Comparison
Freelancer, agency, or studio?
Three ways to get software built, with genuinely different trade-offs. This page is written by one of the three, so read the 'pick a freelancer when' section first — that's the part with something to lose.
The short answer
A freelancer is cheapest and fastest for one well-defined job. A large agency is right when you need procurement, scale and someone to sue. A small studio sits between: several disciplines under one contract, without the account-management layer.
Side by side
Where each one actually wins.
| Factor | a freelancer or a big agency | Us |
|---|---|---|
| Typical cost | Freelancer: lowest. Agency: 2–5× a studio. | Between the two, and published. |
| Who does the work | Freelancer: them. Agency: often a junior you never meet. | ✓The specialists the job needs, with a named lead. |
| Range of skills | Freelancer: one discipline, deeply. Agency: everything, at a price. | ✓Engineering, design, SEO and AI under one contract. |
| If they get ill | Freelancer: the project stops. | ✓Someone else picks it up. |
| Speed to start | ✓Freelancer: often tomorrow. | Days, sometimes a couple of weeks. |
| Cost of a tiny job | ✓Freelancer: hard to beat. | Our floor is higher — a two-hour fix isn't worth our overhead. |
| Process and paper trail | Freelancer: varies wildly. Agency: heavy. | ✓Written scope, fixed price, staging URL in week one. |
| Who owns the result | Agency: sometimes licensed back to you. | ✓You do — repo, domain, keys, accounts. |
| Procurement and compliance | ✓Agency: built for it. | We're small. A 40-page vendor questionnaire is not our strength. |
When you should NOT pick us
Written plainly, because the alternative is you finding out three weeks in.
- You have one small, well-defined job — a landing page tweak, a plugin fix, a single design.
- Your budget is genuinely under a thousand dollars. A good freelancer will serve you better than we can at that number.
- You already know exactly what you want built and just need hands.
- You need a vendor who can pass enterprise procurement, carry large insurance and field an account team — that's a big agency, and we won't pretend otherwise.
- The work is deep in a single specialism we don't staff.
We've turned work away for every reason in the left-hand list. It costs us a project and saves both of us a bad one, which has consistently been the better trade.
When we're the right call
- The project needs more than one discipline — building it AND getting it found AND keeping it alive.
- You want a fixed price in writing rather than an hourly meter.
- You've been burned by a freelancer who went quiet, and continuity matters now.
- You want to talk to the person who owns your build, not an account manager relaying messages.
- You want everything transferred to you at the end, with no lock-in.
If you pick us
What it would actually cost.
Public starting prices, so you can compare like for like rather than waiting on a quote.
from $279
Business website
A multi-page site for a real business — what you do, who you are, how to reach you — that looks like this decade.
2–4 weeks
from $1,199
Web app / SaaS platform
A real product with accounts, permissions, payments and an admin panel — built to be run, not just demoed.
6–12 weeks
from $29/mo
Website care plan
Updates, backups, security patches and monitoring — so your site never quietly rots while you're busy.
Monthly · cancel any time
01
14-day money back
02
Fixed price, in writing
03
You own all of it
04
No lock-in on monthly plans
Still weighing it up
Tell us what you're deciding between.
Describe the project and we'll tell you honestly which of the options above fits — including when the answer is one that doesn't involve paying us.
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