 11,000 followers.
- Walk the Pier 39 and Fisherman's Wharf stretch after your last drop-off. Hack every blue-square NPC you pass. Grab any ScoutX locations in the neighborhood if you haven't photographed them yet (Pier 39 Sea Lions, the Living Statue, and the Crab are all within walking distance).
- Run two drone races if you're near the Mission Dolores Park area. Two gold medals add $24K+ to $30K in about two minutes of race time.
- Detour for any money bag icons visible on the map along your route. Deploy the Jumper for restricted zones. Each bag is $4K to $25K for 30 seconds of work.
- End at a Pawn Shop. Sell everything you picked up. If you looted three or four gloveboxes and grabbed a couple bags along the way, you might see $10K to $20K from the Sell All button alone.
A clean loop through these steps puts $300K to $500K cash and 120K to 200K followers into your account in about half an hour, depending on whether an armored truck spawned and how many Driver SF runs you fit in.
Things Other Guides Get Wrong
The "Eye for an Eye" Exploit
Old guides and YouTube videos still recommend hacking Pablo Cortes during the "A Real Dog Fight" segment of the "Eye for an Eye" operation, reloading the checkpoint, and repeating. Ubisoft patched this. The game no longer resets his bank balance at the checkpoint. Other checkpoint-based balance exploits from early patches got the same treatment. If a money method requires a checkpoint reload, assume it's dead.
"Just Hack Everyone You See"
Without Improved Profiler, random NPC hacking pays $50 to $70 per target. You'd need to hack over 3,500 pedestrians to match one armored truck robbery. Hacking is supplemental income after you upgrade your Profiler, not a primary strategy.
Buying Cars and Clothes Early
Neither clothing nor vehicle paint jobs affect gameplay. No outfit gives a stealth bonus. No car skin improves handling. Spend your first $135,000 on the Jumper and Quadcopter. Those two gadgets unlock more earning potential than any weapon or vehicle purchase in the early game.
Useful Tricks That Save Time
- Fast travel to any shop. Open the map, select a clothing store, gun shop, or Hackerspace, and teleport there. You don't need to have visited it first. Most guides only mention Hackerspaces as fast-travel points.
- Steal motorcycles before you unlock Hijacker. Cars trigger alarms unless you have the Hijacker skill. Motorcycles and scooters don't. Ride those early on to avoid police responses from stolen vehicles.
- Use Car on Demand. The app on Marcus's phone delivers any car you've purchased or unlocked to your location. You almost never need to buy a car from a dealership. Between Hijacker and Car on Demand, vehicle purchases are a waste of money.
- Quick-hack without holding the button. A single tap performs the default hack on any target. Holding opens the hack menu for alternate options. During chases, tap-hacking traffic lights, blockers, and steam pipes is faster and keeps your eyes on the road.
- Scan from the Quadcopter. Flying the drone within about 90 meters of a collectible tags it on your map. Scan a neighborhood from the air before approaching on foot to plan an efficient pickup route.
FAQ
Can I still farm followers after the main story?
Online Operations, eKart races, Bounty Hunter, Hacking Invasions, ScoutX, and Driver SF all remain active after credits roll. Side Operations can be replayed too. The game doesn't lock you out of farming at any point.
Is there a follower cap?
Your count can reach the millions, but Research Point level-ups stop at a certain threshold. By that point you've earned enough points to buy most of the skill tree. The follower counter keeps climbing for bragging rights, but the gameplay rewards plateau.
Do armored trucks need multiplayer to spawn?
No. They appear in both online and offline play. Community reports disagree on which mode spawns them more often. Test both. If you're getting invaded by other players mid-robbery, switch to offline and see if trucks still appear for you.
What gives the most followers per hour?
First-time Main Operations pay the most. For repeatable farming after the story, mix eKart races (10K/win, three-minute races), Online Operations on hard difficulty, and Bounty Hunter. ScoutX is a one-time burst: about 456K followers in two hours if you run all 57 locations back to back.
Is the "Eye for an Eye" exploit still working?
No. Patched. The checkpoint no longer resets Pablo Cortes's bank balance. Any guide recommending it is outdated. Use armored trucks, drone races, and Driver SF instead.
Where do I buy the RC Jumper and Quadcopter?
Both cost $67,500 each at any 3D Printer shop (marked on the map). Buy them as soon as you have the cash. They open up 149 money bags, dozens of Research Points, and stealth mission approaches that are impossible without remote gadgets.
How many money bags are in the game?
149 bags total across all regions. Each holds $4,000 to $25,000 in cash or valuables. Collecting all of them takes several hours, but the Quadcopter scanning trick (fly overhead, tag from 90 meters) cuts the search time in half compared to wandering on foot.