Are you looking to start your freelance career? But wait. The first thing you need is to decide is a platform from probably hundreds of options out there. To make things a little easier for you, here is an in-depth Fiverr vs Upwork comparison, the two most popular options out there.

Fiverr vs Upwork – What is Better?

Are you interested in working remotely from home?

Do you want to make money online by finding creative jobs?

Have you ever thought about freelancing and working on your terms?

If the answer is yes, then you are not alone.

Instead of working in boring, traditional offices, more and more people are choosing freelancing to have a flexible work schedule. According to a survey, around 57 million Americans are involved in freelancing these days.

This ever-growing industry has a job for each one of you, whatever your set of skills might be. Among the hundreds of freelancing platforms out there in the market, most people prefer either Fiverr or Upwork.

So which one is better?

Which one is more suitable for your skills?

To help you out, we have provided in-depth analysis to put an end to the debate on Fiverr vs Upwork in the following article.

Fiverr

This is an online marketplace that was founded in 2010 by Shai Wininger and Micha Kaufman to bring clients and freelancers together. Headquartered in Tel Aviv, Israel, this platform provides an opportunity for remote workers to make money in the gig economy.

With over one million transactions per month, Fiverr provides a vast pool of skilled freelancers to the employers. Since this marketplace divides this pool into three skill-set levels, entrepreneurs can narrow down their search for the perfect employee.

As a result, they can find people with the perfect skill sets to aid their business. Besides this, Fiverr adopts a complete transparency policy.

Employers can go through freelancer’s reviews, profiles, and information to learn if the person is reliable and highly skilled.

How Fiverr Works

With Fiverr, you can make a profile to display your skills and the types of jobs you are interested in. Instead of bidding on a client’s post or job, clients pick you for their task. Among thousands of candidates, clients have to skim through profiles to find the perfect person for their task.

To put it in simple words, Fiverr forms a directory of sellers for the clients, with multiple categories to find the right candidate according to their specific requirements. Moreover, the freelancers are listed down according to their rating and reviews from previous jobs.

Here, clients can find all of their qualifications, services, skills, and availability.

Pricing

Fiverr is a safe platform to find a gig economy job. You can set your own gigs with your own pricing, and can offer different packages under their basic, standard, and premium package.

For example, a writer can set a following gig:

The Basic package starts at only $10 and offers 500 words in two days, along with one revision.

Starting at $20, the Standard one comes with a write-up of 1000 words per day and two reviews.

The Premium package is worth $15, giving you 1500 words per day with three revisions.

Also, Fiverr takes payment from both the client as well as the freelancer. From the client’s side, they will have to pay $2 for tasks worth up to $40. Above $40 jobs, they will have to pay 5% of their gig’s worth.

On the other hand, Fiverr takes a 20% commission from the freelancer’s side, whatever the job might be worth.

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Quality

When you are paying someone for a project, you always expect them to provide high-quality results. But how do you make sure that the freelancer is adept at your niche? Does he have the skills to create that animation you wanted?

Since Fiverr is divided into categories and related subcategories, clients can always find suitable candidates for your needs.

For example, typing ‘logo animation’ in the search bar will give clients further options like logo design, cartoon or comics, character modeling, presentation design, and poster design.

Moreover, a client can find a plethora of information on any service provided by a freelancer on Fiverr. Clients can even compare similar services offered by different people and choose the best person for your job.

I purchased a $25 lead magnet on Fiverr. Here is what I got.

Work Monitoring

An excellent online freelancing platform offers various monitoring tools to the users to maintain the quality of their work. When it comes to dispute management and work monitory, Fiverr does not provide much.

All the agreements regarding the projects are made between the seller and the client before starting the task. However, the client can always check up on its employees to find the progress on their project.

Similarly, you do not get a mediator to settle any disputes on Fiverr. Instead, you can just ask for an extension on the resolution center or even get updates on the task.

With subpar work management, it is harder to solve issues on Fiverr.

