{
  "$comment": [
    "Source of truth for the Developer Rate Index. The published page, the JSON",
    "endpoint and the CSV are all generated from this file — there is exactly one",
    "place a number lives, so the page can never disagree with the download.",
    "",
    "Every figure carries source_url, checked (the date that page was read) and",
    "confidence. Nothing enters this file that was not read on the named page.",
    "The rule is the point: the index is worth citing only because a reader can",
    "check any line without trusting us. See /post/how-we-verify-platform-pricing/.",
    "",
    "confidence:",
    "  primary   — read on the platform's own page, live or in a dated archive snapshot",
    "  secondary — only third-party confirmation; always presented as an estimate",
    "  absence   — the claim is that NO figure is published; verified by searching",
    "              the platform's own pages and recording what was searched for"
  ],
  "edition": "2026-07",
  "title": "Developer Hiring Platform Rate Index",
  "round": "July 2026",
  "published": "2026-07-27",
  "next_update": "2026-10",
  "cadence": "quarterly",
  "publisher": {
    "name": "Match.dev",
    "url": "https://www.match.dev/",
    "disclosure": "Match.dev is one of the nine platforms in this index and competes with the other eight. Its own figures are marked self-disclosed and are held to the same standard: published on its own site and checkable there. The method is built so the reader does not have to trust the publisher — only a platform's own pages count as primary evidence, conflicting claims are shown side by side rather than resolved, and figures that cannot be reproduced in a source are dropped, including flattering ones."
  },
  "methodology_url": "https://www.match.dev/post/how-we-verify-platform-pricing/",
  "license": {
    "name": "CC BY 4.0",
    "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/",
    "summary": "Free to reuse, including commercially, with attribution to Match.dev and a link to this page."
  },
  "platforms": [
    {
      "name": "Match.dev",
      "slug": "match-dev",
      "self": true,
      "publishes_rate": true,
      "rate_low": 50,
      "rate_high": 80,
      "rate_label": "$50–80/hr",
      "rate_scope": "senior engineers, client-facing",
      "pricing_model": "Published hourly rate",
      "fees": "No fee until you hire. $150 credit for attending the intro call. Free replacement if a hire does not work out.",
      "notes": "Every candidate clears a 10-hour paid assessment on real work before the client meets them. First candidates within 48 hours, no sales call.",
      "confidence": "primary",
      "source_url": "https://www.match.dev/",
      "checked": "2026-07-27"
    },
    {
      "name": "Lemon.io",
      "slug": "lemon-io",
      "publishes_rate": true,
      "rate_low": 55,
      "rate_high": 95,
      "rate_label": "$55–95/hr",
      "rate_scope": "client-facing",
      "pricing_model": "Published hourly rate",
      "fees": "Month-to-month, no long-term commitment. Direct-hire buyout for \"just a recruiting fee\" — amount not published.",
      "notes": "The only other platform in this index that puts a client rate on the page.",
      "confidence": "primary",
      "source_url": "https://lemon.io/startups/",
      "checked": "2026-07-14"
    },
    {
      "name": "Upwork",
      "slug": "upwork",
      "publishes_rate": true,
      "rate_low": 20,
      "rate_high": 150,
      "rate_label": "$20–150+/hr",
      "rate_scope": "freelancer-set; entry $20–40, intermediate $40–70, expert $70–150+",
      "pricing_model": "Open marketplace with a client fee",
      "fees": "Client fee 5% on Basic (3% for eligible US clients paying by checking account, up to 7.99% for some payment methods). Contract Initiation Fee $0.99–14.99 per contract. Business Plus raises the client fee to 10% (8% discounted) and bills Direct Contracts at $49/month per active contract.",
      "notes": "A marketplace, not a curated network: freelancers set rates and the client does the screening. Freelancers are also charged 0–15% per contract, which they price into their rate.",
      "confidence": "primary",
      "source_url": "https://www.upwork.com/pricing",
      "source_note": "Upwork returns HTTP 403 to non-browser fetchers; figures verified through dated Internet Archive snapshots of Upwork's own pages — pricing page 2026-06-23, cost guide 2026-05-07.",
      "checked": "2026-07-11"
    },
    {
      "name": "Toptal",
      "slug": "toptal",
      "publishes_rate": false,
      "rate_low": 60,
      "rate_high": 150,
      "rate_label": "not published (third-party estimates $60–150+/hr)",
      "rate_scope": "third-party estimate only",
      "pricing_model": "Flat subscription plus hourly",
      "fees": "Flat $79/month subscription, charged only if you proceed with matching, refundable on cancellation if Toptal cannot supply talent.",
      "notes": "The long-cited $500 refundable deposit no longer appears on Toptal's FAQ, homepage or developers page as of July 2026 — a full-text search for \"deposit\" and \"$500\" returned zero hits. Some third-party sites still quote it. Specialized talent is estimated by third parties at $200+/hr.",
      "confidence": "secondary",
      "confidence_note": "The $79/month subscription is primary (Toptal's own FAQ). The hourly range is third-party estimate only and must be cited as an estimate.",
      "source_url": "https://www.toptal.com/faq",
      "checked": "2026-07-11"
    },
    {
      "name": "Index.dev",
      "slug": "index-dev",
      "publishes_rate": false,
      "rate_low": 60,
      "rate_high": 90,
      "rate_label": "~$60–90/hr, in its own blog only",
      "rate_scope": "stated in a comparison blog post, never as a rate card",
      "pricing_model": "Quote after a call",
