.png)
.png)
.png)
.png)
.png)
Toptal Fee Calculator
See your freelance take-home earnings on Toptal instantly using this pricing calculator.
How to use the Toptal Fee Calculator
Upwork’s Toptal Fee Calculator can help you calculate exactly how much you’ll take home from every Toptal project. If you plan to work full-time on Toptal, enter 40 hours into the calculator to see your weekly pay. You can also estimate your full-time annual salary by entering 2,080 hours (assuming you work 52 weeks a year). Make sure that your freelance rate and hours worked are high enough to cover the cost of living in your area and your monthly expenses.
Toptal doesn’t charge freelancer service fees. This means that, unless your rate or hours billed changes, you’ll take home the number you see here.
However, Toptal charges clients a fee on top of your hourly rate. This fee is never disclosed to you, as the freelancer. If Toptal decides to increase this fee, your average salary and hourly rate won’t necessarily increase. And if clients feel the fees are too expensive, the number of jobs available to you could dry up.
%20(1).png)
Browse retention rate and other marketing service opportunities.
.svg)
Compare Upwork and Toptal
Here’s how Upwork stands out when it comes to control, visibility, and earning opportunities.
Frequently asked questions
Toptal doesn’t publicize the fees they charge clients, but Reddit users who shared their experiences indicated that fees may range from 1.5–3.5 times more than your base hourly (take-home) rate.
You have the freedom to set your own rate on Toptal, and you can choose to work on a full-time (40 hours per week), part-time (20 hours per week), or hourly basis. Toptal doesn’t give you the option to work on fixed-price projects. For that, you’ll need to use a platform like Upwork.
On Upwork, we enable you to earn money in several ways depending on what suits you best: hourly, fixed-price, or weekly retainer payments. You can even build scheduled rate increases into your client contracts.
If you pass Toptal’s screening process, you can browse available job posts, review project requirements, and submit applications. You may also be matched with a client by a Toptal recruiter involved in the hiring process. Other freelancing platforms, including Upwork, give you more options to find clients.
On Upwork, you can find work with top-tier clients in multiple ways, including:
- Browse jobs and submit proposals (for yourself or as part of an agency with team members)
- Book paid consultations
- Indicate your immediate availability for work
- Boost your profile
- Bid to send your proposals to the top of a client’s inbox
- Respond to invitations from Upwork Talent Specialists
Most Toptal freelancers have at least two years of experience—and all of them work in one of the six skill sets supported by Toptal:
- Development: software, back-end, and front-end developers
- Design: illustrators, animators, and web designers
- Management consulting: business strategists and M&A consultants
- Project management: finance, healthcare, and e-commerce project managers
- Product management: digital product management
- Marketing: digital marketers, content writers, and social media marketers
If you’re a junior freelancer or work in a different industry, you might not be able to use Toptal.
Upwork is open to skilled professionals in a wider range of industries—with any amount of experience. There are human resources consultants, web developers, machine learning engineers, teachers, nurses, bookkeepers, and more working on Upwork every day.
Yes, there are some AI jobs available to specific tech talent on Toptal. Toptal doesn’t offer its own user-facing AI to customers, though, so you’ll need to use an external tool approved by your client. On Upwork, you can apply to a range of AI jobs or talk to your client about the ways that AI can enhance your work together. We even have AI tools built right into our platform—Uma™, Upwork’s Mindful AI, helps with everything from writing a proposal to brainstorming a new project idea.
Upwork is not affiliated with and does not sponsor or endorse any of the third-party tools or services discussed in this article. These tools and services are provided only as potential options, and each reader and company should take the time needed to adequately analyze and determine the tools or services that would best fit their specific needs and situation.