Ease of Use

Not only can a user-friendly interface help you navigate a site quickly, but it will also help both the parties in their tasks. As such, Fiverr offers multiple amazing tools to find the perfect job or the ideal candidate for your needs.

Fiverr can help you filter out undesired skills, profiles, and niche from your search. Unlike other freelancing platforms, it provides customized search bars to find what you exactly need.

For instance, if a client is looking for a creative writer, he can filter out the candidates depending on the style, format, tone, and topic that he requires. In the case of logo designing, Fiverr can narrow the search down from thousands of profiles to barely 50 available sellers.

Besides this, Fiverr can further help clients eliminate profiles by displaying all their information to you. Clients can get freelancers’ average response time, previous reviews, portfolio of articles, and their rates on their profiles.

Job-Finding Ease

Since clients pick the freelancers for their tasks in Fiverr, it is quite tough to find the first job here. Naturally, clients do not want to hire inexperienced sellers to save their money and time. Without any previous reviews or ratings, it can be hard to put yourself out in the market. Here are some tips for growing your side hustle.

Even though Fiverr does have a section where employers post their projects, they are only a few, and the competition is quite fierce.

Bidding on the post might give you a small chance, but experienced freelancers take the majority.

However, if you have already gained some experience and have a good reputation, it is quite easy to earn gigs on Fiverr. You will not even have to comment on any jobs, and clients will contact you by themselves.

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Pre-Screening Option

Unlike Upwork, Fiverr does not screen its freelancer for authenticity. Unless you are purchasing Fiverr Pro, anyone can sell their products and skillsets on the platform.

Moreover, it does not even offer any skill testing service to help distinguish the right and subpar talent on the site.

Pros of Fiverr

Rating and feedback from clients

Categorized skill sets

Customizes search bar

Communication channel set-up

User-friendly interface

Large client base

Minimum bidding on job postings

Cons of Fiverr

No proper pre-screening features

Poor resolution center

No free trial

Tough for new freelancers to get settled

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Upwork

Upwork was formed in 2015 after a merger of Elance with oDesk. With its headquarters in California, US, this global marketplace facilitates clients and freelancers, allowing them to work together remotely.

Since its establishment, Upwork has become a successful outsourcing platform where you can get paid to freelance by posting about your skill sets, experiences, and rates. I like to call it a way to sell your skills online. You don’t have to invest anything upfront.

You can build your profile and start earning. Obviously, you need to have a skill to sell in advance.

Amazingly, this platform gets over three million job postings every year. Therefore, if you are a freelancer, you can always find a suitable job for yourself. Upwork is one the best freelance apps out there.

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How Upwork Works

Unlike Fiverr, Upwork works opposite. It’s more, sort of, a traditional marketplace where clients post about their job in detail, mentioning the type of skill sets they require. In response, interested freelancers bid on the task by sending in their profiles and cover letter.

The client goes through their profiles and evaluates their skill sets, rates, and experience. Although it can get tiring, they can find a person that is suitable for their needs.

On the other hand, Upwork can also offer a list of sellers to the client by matching their details. To help the client find the right person for the task, they display the freelancer’s experience and skillsets in that specific niche.

In this way, they can cut back on time, interview the possible candidates, compare different profiles, and find available people easily.

Pricing

Just like Fiverr, Upwork also charges both the clients as well as the freelancer. The clients have to pay a 2.75% processing fee for every transaction on their job. This percentage of the fee is taken on top of what you pay to your employee.

On the other hand, freelancers are charged a 20% commission by Upwork for each new client. This percentage drops down to 10% after the earnings pass a certain limit ($500) and then to 5% when the client’s transactions to a particular freelancer crossed over $10,000.

This drop is a motivator for freelancers to work harder and secure their clients. The more you work for a specific client, the less you will have to pay to Upwork over time.

When it comes to making money on Upwork, you can bid for fixed-price jobs and hourly jobs. The client will then choose you if they like your work and skillsets along with your quoted price.

