Market yourself as the AI slop fixer if you do. Will probabpy attract newly-enlightened clients that will bend over backwards for you to fix their mess.
this post was submitted on 12 Aug 2026
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no, that most probably won’t work.
Being a freelance software engineer myself for four years I can only advise against persuing a career as freelance developer at this point.
The market is fucked up, it’s nearly impossible to get new gigs and LLMs are a big part of the reason why. Also they give companies a weapon to negotiate lower rates. There’s a special place in hell for these people.
Unsolicited advise incoming: Do you have any relevant work experience or are you even an employee? Of so: Great! Hold on to your job to as long as possible or get one.
And join a union!
how to get a job? * no degree, only some projects, what would you recommend?
In my experience software employers don't really care about degrees. If you can code well that's all you really need. If you have no previous employers you might need some personal projects to demonstrate that skill though.
(At least that's how it was before AI. I have no idea now... By all accounts entry level is fucked.)
applying to jobs, learning in the meantime
I'm in a different field of engineering, but my first thought is that because of "AI" there's going to be/is a massive flood of "freelance developers" and it's going to be even harder than before to stick out of the no-diploma no-pro-experience (full remote?) crowd. Maybe freelancers here can give a better picture.
I’m a self-taught web developer and it took me ages to finally get my act together, but what finally landed me a professional position was having extensive examples of systems I created while working for non-development companies. So even though it was mainly fast food, warehouse and shipping work I was able to prove myself by saying things like “I developed an application that allowed me to dump CSV from Sage then process it to track orders normally tracked only on paper” and “I developed a system to manage food cost.”
Having conducted technical interviews after managers have screened the candidates' resumes, I second this. Businesses absolutely look at example works, precisely because it's what they care about: it doesn't take a leap of the imagination that if someone has churned out excellent work for hire, that they can do it again once hired on.
It's a bit harder for prospective employers to take someone at their word without works that they can point to, or can succinctly describe said works in sufficient detail.
Well, I have no previous work experience like that, but I have a friend that runs a house renovation business and one who runs a concrete finishing business. Both of them I think also have lots of good connections.
What I was thinking I could do is ask them if they need a website or anything or know somebody that does and do stuff either for free or for really cheap at first. Also, focus on making stuff that's better and more complicated (I mean, not just stuff like simple landing pages) than what an AI or cheap programmers from places like India or China could do.
than what an AI or cheap programmers from places like India or China could do.
People abroad making less money has more to do with the cost of living, different regulations and so on, not necessarily skill. I'm a mid developer with years of professional experience and my salary is shit for US standards, but it allows me to live okayish here, so that's why we put up with it. Immigrants also often face a precarious position (such as a visa status being tied to their work, or prosecution by the authorities, or not being part of a union in an otherwise unionized industry, etc), so them getting paid badly is, again, not always related to skill. I've met Arab doctors who are cab drivers in Europe.
Usually when people ask what I do I say I’m a web application developer rather than just web developer just to differentiate between what you’re saying (static sites, graphic design focused) and business applications.
Sadly freelance was hard even before AI let people make awful bullshit insecure websites. Its over now until AI gets properly expensive for what it costs to produce.
Or larger companies start to notice the large gaps in security affecting their bottom line due to reviews with large lines of code getting what's a rubber stamp at best.
I'm guessing this will take years though, companies tend to not care unless they lose large contracts and are happy to throw individual managers or directors under the bus to appease a client.
IMO the hardest part is finding clients who pay decent and regularly. This often has more to do with luck, connections, etc. than with portfolio. But I think a decent portfolio is a prerequisite.
Related: Supreme Clientele