3700 Freelancers Surveyed … The Results Are Here!
There are millions of freelancers around the globe, but for most, freelancing is something done in isolation. What do other freelancers charge? Do they quote or estimate? How many hours a week do they bill? These and many other questions are what we set out to answer in the Global Freelancer Survey of 2007.
3700 people took part in the survey from 6 continents and 10 industries. The results revealed some interesting facts:
Do Freelancers Work More? And if they do, do they Earn More?
We asked freelancers how many hours a week they worked, and just how that compared to their work as regular employees. Additionally we asked them how their earnings compared to the ol’ nine to five, here’s what we found out:
It almost seems unsurprising that Australians are the most laid back of all freelancers in the world (it must be all the sun and sand we have here).
And just what are other freelancers charging?
Of course the question almost every freelancer will want answered is, just how much do other freelancers charge? In our complete report we’ve gone into a lot more detail of ranges, countries and even genders, but here’s perhaps the most sought after statistics, the average hourly rates according to industry:
Get the full 55 page report
We’ve emailed out the full report to everyone who took part in the survey. For everyone else, you can still get it via Rockable Press.
Why the charge? Close to 300 manhours of work went into hosting, compiling, analysing and reporting the survey. While it has been distributed freely to anyone who chose to participate, we are charging for the results to help pay for the rather large expense of putting it together. We thank you for your understanding.
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wow, very cool. what’s the difference between programmer and software though?
ooo, it’s Software Design, but in this table it’s been abbreviated!
Thats awesome, I would love to help out with the donation. I can tell that this took a long time. Good Job!
Thanks guys!
Keep Rocking!
Aloke Pillai
Incredible job! The numerical freak inside me will have a field day with this. Hats off to the entire FS team.
Yes! the results are in. Lovely! Thanks FreelanceSwitch…
That’s one huge pile of work, Collis… and this promises to address so many of those haunting questions that come up time &again wherever freelancers gather to weep in our beer and cautiously compare notes. Just downloaded & can’t wait to read it – thanks much.
Holy hannah, that must have been super fun to get all that data together. Awesome work and I will donate to get this snazzy report!
Yay! Thanks guys, yeah it was waaaaaay more work than we thought it was going to be, that’s why it’s so late
Better late than never!
Because the writers guild was on strike you should get the oscar for this performance!
I had received free report.
Good job, Collis!
It was really fun mucking around with the data. I’m such a nerd.
Hats off to Collis for making it attractive. That kind of stuff isn’t my forte.
I’m gonna have to get a copy of this!!! Good job =D
Fascinating results! I’m glad I participated and appreciate all the effort that went into producing this great report.
Excellent survey. Thanks. Next time I’d like to see you include freelance editors.
Collis/Cyan..already sent my donation
. cant wait to read the report.
Thanks!
Zaizen Goro
http://www.graphicsalien.com
Collis,
Enjoying the survey so far, but thinking I might have found a typo…
Are the second table on page 36 and the first table on page 39 both “Hourly Rates of Software Designers / Engineers?”
Just checking. Thanks again for the survey, the time it took to compile, and the results.
Christian Ross
http://www.christianross.net
Another thanks for going to the trouble of compiling this useful survey. One thing I’ve wondered about since I subscribed a few weeks ago: I know most any trade can have freelancers, or the potential to have freelancers, but freelance SEO’s and online marketing consultants make up a huge portion of the freelance community on the web, do they not? How ’bout some more info geared to this audience?
And how ’bout seeing how many times I can use the word “freelancers” in this post?
free free freeeeelancers…
I’m a small publisher myself and love the PDF format. But I’m curious as to why you formatted this document (and your book) for paper? It seems that the majority of people will read it on a computer, so a landscape format that fits one page per screen would be more useful. Or have you found that most people end up printing it out?
Thanks for the wonderful statistic you have compiled. Sure to be most useful information for all freelancers and want to be freelancers. Just an incredible Report!
Amazing, beautiful report… And some of the analysis in the end confirms my thoughts on marketing and money. The whole thing is a wealth of knowledge that will help to guide my business and personal decisions for some time to come, I’m sure! Thanks so much!
Hey Geoff, that is an EXCELLENT question
The short answer is, I’m used to making things in A4 portrait and didn’t think 
fwiw, i like the option of printing it out portrait.
I hate printing stuff landscape.
Hey guys, thanks for the blog, the e-book and everything. I participated on the survey too, so I got it for free.
I have to say though, over the last months, this website has been more and more commercialised. I’m an entrepreneur myself, so I understand how much effort you guys put in here. Still I think asking for a donation for the results of the survey, is not really appropiate. You would get a lot bigger response from the whole blogosphere if it were for free. And the e-book for 30 bucks? I dunno guys…
Congrats for the hard work Collis and we all thank you for sharing this survey with us.
