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Upwork, a popular freelancing platform, offers a range of use cases for both individuals and businesses. Users have utilized Upwork as a …
Starting at $49.99 per month
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What is Upwork?
Upwork headquartered in Mountain View, California offers their eponymous freelance management system (FMS).
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$49.99
Cloud
per month
Basic
Free
Cloud
Entry-level set up fee?
- No setup fee
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- Free Trial
- Free/Freemium Version
- Premium Consulting/Integration Services
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What is Upwork?
Upwork Video
At Upwork, we believe the best companies win with the best talent. But great people can be hard to find. Through Upwork, you can hire and collaborate with high-quality independent professionals with the exact skills you need to get the job done. Watch our short video to learn ...
Show More Upwork Technical Details
| Deployment Types | Software as a Service (SaaS), Cloud, or Web-Based |
|---|---|
| Operating Systems | Unspecified |
| Mobile Application | No |
Frequently Asked Questions
Upwork headquartered in Mountain View, California offers their eponymous freelance management system (FMS).
Reviewers rate Support Rating highest, with a score of 9.1.
The most common users of Upwork are from Small Businesses (1-50 employees).
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Community Insights
TrustRadius Insights are summaries of user sentiment data from TrustRadius reviews and, when necessary, 3rd-party data sources. Have feedback on this content? Let us know!
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Upwork, a popular freelancing platform, offers a range of use cases for both individuals and businesses. Users have utilized Upwork as a customer acquisition channel, enabling them to create a higher number of blog posts, copy for ads, and graphics for social media and Google ads at scale. The marketplace provides the opportunity to hire contract developers for small to medium-sized projects, allowing users to prioritize marketing tasks over content creation. Upwork has also become a go-to platform for agencies looking to find clients that match their specific Amazon seller skills, while facilitating billing and invoicing processes. Freelancers leverage Upwork to build a client database and generate extra income by utilizing their writing abilities. With its hourly service model, Upwork helps businesses grow in client volume and build trust through regular screenshots.
Additionally, the platform is used for short, randomly-occurring tasks that don't require hiring permanent staff or when departments are overloaded and specific skills are needed. It solves administrative pain points by providing virtual assistance for general administrative duties and data analysis. Upwork can be a quick way to outsource tasks or projects without upfront expenditure and ensures that freelancers get paid worldwide. This has proven beneficial in boosting efficiency in workflow and roadmap by providing candidates for different project lengths and commitments. Overall, users have found that Upwork streamlines the process of finding, vetting, and managing an outsourced workforce while effectively tracking hours worked and facilitating payment activities.
Valuable platform for finding verified talent: Many users have found Upwork to be a valuable platform for finding reputable and verified designers, writers, and creative talent. They appreciate the extensive candidate pool on Upwork, stating that it almost guarantees finding individuals who specialize in the specific skills they are looking for. Convenient communication and project management: Users appreciate how easy it is to communicate with customers and keep track of billing, tracking, and conversations in one place on Upwork. They also like the messaging service available on Upwork's desktop app, browser app, and mobile app, which allows them to stay in constant contact with clients regardless of their location. Flexible payment options: Some users find it useful that Upwork offers both fixed bid and hourly options. They mention that these options are helpful for different kinds of projects and provide flexibility when working with freelancers.
Difficult to contact customer service: Many users have expressed frustration with Upwork's customer service, finding it difficult to get in touch and feeling that the company lacks transparency in their decision-making processes.
Upwork does not prioritize freelancers' best interest: Reviewers frequently mention that Upwork seems to prioritize its own interests over those of the freelance community. This has led many freelancers to feel disposable and undervalued on the platform.
High fees charged by Upwork: A common complaint among users is the high fees charged by Upwork, especially for freelancers who are just starting their businesses. These fees are seen as a significant barrier and make it challenging for both clients and freelancers to use the platform cost-effectively.
Users recommend the following when using Upwork:
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Be patient and put in consistent effort to find good clients and build a good rating. Thoroughly fill out your Upwork profile and explain your needs clearly.
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Send multiple pitches per week and bid lower than others when starting out. Take on jobs outside of your preferred skills to get the first few 5-star reviews. Start with small, quick turnover projects to build your portfolio. Ask for fair pricing to avoid charging too little.
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Use a guide and review freelancers' performance on Upwork for reliability. Conduct thorough interviews with candidates on Upwork and communicate only through the platform. Make sure to explain what you need in detail and have a clear idea of what you want.
Overall, users highly recommend trying Upwork for freelancing opportunities and finding qualified professionals. They believe that Upwork is a great platform for achieving business objectives, economic independence, and connecting with excellent freelancers quickly.
