Upwork is a great platform for freelancers. Fiverr is the best when it comes to freelancing. Upwork offers more features and flexibility to freelancers. It is very easy to sell gigs on Fiverr and make money.
Arguments like this never get old. You must have heard them over and over again. Maybe even a cliché now.
These arguments bore people because they lack facts and because most arise due to personal sentiments.
People often forget to ask how Fiverr is different from Upwork, which should be the real deal.
Knowing how Fiverr is different from Upwork will expose you to critical facts to make informed decisions.
Perhaps knowing how Fiverr is different from Upwork will remove personal sentiments and emotions from decisions and arguments.
Different things work for different people.
Maybe Upwork has been very good to you in your freelancing career, and you deem it the best freelancing platform.
Or Fiverr must have allowed you to earn money by selling gigs faster.
Like it or not, Upwork and Fiverr have dominated the world of freelancing. Some people won’t even consider you a freelancer if you are neither on Upwork nor Fiverr.
While these two platforms share many things, they exhibit differences in their key functionalities and purpose.
This you will come to know by the end of this piece.
Are Fiverr and Upwork the same company?
The two platforms are very similar in that they connect clients to freelancers, but they are separate companies.
While Fiverr is headquartered in Tel Aviv, Israel, Upwork operates in the United States from San Francisco, California.
How is Fiverr different from Upwork?
Both platforms look similar in operation and pricing, but the key differences are apparent when carefully analyzed.
To answer the question of how is Fiverr different from Upwork and to better understand their key functionalities and other modes of operation, these differences will be discussed under the following subheadings
- Purpose
- Duration
- Verification standards
- Freelancer profile
- Pricing
- Dispute resolution
Purpose
While Upwork encourages building long-term working relationships between clients and freelancers with its long-term projects, Fiverr is mainly geared towards one-off assignments called gigs.
Upwork is designed so that you are encouraged to have clients you’ve worked for in the past to keep coming back.
However, Upwork charges less for repeat clients than for new clients.
On Fiverr, the case is entirely different. Sellers create what is known as gigs. These are forms of advertisements for services offered very each seller.
For example, when a client sees a gig and orders for it, the sellers create it and deliver it, which is a one-off project.
Although both platforms can be used interchangeably in terms of purpose, the main emphasis on Upwork is to build long-term relationships with your clients, while Fiverr is for one-off projects.
Duration
Since Upwork encourages building long-term relationships between clients and freelancers, long-term projects would be best for achieving this goal.
Long-duration projects would help clients and freelancers get familiar with one another, and they also know individual working modalities.
Fiverr is mostly for short-term jobs or hiring. You want to get something done as quickly as possible.
No need to build relationships between sellers and buyers. This is what Fiverr aims to achieve.
Verification Standards
When it comes to Fiverr, it doesn’t do much verification except for its Pro Sellers. Pro sellers are the freelancers with “pro verified” on their gig.
Fiverr gives the easy way to run a freelancing business without going through the stuff of verification.
If, on the other hand, you are a non-pro seller, you can always rely on community transfer and buyers review to verify the capability of the freelancer.
Upwork is excellent when it comes to verification. From the very start, you must apply to the platform, which can either be rejected or accepted.
If it gets accepted, there comes the other hustle, such as taking the necessary steps of completing the profile and filling out further essential details to make the profile as complete as possible.
Upwork also allows Top-rated Status.
The Top-rated freelancers have a job success score of 90% and monthly earnings of $1000, indicated by a blue-shield icon having a crown on it.
The tough side of this Upwork tedious verification process is that some freelancers are never given the opportunity to be on the platform due to one or two verification problems.
Others don’t even bother to sign up to save themselves the stress of going through a complicated process.
Fake and embellished profiles are still found everywhere despite all these quality assurances.
Freelancer Profile
The main aspects of profiles on both platforms include user reviews, ratings, languages, list of applicable skills and certifications. What differs is how they are presented.
Fiverr’s profile talks more about the gigs.
The gigs play a central role such that everything about the profile information is geared towards making the right decision when buying a gig.
