Whichever way clients buy — by the hour or by the project — the price of good freelance work has climbed every quarter but one since mid-2023.
Up 42% across three years — $52 in Q3 '23 to $74 in Q2 '26, with the steepest climb after Q4 '24.
Web and app development remains the biggest bucket of postings, but AI & automation — barely a category three years ago — now sits at number two and is the only one still accelerating.
One-off projects still lead, but ongoing retainers are now more than a quarter of all postings — clients increasingly want a freelancer on call, not a one-time fix.
Postings mentioning AI, automation, or LLMs grew from 2,030 to 6,910 year over year — the fastest-growing slice of the dataset.
The overall median posted rate — up 42% in three years. AI & automation specialists post a full $19/hr above it.
Location requirements keep fading: 61% of postings now say remote-first or fully remote, up from 44% in 2023.