Interesting stats, thanks for putting in the time to compile all this data.
Wonderful job – really. The information gathered is very useful, not to mention the great style in which it is presented. Love the design and the statistical graphs – which software was used for these?
Again, great job and thanks!
Congratulations on the not only the great blog you have going on (1st time I’m posting so I think this is due
).
Regarding the report, like other fellow readers summed it perfectly: “i’m going to have a field day with it”
Keep up on rocking the free world!
Thanks for the copy of the survey Collis. I’ve given a donation even though you didn’t ask it off the people who it got for free.
Good results there. One thing, did you already send out the report to participants? I didn’t receive it and I’m sure I took part.
… and who are the two programmers in UK who totally skewed the hourly numbers??
Awesome. Now I can see what it feels like being a freelancer in terms of figures and graphs.
Thanks FSW.
Ta muchly, donation paid – now to tha readin.
The rates you list above – AUD? Or was the survey not currency specific?
Good to see I’m about on average for the programmer/web designer rates – and I’d not go back to software design even for the rate you list – screw the deadlines, bosses and stress.
Wow! I enjoyed the results. It’s very interesting to learn about how other freelancers do in other places in the world.
Thanks a lot.
Thankyou for the survey results. An eye opener indeed.
It’s really nice to see the percentage of creatives on each field perform.
Good job!
Rongen Robles
http://www.rongenrobles.com
Wow. Perfect. I like it
I am really suprised that there is also info about Slovakia, great work
Thanks so much for making the effort to collect, compile, and analyze these data–I look forward to pouring over it for the next few days.
Pat French
Left Lane Communications
http://www.leftlanecomm.com
Great stuff there, nice to have a global overview.
Jan Lukacs
The Freelancers Time Tracker
http://www.paymo.biz
An eye opening report. Really makes me wonder what I actually have to lose putting up with the Tyrant each day.
BTW, the $9 is more than fair. Actually something of a bargain. It took all of 2 seconds to make the purchase/donation decision. Very smart move!
Definitely interesting results of the survey…
A little sad that the results for my country (P)erú didn’t show, but i assume it’s because maybe i was the only participant from there
Good job
Thanks for putting this report together! I would like to second Katharine’s suggestion that you include freelance editing in your next survey.
Hey everybody, thanks so much for all the support, we really appreciate it!!
We learnt a lot doing this survey, I think we could do things a lot more efficiently / better next time. Though for now I think a years gap might be a good breather
By way of convincing you to include freelance editors in your next survey, take a look at these web sites:
http://www.the-efa.org/
http://www.bels.org/
http://www.councilscienceeditors.org/
http://www.editors.ca/
We’re everywhere!
Just wanted to say thanks for all the hard work. I’ve just donated and downloaded and looking forward to seeing what the results are. It might take me a while as I ‘m still working my way through How to be a Rockstar Freelancer!
So much to learn so little time
This is wonderful. You guys rock. So insightful and simple to read. I really do love this blog! Thank you for sharing! By the way the calculator you guys have is amazing too!
Not sure how a forced charge can be called a donation. but whatever.
yes, i agree with ^^ as well! forced charged = donation? nice one! all creative ways to reap profits.
I feel like I have to comment on the donation/fee issue for the survey. I donated 64 man hours to this project. Donated. Collis offered to compensate me with a portion of the very modest fees that are collected from this survey and I told them to keep it. You know why? Because what they’re doing is a service to the community that you belong to. That’s why I donated my time. That’s why you shouldn’t complain about not getting something for free when you put nothing into it.
It’s pretty hilarious that when it’s suggested someone take a crack at a design for free on the forum, they get shouted down with “NO SPEC!!!” Fine. I get it. Doing work for free increases the urinary content of everyone’s breakfast cereal. So why should Collis and Cyan (who did the lion’s share of the work on this survey) do this work for free?
I donated my time because I wanted to give something back to a community I enjoy. It’s not part of my core business. This site is part of Collis and Cyan’s core business.
NO SPEC!!!
You convinced me. Don’t go getting all hypocritical on me.
Great Tools to View PDF E-BOOKS !!!!! Store all your current and Upcoming Freelance Switch E-Books – http://labs.adobe.com/technologies/digitaleditions/
Well said Aaron
We were actually just going to charge $10 p/survey, but Cyan suggested we lower it to $3 but let people choose the price. I must admit it’s not exactly a donation, but it sorta is, and it sounds way better
In any case thanks to everyone who has donated, and for all the pleasant comments, makes it all worth it!
I am not surprised at all that us Aussies are the slackest
We have the best beaches, best sports and the best environment to live in, why stay inside any extra???
Great job guys, that is really well done.
When I read that Australia has the lowest work hours, I laughed pretty hard inside my head of course. I am from Australia myself and the data backs up the facts. A lot of Australian’s don’t like working over 38 hours a week.
