After working on Upwork for over two years, I have everything you need to know before getting started. But if you’re looking to hire on Upwork, check out my article here. When you’re a freelancer, it can be hard to find steady work with great clients.

This is especially true if you are just starting out. Thankfully, some of the new freelancer platforms can help jumpstart your new career so you can get out of that dreaded nine-to-five. Work on Upwork can be consistent and helpful.

Working On Upwork

Upwork is a platform that helps freelancers find clients. They have plenty of freelancer categories, so whether you’re a graphic designer or a ghostwriter, there are clients for you to find. Because Upwork allows clients to review and rate a freelancer, the more contracts or clients you get, the better your profile looks. If you are thinking of working on Upwork, here’s what you need to know.

The Good

There are a lot of benefits to Upwork. It’s where I started my freelance career and I’ve been happy with it. One great thing about Upwork is that there are no shortage of clients and jobs to apply for. There are thousands that are posted daily, and there aren’t any limits to what you can apply for. If you’re great at graphic design and marketing, you can apply for jobs within both categories. If you’re a writer and a website designer, awesome, you can apply for more jobs!

Explore careers

Upwork also allows you to explore what you hope to create a career in. You can check out jobs in categories you’re interested in and see what they require. Because Upwork shows whether the job is for entry, intermediate, or expert levels, you can easily determine whether or not you could do it. You could start with those beginner jobs when it’s something that you’re just learning, and as you continue, you can make your way up to higher-paying expert jobs.

Easy to get paid

Another thing I like about Upwork is how it pays. First of all, clients fund the project when they hire you, so you know that you are going to get paid for the work that you do. Upwork keeps this money in escrow and waits until you submit the work for payment. Then, the client releases it, or Upwork will release it after 14 days. It protects both the freelancer and the client, which is awesome!

You can also choose to get paid whenever. As long as you have over $100 in your account on Upwork, you can get paid. There’s no reason that you have to wait until two weeks is up, or a month, and you can get paid however and whenever.

Good rating system

I also love that Upwork allows you to become “Top Rated.” Essentially, this is a way to show that you do great work and that the majority of your clients would hire you again. While this takes a few months to earn, it makes your profile stand out against all the others, and more clients will want to interview and hire you.

So, to sum it up, here is the good about Upwork:

• No shortage of jobs
• You can apply for jobs in multiple categories
• You can expand your skills by starting with entry-level jobs
• Upwork comes with payment protection
• You can get paid whenever you want
• Becoming Top Rated allows you to get more work

The Bad

Now, with everything, there is some bad to Upwork. Since they are a huge company, they can’t do everything. I, personally, think the good outweighs the bad. That’s why I’m still on Upwork today! However, let’s get into the nitty-gritty.

Expect competition

For one, there is a lot of competition. For new freelancers, you often have to take low-paying jobs just to build up your profile and get enough ratings that clients will actually want to look at you. Upwork has tried to combat this with the US-only jobs, which has helped a bit, but there is still a lot of competition within the United States.

No guarantee

Also, many people will post jobs and never follow through with hiring people. They aren’t required to hire an Upwork freelancer, so you can waste your connects (the currency required to apply to a job) by applying to a job that may never come to fruition.

Can be slow

Last, but not least, their website is a little bit slow. Reports regularly update as well as your messages and job feed, but loading times take longer than other websites for some reason.

So, to sum up the bad:

• Lots of competition
• Not guaranteed to get a job
• Slow website

The Ugly

Of course, there is some really bad stuff about Upwork. The biggest one is that Upwork takes 20% of a freelancer’s pay up until they reach $500 with a client. That means that if you aren’t having repeat clients and working with the same people, you’re always going to hand over that 20% to Upwork. This fee goes down to 10% once you hit $500 with one client, and then 5% after you hit $10,000.

Pay to apply

One thing that also made Upwork-lovers turn sour was that Upwork is now charging for connects. In general, a freelancer needs two “connects” to apply for a job on Upwork. You used to get 60 free connects a month, which meant you could apply to 30 jobs. If you wanted more connects, you could buy them. Now, you don’t get any free connects. You have to pay to apply for each job. It comes out to about $0.15 to apply for a job, which isn’t a ton, but when you factor in that 20% they take off of you, it does leave a little bit of a sour taste in your mouth.

So, basically, the worst things about Upwork are:

• They’re going to take 20% from you
• You have to pay to apply for jobs

Is it Worth it?

In the long run, I still think it is worth it to go on Upwork. You can meet great clients and build your skills, and I actually really like the rating system. Once you’ve worked on Upwork for a while, it builds a rapport that makes you stand out from the rest. With no shortage of jobs and the Upwork Payment Protection, I’ve been happy working on the platform.