      "fees": "\"No upfront costs, pay only when you hire.\"",
      "notes": "Publishes a number inside its own comparison blog but has no rate card. Its acceptance-rate claims contradict each other across its own pages — see contradictions.",
      "confidence": "primary",
      "source_url": "https://index.dev/",
      "checked": "2026-07-14"
    },
    {
      "name": "Turing",
      "slug": "turing",
      "publishes_rate": false,
      "rate_label": "not published",
      "pricing_model": "Quote after a sales call",
      "fees": "Not published.",
      "notes": "turing.com/pricing returns HTTP 404, status-checked directly. Every path routes to sales. Third-party estimates span $30–200/hr — a spread wide enough that the only honest statement is \"quote-based, undisclosed\".",
      "confidence": "absence",
      "absence_check": "turing.com/pricing status-checked (404); homepage, /hire-developers, /services and /get-started read for a rate card.",
      "source_url": "https://www.turing.com/",
      "checked": "2026-07-11"
    },
    {
      "name": "Andela",
      "slug": "andela",
      "publishes_rate": false,
      "rate_label": "not published",
      "pricing_model": "Quote after a discovery call",
      "fees": "Set per statement of work.",
      "notes": "No rates shown; the site asks you to book a discovery call. Talent-profile cards show example developer pay, which is not client pricing and is not counted as such here.",
      "confidence": "absence",
      "absence_check": "Homepage, /why-andela, /ai-native-talent, /ai-engineers, sitemap.xml and the news archive read for a rate card; help centre blocked, search snippet only.",
      "source_url": "https://www.andela.com/",
      "checked": "2026-07-14"
    },
    {
      "name": "Arc.dev",
      "slug": "arc-dev",
      "publishes_rate": false,
      "rate_label": "not published",
      "pricing_model": "Quote after a call",
      "fees": "Not published.",
      "notes": "Markets the \"top 2% of talent\" but shows no rate card on its own site.",
      "confidence": "absence",
      "absence_check": "Homepage, /hire-developers and /w/codementorx read for a rate card.",
      "source_url": "https://arc.dev/",
      "checked": "2026-07-11"
    },
    {
      "name": "Gun.io",
      "slug": "gun-io",
      "publishes_rate": false,
      "rate_label": "no standard rates, by its own statement",
      "pricing_model": "Custom package per client",
      "fees": "All-in price shown upfront; developers set their own rates.",
      "notes": "Gun.io states plainly that it has no standard rates. A $75–175/hr range circulating in other comparison articles matches no source we could find — see refused figures.",
      "confidence": "primary",
      "source_url": "https://gun.io/faq/",
      "checked": "2026-07-11"
    }
  ],
  "contradictions": [
    {
      "platform": "Upwork",
      "claim": "Client fee",
      "readings": [
        "5% on the pricing page plan card (\"a $100 contract would cost $105\")",
        "7.99% in an alternate FAQ variant on the same page",
        "\"Up to 7.99%\" on Upwork's is-upwork-free page"
      ],
      "handling": "Both readings published: 3–5% typical, up to 7.99% for some payment methods."
    },
    {
      "platform": "Index.dev",
      "claim": "Acceptance rate",
      "readings": [
        "top 7% of applicants survive all five steps (its verification page)",
        "\"sub-3%\" (its blog)",
        "\"top 1%\" (its blog and homepage)"
      ],
      "handling": "All three are on index.dev and mutually inconsistent. The spread is reported; no single number is treated as reliable."
    },
    {
      "platform": "Index.dev",
      "claim": "Replacement terms",
      "readings": [
        "free replacement under a 30-day guarantee (product page)",
        "a replacement discount (its own comparison blog)"
      ],
      "handling": "Both readings noted."
    },
    {
      "platform": "Lemon.io",
      "claim": "Network size",
      "readings": [
        "1,500+ vetted developers (homepage)",
        "1,264 (startups page)"
      ],
      "handling": "Both figures are Lemon.io's own and are reported as such."
    }
  ],
  "refused": [
    {
      "figure": "Gun.io at $75–175/hr",
      "circulates_in": "other comparison articles",
      "reason": "Matches no source we could find, primary or secondary. Gun.io itself states it has no standard rates."
    },
    {
      "figure": "Index.dev acceptance rate of 1.2%",
      "circulates_in": "AI-generated summaries",
      "reason": "Appears in no page HTML on index.dev."
    },
    {
      "figure": "Turing at $30–200/hr",
      "circulates_in": "third-party estimates",
      "reason": "A spread that wide carries no information. The honest statement is \"quote-based, undisclosed\"."
    },
    {
      "figure": "Index.dev 97% trial-to-placement conversion",
      "circulates_in": "automated page summaries",
      "reason": "Could not be reproduced in the raw HTML. Treated as noise, not fact."
    }
  ],
  "findings": [
    "Two of nine platforms publish a client rate on their own site: Lemon.io at $55–95/hr and Match.dev at $50–80/hr. A third, Index.dev, states roughly $60–90/hr inside its own blog but has no rate card.",
    "Five of nine publish no client rate at all. Turing's pricing page returns a 404; Andela, Arc.dev and Gun.io route to a call; Toptal publishes a $79/month subscription but not developer rates.",
    "The headline rate is rarely the bill. Upwork adds a 3–7.99% client fee plus a $0.99–14.99 contract-initiation fee; Toptal adds $79/month; Lemon.io's direct-hire buyout fee is not published.",
    "Toptal's widely-cited $500 deposit is gone from its own pages as of July 2026, replaced by the $79/month subscription — yet third-party articles still quote it."
  ]
}