I use to work for 43 hours a week for a web design company and the money wasn’t too bad at all
The reason I stayed so long.
- Dwayne Charrington.
http://www.dwaynecharrington.com
Excellent work, but i can’t donate with paypal. 2co or credit card only. Any chance getting the report?
How come I cannot find Maldives (where I am from) among the countries in the results.
I did take part in the survey for sure.
Seems u guys are getting a lot of rave reviews – like am said, what happens if u cant pay thru pay-pal or any payment engine?? Regards. And more ‘xters to you keyboard’.
Excellent survey. Thank you for the top notch information. I have always wondered about the results you report on and its nice to have answers!
Hi, I´m a journalist from Brazil and I would like to write aboout the research. Is it possible to send me the full report?
Regards,
Karin
Great report! A couple of comments:
* In the extra analysis on happiness, Aaron Cruikshak says, “the vast majority of respondents (71%) are happier since they started freelancing,” but the graph from page 18 seems to indicate that this number should be 88.9%. Why the difference?
* I’d like to see an explanation of the difference between “Programmer” and “Software Designer.”
* In the extra analysis on income, Aaron Cruikshak says that overall income is not correlated to experience, yet the table on page 35 shows that hourly rate generally increases with experience. How can these two things be simultaneously true – are experienced freelancers working fewer hours and thus making less net income?
* Some of the data is duplicated in the hourly rate tables (p.40 and 41 both have hourly rates of illustrators, p. 36 and 39 both have hourly rates of Software Designers.
* Hourly rate charts were useful but it would also be useful to see income distributions. Averages (p. 54) just made me more curious about how this data was distributed.
Thank you,
That Software Guy
Your survey was favourably mentioned on DSD-professionals (Digital Scrapbook Designer Professional Business Association) in their first ever BIZBUZZ podcast.
Link to actual podcast
http://dsd-professionals.com/180/dsd-professionals-bizbuzz-edition-1/
Link to blog site
http://dsd-professionals.com/
Too bad this is in PDF format, and not Excel. I’d like to isolate the USA because I’m not entirely interested in knowing what other countries charge and work. How many freelancers were surveyed in California or the San Francisco Bay Area?
I don’t mind one bit paying $3 for a survey like this.
Thank you
thank you very much for the info! it is really important to have the full report.
thanks again guys!
cheers! \m/
What an amazing and well put-together site this is! Will definitely be joining, and will be passing this along to all the freelancers (and even just home-based business owners) I know! Keep it up!
I think this just sums it all up: Made me laugh.
“”"Getting regular exercise is a strong contributor to satisfaction with income. I suspect that there is some halo affect associated with feeling good physically. A recent study (needs citation) found that people who had sexual inter- course once a week or more “felt” like they made $50,000 per year more than they actually do. Exercise produces similar hormones in the blood-steam to sexual intercourse so it’s conceivable that regular exercise could make you feel like you’re making more than you actually do.”"”
… so if your a freelance porn star your going to be REALLY happy. Even if you dont get paid.
The rest of the document is interesting but there are some obvious problems with the stats. A UK client will pay $13,975 average per job for graphic design, seems a bit out, especially compared to everywhere else in the world. There are a few like this.
Has someone checked some of the strange figures people have typed in and made sure they didnt get into the final stats for checking. Some random $50,000 entry would certainly do this.
All in all, thanks for finally putting this up.
Further comment:
Please send this as anon data to a few universities, I feel more interesting correlations can be made from it. There is an opportunity to grab a lot more info from such a large sample size and universities and their students are often very keen to get hold of such data.
As long as they report back any NEW finding to all us who contributed, I cant see why it wouldnt be advantageous to us all.
How come there are no freelance interpreter or translators included?
Anyhow, it’s a clearly illustrated report.
Thanks!
Thanks for the survey. Keep up the good work.
Hi, I tried to get the report, but the cart window says the product combination does not exist. Is there any way to obtain this report currently ?
Thanks for the great preview, Collis Ta’eed!
How can I get full version of your report? I tried to donate )) But I getting message “Product combination does not exist”… could you help me? It’s VERY interesting to learn more about…
It surprising that American work less hours than the Europeans…
My, my.. I’m way under paid. thanks for the info FS
Fascinating and really helpful report. Many thanks for your hard work collecting and crunching the numbers.
I have one IMPORTANT question, though.
In the Hourly Rate x Industry table, what currency is that? Aussie dollars? US dollars? Kiwi dollars? Zimbabwean dollars? Makes a difference!
@Phillipe Calmet:
You are not the only one in Peru. I also took part in the survey.
Do you anyone have statistics on freelancing of Bangladesh? I need this information vary badly.
Very interesting Stats.
I almost at the point of leaving my regular job and keep online freelancing as my only way of income! This business keeps getting better and better!