{
 "schema_version": "1.0",
 "id": "upwork",
 "name": "Upwork",
 "research_status": "researched",
 "vendor_domain": "upwork.com",
 "category": "HR & People",
 "task": null,
 "summary": "Freelance marketplace where clients post jobs, hire and pay freelancers, with fees charged on payments instead of a flat plan price.",
 "best_for": "small businesses and teams that need to find and pay freelancers on a project basis and want one place for contracts and payments",
 "skip_if": "you want a fixed monthly price, you hire the same person long term and would rather pay them directly, or you need a plan comparison we could not verify",
 "honest_knock": "There is no flat plan price to compare: the cost is a percentage on every payment, charged to the client and separately to the freelancer. The Client Marketplace Fee is not refundable even if the payment is refunded, and the client pricing pages were not readable for us, so the paid-plan features are not verified.",
 "pricing": {
  "status": "see_details",
  "entry_price": null,
  "entry_price_terms": null,
  "from_price_usd_month": null,
  "plans": null,
  "plans_source": null,
  "notes": "(read 2026-10-23 on support.upwork.com help articles; the client pricing pages returned an access error, so there is no complete plan table) Upwork is a marketplace where clients hire freelancers, and it earns through fees on payments rather than a single subscription price. Its help article on the Client Marketplace Fee describes the Basic client plan as free and says payments made to freelancers carry a Client Marketplace Fee of up to 7.99%, which is not refundable even when the underlying payment is refunded. A Business Plus client pays a 10% fee on freelancer payments, and eligible US Business Plus clients may qualify for a reduced 8% fee when paying from a checking account. Freelancers pay a separate service fee of 0% to 15% per contract, fixed once the contract begins, and Upwork returns the freelancer service fee on any amount that is refunded. Freelancers bid with Connects, which cost $0.15 (USD) each. Enterprise pricing and the Connects allowances per membership are not published in the pages we read. Client and freelancer fees are separate and should not be added into one price.",
  "verified_at": "2026-10-23",
  "source_url": "https://www.upwork.com/pricing/",
  "schema_offer": null,
  "source_quotes": [
   {
    "field": "refund",
    "plan": null,
    "quote": "This fee is not refundable",
    "source_url": "https://support.upwork.com/hc/en-us/articles/4660220468499-What-is-the-Client-Marketplace-Fee",
    "read_on": "2026-10-23"
   }
  ],
  "recent_change": null,
  "price_history": null
 },
 "free_plan": false,
 "free_plan_evidence": null,
 "cost_traps": [
  {
   "id": "per_seat",
   "label": "Per-seat pricing",
   "evidence": "Enterprise pricing and the Connects allowances per membership are not published in the pages we read.",
   "verified_at": "2026-10-23",
   "source_url": "https://www.upwork.com/pricing/"
  }
 ],
 "compare_with": {
  "name": "Fiverr",
  "why": "Fiverr is not yet in our directory as a reviewed tool, so we have no comparison of the two. Check both fee pages against the size of the contracts you plan to place"
 },
 "links": {
  "record": "https://aibuildermarketplace.com/api/v1/products/upwork.json",
  "review": "https://officesoftwaremarketplace.com/upwork-review.html",
  "marketplace": null,
  "vendor_site": "https://upwork.com"
 },
 "purchase": {
  "seller": "the vendor",
  "how": "AIBuilder Marketplace does not sell this software. Sign up, start a trial or buy on the vendor's site.",
  "handoff_url": "https://partners.upwork.com/5z1kpvu2bqw0",
  "affiliate": true,
  "disclosure": "Where purchase.affiliate is true, purchase.handoff_url is an affiliate link: AIBuilder Marketplace may earn a commission at no extra cost to the buyer. Commission never changes what a record says, and products are not ranked by commission. Where it is false the link is the vendor's plain site."
 },
 "provenance": {
  "research": "hand-researched dossier, read on the vendor's own pages",
  "researched_since": "2026-07",
  "method": "https://aibuildermarketplace.com/how-we-review/",
  "license": "CC BY 4.0. Credit 'AIBuilder Marketplace' with a link to https://aibuildermarketplace.com/atlas/.",
  "note": "A rebuild is not a new measurement: pricing.verified_at is the date that matters."
 },
 "cost": {
  "status": "not_yet",
  "engine": "https://aibuildermarketplace.com/agents/#cost",
  "rules": null,
  "growth": null
 },
 "unknowns": [
  "Pricing status is 'see_details': no single public entry price.",
  "Plan-by-plan prices are not structured in this record yet; pricing.notes has the full text.",
  "Contract terms (cancellation, data export, data location, minimum seats) are not researched as separate fields; pricing.notes mentions them only where the vendor's pricing page does.",
  "Being verified: free trial terms are not yet matched to a verbatim line on the vendor's own pages. Not matched does not mean there is none.",
  "No computable price rules yet: cost at a given team size cannot be calculated for this product.",
  "Not tested hands-on by us: what the product does comes from the vendor's pages and our reading of them."
 ],
 "verification": {
  "price": "read",
  "free_trial": "being_verified",
  "refund": "quoted"
 },
 "status_page": null,
 "task_evidence": null,
 "open_questions": [
  {
   "question_id": "upwork:cancellation_terms",
   "key": "cancellation_terms",
   "question": "Can a customer cancel at any time, and what happens to an annual plan that is cancelled mid-term?",
   "status": "open"
  },
  {
   "question_id": "upwork:data_export",
   "key": "data_export",
   "question": "Which data can a customer export, in which formats, on which plans?",
   "status": "open"
  },
  {
   "question_id": "upwork:data_location",
   "key": "data_location",
   "question": "Where is customer data stored, and can a customer choose the region?",
   "status": "open"
  },
  {
   "question_id": "upwork:minimum_seats",
   "key": "minimum_seats",
   "question": "Is there a minimum number of seats or users on any plan?",
   "status": "open"
  }
 ],
 "vendor_answers": [],
 "agent_channels": {
  "vendor_mcp": null,
  "agent_checkout": {
   "status": "not_checked",
   "detail": "We could not read the vendor's pages as plain HTML.",
   "checked_at": "2026-10-07",
   "method": "homepage, /pricing and the pricing page we cite, read as plain HTML (no JavaScript) and searched for explicit support of purchases by AI agents: Agentic Commerce Protocol, Instant Checkout, Agent Payments Protocol, buy in ChatGPT, agentic checkout"
  }
 }
}