1️⃣Upwork
Upwork connects skilled freelancers with serious buyers and uses escrow for safety. Top talent can charge premium rates and build long-term contracts fast.
Address: 475 Brannan St, San Francisco, California, USA
- Huge volume of quality clients
- Escrow protects your payments
- Hourly tracking and contracts built in
- Strong search and filters to win niche work
- Repeat clients and long-term engagements
- Competition is intense in popular categories
- Profile approval and verification can take time
2️⃣Fiverr
Turn your skills into productized gigs and get discovered while you sleep. Fiverr Business brings higher-budget brands and quick payouts.
Address: 8 Eliezer Kaplan St, Tel Aviv, Israel
- Easy storefront setup
- Great for selling microservices fast
- Built-in upsells and packages boost order value
- Large buyer traffic
- Fast
- reliable payouts
- Learning gig SEO takes practice
- Seasonality can cause demand swings
3️⃣Toptal
Elite network with Fortune 500 clients and rates to match. If you pass the rigorous screening, projects are steady and well-paid.
- Premium clients and budgets
- Remote-first engagements
- Strong support and screening raises trust
- Very tough multi-step screening
- Limited categories and fewer openings
- Long wait times between matches
4️⃣Freelancer.com
Massive marketplace with contests and projects across nearly every skill. Good for building a portfolio fast if you can cut through the noise.
Address: 680 George St, Sydney, Australia
- Huge number of postings
- Contests help you showcase work
- Milestone payments available
- Many low-budget bids drive prices down
- High competition and spammy invites
- Fees and upsells can eat margins
5️⃣PeoplePerHour
UK-centric platform with one-off jobs and ongoing retainers. Good for European time zones and local clients.
Address: 12 Hammersmith Grove, London, United Kingdom
- Strong presence in UK and EU
- Hourlies make it easy to package offers
- Integrated invoicing
- Credit system limits early bidding
- Client quality is mixed
- Less traffic than larger rivals