How Much Should You Charge as a Freelancer?

Start from what you want to keep, then work backwards

The most common pricing mistake is starting from a rate that sounds reasonable and hoping it adds up. Do the opposite. Decide the take-home income you want for the year, then work backwards through tax, business costs, and the hours you can actually bill to find the rate that delivers it.

This flips pricing from a guess into arithmetic. The rate stops being a number you defend nervously and becomes the obvious output of your real targets.

Count only the hours you can bill

A full-time employee is paid for roughly 2,080 hours a year. A freelancer cannot bill all of them. Marketing, proposals, admin, invoicing, learning, and the gaps between projects are all unpaid. Realistically you bill 50–70% of your working hours once you are established, and less when you are starting out.

If you price as if every working hour is billable, you will quietly run at a loss. Subtract holiday and sick weeks first, then apply a billable percentage to what remains.

Add the costs an employer used to hide

Employment bundles a lot of invisible value: payroll taxes, paid leave, equipment, software, insurance, and a pension. As a freelancer you fund all of it from your rate. List your annual business expenses and add a tax margin on your profit so your take-home target survives after the bill arrives.

Move from cost-plus to value pricing

The rate you calculate is a floor — the minimum that keeps you sustainable. It is not a ceiling. Once you know your floor, price the outcome you deliver, not the hours you spend. A project that earns the client €50,000 is not worth less because you are fast.

Use the floor to walk away from work that pays below it, and use value to price above it whenever the result justifies it.