Ask HN: Freelancer? Seeking freelancer? (April 2025)

Hacker News Discussion ↗

Overview

  • Thread is a monthly marketplace-style post where most participants are SEEKING WORK and a smaller number are SEEKING FREELANCERS.
  • Content is almost entirely self-introductions and capability statements rather than discussion or debate. Tone is promotional and optimistic, with no visible skepticism or disagreement.

Common Roles and Skill Sets

  • Heavy concentration of full‑stack web engineers: JavaScript/TypeScript, React, Next.js, Vue, Svelte, Node.js, Python (Django/FastAPI), Ruby on Rails, Go, Clojure, Elixir/Phoenix, Java, .NET.
  • Many mobile and desktop specialists: iOS/Swift/SwiftUI, Android/Kotlin, Flutter, React Native, cross‑platform apps, macOS and Windows.
  • Strong presence of DevOps / SRE / Platform engineers: AWS, Azure, GCP, Kubernetes, Terraform/Ansible, Nix/NixOS, CI/CD, observability stacks.
  • Multiple data/ML/AI/LLM engineers: RAG, LLM agents, computer vision, NLP, data engineering, vector search, financial and scientific computing.
  • Several UX/UI and product designers, including “designer who codes” profiles bridging Figma/Framer/Webflow with HTML/CSS/JS and modern frontends.
  • Additional specialists: video/audio streaming, robotics and autonomous systems, mechanical/CAD and manufacturing, QA automation, technical writing/copywriting, marketing/demand gen.

Domains and Niches

  • Frequently cited domains: FinTech, healthcare, e‑commerce, SaaS, web3/crypto, education, social/environmental impact, and document processing (PDF/OCR/LLM).
  • Some engineers emphasize deep experience in high‑scale systems, trading/exchanges, or regulatory contexts (healthcare, finance).

Engagement Models and Rates

  • Mix of freelance, contract, fractional, and retainer work; some open to full‑time remote roles.
  • Several explicitly offer fixed‑price, milestone‑based engagements; others monthly retainers or part‑time (e.g., 10–20 hours/week).
  • A few list concrete rates (e.g., ~$27–45/hr for dev shops, ~$40/hr for design, ~$150/hr for senior AWS consulting).

Remote Work & Geography

  • Contributors span North America, Europe, Africa, South America, and Asia; remote‑only or remote‑first is the norm.
  • Some are willing to relocate or travel; others explicitly prefer to remain in their region while covering US/EU time zones.

Hiring Posts (SEEKING FREELANCER)

  • A reptile‑pet marketplace seeks a hybrid designer + front‑end engineer to unify UX and CSS/React implementation.
  • An LLM‑tooling startup looks for a staff‑level front‑end/design engineer (TypeScript/React, open‑source focused).
  • A web3 developer‑tools company and an e‑commerce group advertise senior Ruby on Rails and related positions.