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Quality

As mentioned in the Fiverr section, clients look for high-quality outcomes for their money. Since Upwork offers a bigger pool of skilled freelancers, they just have to pick the right person for their needs.

To make their search more manageable, Upwork offers a lengthy list of potential freelancers when you search a particular niche. It displays various skills under the selected categories, and from there, Upwork narrows down your search to a few.

The profiles of the freelancers on that list contain all the information on their performance, rating, experience, and more. Here, you can opt for one to make your task easier.

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Work Monitoring

Compared to Fiverr, Upwork has much better work management features set in place for its customers. Firstly, you can sort out your whole project on Upwork along with maintaining a proper communication channel between the client and the seller.

You can also assign milestones to the freelancer to keep track of their progress. When they are finished with the task, you can get an alert to pay them for their service.

For disputes, there’s an option as well. On Upwork’s dispute resolution center, you can lodge a complaint regarding your completed task and address any problems that you might be facing. A mediator checks if the complaint is valid, in which case, your money will be returned to you.

Similarly, freelancers enjoy sufficient earning security with things like set milestones and hourly work tracking (manual hours are not covered, however).

If the client has no valid issues against you, you’ll get:

The entire sum as promised in the milestone for fixed-price jobs

The hours tracked and recorded into your work diary (within the limits specified by the client)

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Ease of Use

Upwork has one of the most colorful, visually-appealing interfaces in the market. The designer team makes regular changes to the site to keep the site up-to-date and stylish.

Unlike Fiverr, this platform has simple registration progress, requiring only your email, password, and username. It has unique yet intuitive interface navigation to help you find the ideal job for you.

As discussed previously, its features allow you to narrow down the result to a bare minimum by providing a list of freelancers to cater to your task.

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Job-Finding Ease

One thing that sets this platform apart is how it showcases talent. While going through top freelancers’ profiles, clients can also send invitations to the candidates who match their needs.

So, in a way, it saves an ample amount of time spent on the job posting, going through profiles, interviewing and selecting. For high-performance freelancers, it’s a way to get the jobs without having to search for them.

But if you’re a newcomer, competition is quite tough. However, Upwork has a little advantage over Fiverr when it comes to kickstarting beginner profiles.

Since clients post their projects on this platform, freelancers can bid on them and work actively to find a suitable gig. With over 360,000 members, there is no shortage of job postings on Upwork at all.

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Pre-Screening Option

Compared to Fiverr, Upwork screens its freelancers to offer higher quality results to the clients. Apart from giving reviews, ratings, and feedback, the platform helps to distinguish the talented freelancers on their site.

For example, they verify profiles for security purposes and offer various features to conduct interviews between the client and the seller. Furthermore, freelancer profiles display previous reviews, successful jobs, and their scores to the next clients.

Pros of Upwork

Comprehensive screening

Ability to reach out to the freelancer

Can browse through profiles

Account verification for valid profiles

Proper resolution centers for disputes

Secure document sharing

Comprehensive client-to-freelancer chat, call, and video communication channel

Marketing for more than one skillsets becomes easier

Special discounts (less commission) for established and high-performing freelancers

Job posting

Cons of Upwork

Need to bid to find jobs

Bidding is not free

Tough competition

Verification and profile activation process takes time

Fiverr vs Upwork: Conclusion

The freelancing economy has seen a sharp rise in the last few years. According to a survey, 43% of the US workforce will be freelancing in the next five years. Hence, they can explore freelancing platforms like Fiverr, Upwork, and others to find the right kind of jobs.

When it comes to Fiverr vs Upwork, it’s a tough decision to point out which one’s better. However, by looking into the features, such as client-end support, B2B communication, payment/earning security, searchability, navigation, and more importantly, number of profiles, Upwork has an edge on Fiverr.

But the case may be different for you depending on the type of work you do and your expectations from the platform you chose. That said, there’s no doubt both of these platforms offer the best mix of jobs and skills.

Want to get started? Here are some skills that you can monetize with freelancing:

So, which one do you prefer?

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