The gigs are designed to show all a freelancer does, and clicking on a particular gig reveals further information about the freelancer’s past work.
Gigs play a significant role in freelancer profiles, and it is highly encouraged to design a portfolio and make it visually appealing to the eye as much as possible.
This will attract buyers, resulting in more money in your pocket as a freelancer.
Upwork profile depicts that of LinkedIn, a classic resume where the emphasis is laid more on how much you’ve earned as a freelancer, how many hours you’ve worked, your education and work history, and other vital statistical data such as job success score.
If you are a buyer looking for a freelancer to write your blog post, you must scroll down the page to get a feel of the writing style.
Pricing
Most clients choose Fiverr as their preferred platform because it is pretty cheap. Gigs can be bought for as low as $5.
Depending on the seller, most gigs offered at this price are as good or even better than those of higher prices.
Therefore, you are most likely to get the value of what you paid for.
You can be lucky to get low prices on Upwork, but this mostly comes from new freelancers hungry to get reviews for scaling up their profiles.
Either way, the prices are high. Work is mainly billed hourly, which can result in a considerable amount when calculated though there are also fixed-price projects.
To enhance the long-term relationship between clients and freelancers, the Upwork project duration often goes as far as 6 months, which can cause unnecessary delay.
Fiverr has a balanced distribution of prices between buyers and sellers.
For example, a $2 fee is paid for all purchases up to $40, after which the price goes to 5%.
As a buyer, when you buy a gig of $5, you pay $7, and the extra $2 is the processing fee.
On Upwork, things get a little bit different. For example, a client pays only a 3% payment processing fee, which means for the same $5 service, the client pays $0.15, and 20% is deducted from the freelancer’s take home.
This is why most people think freelancers are punished on Upwork, because of this uneven distribution of fees between clients and freelancers.
To accommodate this Upwork 20% fee, freelancers will have to charge higher than expected, which leads to an increase in the price of services.
Both platforms offer security to buyers and clients by ensuring they only release money deposited when the job is complete.
This way, buyers and clients get the value of what they paid for
Dispute Resolution
Both platforms offer dispute resolution mechanisms in situations that warrant it. For example, suppose a buyer or client is dissatisfied with the quality of work a freelancer delivers.
In that case, you can report them to the dispute resolution section, which is a section of the site dedicated to communicating and resolving disputes.
If it is on Fiverr, you either get refunded fully or partially after careful examination of the case by the Fiverr team.
On Upwork, a recommendation is going to be made by a dispute specialist.
However, if you choose to reject the offer, then legal arbiters would be involved, which cost roughly around $800
This is highly not encouraged except when you have lots of money to spare, about $300
Careful examination of both Fiverr and Upwork shows that they differ in what they aim to achieve over time, the time taken for jobs to be completed, how freelancer profiles are presented, the pricing, verification standards, and the way disputes are resolved.
While Fiverr emphasizes one-off projects with the purchase of gigs, Upwork is geared towards building long-term relationships between clients and freelancers.
To enhance a client-freelancer relationship, the duration of projects on Upwork is longer than compared to Fiverr, which mostly takes a few days to deliver a gig.
Upwork presents a freelancer’s profile emphasizing work history, the amount earned, and educational background.
Summary
In contrast, a freelancer profile on Fiverr is directly related to how the gigs are designed and presented.
Freelancer’s verification on Fiverr is less tedious. The pricing is distributed between the buyers and sellers and gives room for refunds in cases of unsatisfied jobs.
A freelancer can be rejected on Upwork, which is part of its verification process.
Instead, the pricing punishes freelancers with a vast 20% deduction. It also offers dispute resolution mechanisms.
It would be good to conclude by saying.
At the same time, Upwork has its advantages in certain situations, especially when a freelancer is looking to build trust and lasting relationships with clients.
Fiverr tops it overall with cheap pricing and easy verification and is recommended as a platform that new freelancers should try out before heading to Upwork.
Don’t forget to drop your comments below and stay tuned for our next money-making piece.
