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Compared Upwork and Toptal for 6 months each and the difference was brutal
I spent 6 months on Upwork chasing $20-$30 gigs (lots of ghosting, you know the drill) then switched to Toptal for my senior developer work and landed a $75/hour contract within 3 weeks. The stricter vetting on Toptal really filters out the time-wasters and lowballers, but the application process took forever. Has anyone else tried both and found one way better for long-term projects?
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abbyhall13d ago
Three weeks to land a gig sounds nice but that Toptal vetting process is a real pain. I went through it a couple years ago and it took nearly two months with all those tech screens and test projects. Not everyone has that kind of time to waste just to MAYBE get approved. And $75/hour is decent but you can find similar rates on other platforms without jumping through so many hoops.
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the_lucas13d ago
Tbh the $75/hour is solid but I feel like a lot of people miss the real tradeoff with Toptal. The vetting is brutal, yeah, but it weeds out exactly the kind of clients who ghost you on Upwork for a $20 gig. I did the same thing as you and eventually realized that the time you spend chasing random lowball projects on Upwork adds up way more than a two month application process. Once you're in, you're basically done looking for consistent work. I'd always pick the slower entry if it means fewer headaches down the road.
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laura_wilson13d ago
Honestly, a buddy of mine tried Toptal last year and he said the vetting took so long he almost gave up twice. But then he got a consistent $80/hour gig that's been going for like 8 months now, so I guess it paid off for him in the end.
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