Attribute Ratings
Reviews
(1-17 of 17)Companies can't remove reviews or game the system. Here's why
October 04, 2023
My experience...Scammed by (in my opinion) Upwork freelancer
Score 1 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Upwork seemed serious
July 18, 2023
Upwork can be a great resource, but it's the Wild West and there are plenty of ways to waste time and money!
Score 7 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
I believe that with all its faults, for professional corporate use cases, Upwork is still the best tool for temporary, remote workforce augmentation.
September 13, 2022
I feel as Upwork tried to destroy our business.
Upwork has the longest project database compared with all other marketplaces. But that dominance makes them treat the freelance community very badly.
September 13, 2022
The best way to find contractors, track their hours and see positive results for your projects!
Upwork is better suited for finding contractors that you can have ongoing relationships. Compared to Fiverr, it's a much easier process to find qualified designers rather than one-time contractors to design simple things for you. The interface is easier to use as well and the billing management makes it so much cleaner and easier to know how much we're spending and how contractors are logging work hours.
June 28, 2022
Upwork Is A Freelancer's Dream
Upwork is the best platform, in my opinion, at least for my area of freelance type work. They make it easy to find clients, set up contracts, and communicate regardless of time zone. We owe a lot to Upwork for the success of our team of freelancers and to our agency as a whole. Their rating system is awesome, and if you do good work, you get rewarded with more opportunities based on that rating. It's great!
September 13, 2021
Upwork - Easy Freelancer Software
- Harvest
Upwork is better in integrated messaging and keeping the client up-to-date with screenshots. However, the percentage that Upwork keeps from revenue is a big negative against Harvest, since you can just use email to communicate.
We have used a few different pieces of software to search for clients and track time. Upwork does the best at combining all of the aspects that we need in order to be organized with client work, in addition to bringing us more clients. The time tracking software does better because it takes reports and bills the client accordingly.
March 06, 2020
Upwork works!
Upwork is better if you are looking for some quick hires that can help solve simple problems. If you are looking for someone to join your team, I would recommend something like Indeed or ZipRecruiter. I've heard Fiverr is also good, but I haven't used it yet. Overall, Upwork is a great platform.
November 06, 2019
Upping the Freelancer Game
Better cost to value ratio, and a greater range of talent; we need more than writers. Fiverr is still good for cheap logo designs.
December 02, 2018
Expands your network to around the globe
I've never used similar products to Upwork, so I can't compare it to others, but I know they can improve on services from a company (looking for jobs) perspective.
November 18, 2018
Upwork - Global marketplace for hiring freelancers
Freelancer.com is another online marketplace to hire freelance individuals for short terms projects. The site is less robust than Upwork in terms of features. The cost is cheaper, but in this case, you get what you pay for. Freelancer does not provide for filtering projects to "US Only" so it makes it much harder to get bids that would be in line with specific project requirements (such as time zone, English fluency, etc.)
June 27, 2018
Quality work for a fair price
In my experience, Upwork is the easiest to use and I have found the most qualified hires there. It could be in your favor to look one as many sites as you can because you never know who won't be on one. Upwork would definitely be my first place to look though.
June 04, 2018
Upwork is the best online jobs marketplace!
Freelancer.com is a big mess when it comes to its user interface. I have my different currency pricing on it and the listing is just a mess. I especially don't like that it will ask you to upgrade to increase your number of applications per month. Upwork provides better options by offering you at least 30 applications in a month (more or less).
To be honest, I've lost track of how many freelance hubs I have my profile listed on. At last count, it was likely over 20, which is overwhelming, to be sure, but necessary to increase exposure to find quality clients and projects. Each of these has its pros and cons, and I think some of them don't even exist anymore. I would say you have to just set yourself up on all of them and make sure you have a consistent message across the lot of them. To date, I've had the most success in Upwork and Skyword, without paying any membership fees. Other hubs require membership fees to bid on certain projects, but I get enough exposure and work to keep me going.
- fiverr, Freelancer.com and Guru.com
Upwork and Fiverr definitely have the most traffic. Fiverr is good for package services while Upwork is better for customized/long-term services. You really want to use both. Freelancer.com and Guru.com don't have nearly the traffic. They rarely have any jobs in my niche and they are almost all non-US freelancers.
Upwork provides a platform (a software that you can install on your computer) and you are able to manage all of your projects and freelancers on it instead of having to log in and log out to the website every time you want to check on your project status. It is even more convenient when offering the mobile app so you can monitor your projects/freelancers on the go.
March 17, 2017
Opens up a world of freelance talent, instantly
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
It's much more streamlined and comprehensive than your average local job bank.