Competition and Hire Rates

Welcome to the third and final part of the Freelance Market Analysis series by Volna, where we break down the trends behind Upwork data. This time, we’re focusing on competition — how many applications the average project receives, which specialties have the highest hire rates, and where clients are putting in the most effort to attract top freelancers.

Key Insights

• Design and Engineering became less competitive as service categories heated up.
• Response rates rose to 15% across the board, up from 11% in 2023.
• Translation projects saw a surprising spike in entry-level responses, with nearly 1 in 3 applicants interviewed.
• More clients are actively reaching out to freelancers — the share of projects with no invites fell from 64% to 60%.
• Unanswered invites surged across categories, but Development remains the most responsive.
• Data Science has the highest hire rate for juniors — half of such projects end with a successful hire.

Competition Up 20% in Customer Service, Down 9% in Design

The average number of applications per project on Upwork continues to decline, but at a slower pace. In 2025, it dropped by 7% compared to 2024, whereas the decline last year was 14%.

Legal remains the least competitive category by far, despite a slight increase in applications compared to the previous year. On average, projects in Legal receive 2.5 times fewer applications than those in Admin Support or Customer Service, which sit at the opposite end of the spectrum.

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The most dramatic increases came in Customer Service (+21%) and Admin Support (+18%), where application volume returned to — or even exceeded — 2023 levels. This rebound likely reflects more freelancers competing for a shrinking pool of service-based projects. Competition in IT & Networking also rose 9%.

Meanwhile, competition eased in Design & Creative and Engineering & Architecture, with both categories seeing a 9–10% drop in average applications. Other fields like Writing and Web Development saw small increases overall but remained relatively stable throughout the first half of the year, before starting to decline in the autumn.

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* While the exact number of applications is proprietary information to Upwork, our data reveals clear trends in freelancer engagement. For this analysis, we focused solely on filled projects — those where a freelancer was hired — to get a more accurate picture of application patterns.*

Legal and Translation Get the Highest Response Rates

In 2025, the average response rate across all categories hovered around 15%, with slightly higher engagement for expert-level applicants (16.1%) than for entry (15.2%) or intermediate (14.8%). Client responsiveness appears to be rising: the average response rate was about 11% in 2023 and 12% in 2024.

Legal stands out with the highest overall response rate (22%), and strong performance across all experience levels, reaching 23.6% for experts. This reflects the category’s low competition and high intent from clients, many of whom handpick freelancers.

Translation shows a curious pattern: while its overall response rate is also higher than average (17%), it’s heavily skewed toward entry-level applicants — nearly a third of them receive an interview.

Design & Creative and Sales & Marketing also perform well overall, both hovering around 17–19%, with relatively consistent response across experience levels.

Meanwhile, categories like Data Science, Admin Support, and Web Development sit at or below average, especially for entry and intermediate freelancers. Despite being in-demand, these fields may attract more saturated applicant pools, lowering the odds of getting a reply.

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More Projects Come with Invites — Especially in Legal and Translation

When publishing a project, clients on Upwork can proactively invite freelancers to apply. The share of projects with no invites dropped from 64% to 60% in 2025, suggesting that more clients are proactively reaching out to freelancers rather than waiting for applicants.

Inviting more than 30 freelancers requires a premium project subscription, which is used in just under 1.5% of projects (down from 2% last year).

Legal remains the most selective category: 45% of projects included free invites this year— the highest share across all fields. One of the more surprising shifts happened in Translation, which saw a 7% share of paid invites — the highest of any category this year, and more than double last year’s 3%.

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The average number of invites sent per project rose in 2025, reaching just over 11, up from 10 in 2024 and 9 in 2023. But this growth wasn’t uniform across categories — and some shifts are striking.

Translation took the lead in 2025, with an average of 25 invites per project, up from 15 last year — a 69% increase. This surge is especially notable given the overall shrinkage in translation project volume, suggesting clients are casting a wider net to find qualified freelancers in a tight market.

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Once a freelancer receives an invite, they can either accept and apply for the project or ignore it. In 2025, about 24% of invites went unanswered, quite a jump from last year’s 18%.

The most dramatic increase came from Admin Support, where the rate nearly doubled from 24% in 2024 to 44% — the highest growth rate of any category this year. Translation followed with a steep rise to 50%, meaning every second invite in this field goes unanswered.

Development remains the most responsive category, with just 12.5% of invites going unanswered — nearly unchanged from previous years.

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High Hire Rates Shift from Expert Roles to Entry-Level Creative Work

In 2025, the share of projects that ended with a successful hire (among those that closed) remained strong across categories, with an average rate of 38% — the same as last year.

Translation continues to lead the pack, with hire rates above 50% across all experience levels, peaking at 51% for intermediate roles. Writing and Design & Creative also saw high success rates, averaging around 42–45% across tiers. Meanwhile, Data Science & Analytics still boasts the highest entry-level hire rate overall (49%).

At the lower end, Customer Service, Sales & Marketing, and Legal continued to struggle with hire conversion. Across all levels, these categories had below-average hire rates, typically under 31%. This may point to either a mismatch between freelancer profiles and project needs — or simply a slower decision-making process on the client side.

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In 2025, we saw a more active — but more fragmented — competitive landscape. Clients are sending more invites, responding to more freelancers, and posting more selectively — but their expectations have risen too. To stand out, freelancers need to respond quickly, fine-tune their niche, and target projects where both interest and intent are high.