Follow these five easy steps to max out your free Dropbox account with 22GB of free storage space.

1. Open a Dropbox account

Just by creating a free Dropbox account you’ll get 2GB of free disk space plus an additional 250MB if you use my (or someone else’s) referral link.

Total so far: 2.25GB

2. Use your .edu email address to double your referral bonuses

If you have a .edu email address, simply provide it to Dropbox at https://www.dropbox.com/edu and your referral bonuses will double to 500GB, giving you a chance to earn 16GB of free space.

Doing this will also retroactively double your free space from any referrals done previous to linking your .edu email address.

3. Use your referral code to get extra free space

Once you’ve created your Dropbox account and linked your .edu email address you’re ready to start inviting your friends, acquaintances and random folks to join the fun.

Find your referral code and give it your friends, add it to your signature, or even use it on an AdWords campaign. Anyone who signs up with your code will also get an additional 250MB of free space.

Total so far: 18.25GB

4. Complete the Dropbox questionnaire for an additional 890MB

Simply connect your Twitter and Facebook accounts to Dropbox, follow @Dropbox on Twitter, tweet about it and answer one question for an additional 640MB of free space (128MB for each action, so you don’t need to them all if you don’t feel like it).

Then finish the seven steps of the getting started guide to earn an additional 250MB of free space.

Total so far: 19.14GB

5. Test the Dropbox Camera Upload Beta for an additional 3GB

If you’re feeling a little adventurous, give the Dropbox Camera Upload Beta a try and earn up to 3GB of additional free space.

This used to give you 5GB of free space but as the Beta has evolved and become more stable, new testers now earn just 3GB of free space.

The Dropbox Camera Upload Beta will automatically grab photos and videos from any camera/SD card/phone you connect to your computer and add them to a Dropbox folder. For every 500MB of photos you add, Dropbox will add 500MB of free space to your account (up to a total of 3GB).

Total so far: 22.14GB

So, there you go: just over 22GB of free online storage space in Dropbox, available on all your computers, phones and tablets as well as anywhere you have an internet connection.

What do you think? Feel free to leave a comment with your Dropbox referral link