Full Scale named to the Inc. 5000 for the 5th time
For teams hiring developers, not freelancers looking for work. If you're comparing Upwork alternatives or Toptal alternatives because you need engineers who stay on your team, Full Scale employs senior developers full-time and places each one with a single client company. From $35 an hour fully loaded, with a shortlist in 1 business day.
“It's a fully integrated team. It's just some of the people happen to be living in the Philippines.”
A 30-minute call to map the roles, the stack and a realistic start date. If a marketplace suits your project better, you'll hear that on the call.
Looking to work with Full Scale as an engineer? Careers are at fullscale.ph.
Named a Top Staff Augmentation Company globally, in the Philippines, and in Kansas. Rated 5.0 across 18 verified client reviews.
Headquartered in Overland Park, Kansas · Delivery center in Cebu, Philippines
“Their employees are like an extension of our full-time employees.”
“Full Scale does a really great job of finding good-quality engineers fairly quickly.”
“They've found real people who want to participate in the growth of our company actively.”
Search for alternatives to Upwork and you'll find long lists of Upwork competitors and sites like Upwork for developers, a dozen brand names lined up side by side. Those lists hide the real decision, because the brands sell three different things. This page is for companies hiring developers, so it sorts them by model. Pick the model first and your shortlist gets short.
Freelance marketplaces (Upwork, Fiverr). You post a task or browse profiles, receive proposals, and pay per job or per hour. The platform connects you with self-employed people and handles the payments. The model is built for defined work with an end: a landing page, a data migration, a bug that needs a second pair of eyes.
Vetted talent networks (Toptal, Turing, Andela). You describe the role, and the network matches you with independent contractors from a pool it has screened. You skip sorting proposals yourself. The person who does the work is typically a contractor engaged through the network rather than its employee.
Dedicated-team staff augmentation (Full Scale). We employ the engineers full-time and place each one with one client, where they work inside your team for the long haul: your standups, your repo, your sprint. The industry name for this is staff augmentation. It's an alternative to freelancers, not another place to find them.
So the useful answer to "what's the best freelance marketplace alternative?" is a question back: do you need a task finished, or a team member who'll still be here next year? When teams weigh dedicated developers vs freelancers, that continuity usually decides it, more than the hourly rate does.
How each model works, not how good anyone is. Where the answer depends on the platform, we say so and point you to their own site.
| Comparison criteria | Freelance marketplaces (Upwork, Fiverr) | Talent networks (Toptal, Turing, Andela) | Full Scale |
|---|---|---|---|
| Engagement model | Post a job or browse profiles, receive proposals, hire per task or per hour. | Describe the role; the network proposes contractors from its screened pool. | Interview a shortlist from our bench; hire engineers who work full-time on your team. |
| Who employs the engineer | The freelancer is self-employed. | Usually an independent contractor. See each network's terms. | Full Scale. Every engineer is our full-time employee in Cebu, Philippines. |
| Typical engagement length | Usually a task or a project, then the contract ends. | Varies by platform, see their site. | Ongoing. No long-term contract; scale down with 30 days' notice. |
| Time-zone overlap | Depends on where each freelancer lives and works. | Depends on each contractor's location and hours. | Three to four hours of daily overlap with US teams as standard. |
| Continuity when someone leaves | You start again from new proposals. | Varies by platform, see their site. | Engineers are our employees, dedicated to your team. Retention is 93%. |
| How candidates are screened | Varies by platform, see their site. | Varies by platform, see their site. | We recruit and assess engineers before they join our bench. You interview the shortlist and make the final call. |
| Who manages day to day | You do. | You do. | You do, like any team member. We handle employment, payroll, HR and equipment. |
| Pricing model | Each freelancer sets a rate; platform fees apply. See their pricing page. | Set by the network. See their pricing page. | From $35/hr fully loaded, with no recruiting fee. |
| Trial / guarantee | Varies by platform, see their terms. | Varies by platform, see their terms. | Two-week money-back guarantee. |
Most Toptal competitors sell the same basic thing Toptal does: a screened network of independent engineers you bring in for a role. So when you compare Toptal alternatives, it helps to know which of two things you're trying to change. If it's the network, you're choosing between similar models with different pools and price points, and our comparison of Toptal alternatives covers that ground.
If it's the model itself, the question changes. A contractor from a network works with you for as long as both sides want to continue, and what they take on next is their decision. That's a fair arrangement, and plenty of teams build that way.
Full Scale is the other model. Our engineers are full-time employees placed with one client, so the people you onboard are the people in your standup a year from now. Our 93% retention rate is why that's the normal case. You're not swapping one network for another. You're choosing employment over contracting, with no long-term contract on your side and 30 days' notice if your plans change.
How teams hire developers without Upwork or a talent network: four steps, and no proposals to read.
A 30-minute call with Wesley May covers the stack, the seniority and the hours you need covered.
Candidates from our bench in 1 business day. Every one of them is already a Full Scale employee.
You run the interviews and pick who joins. Nobody is assigned to you.
Your repo, your tools, your standups. Most engineers are working with your team within about 7 days.
AMC Theatres runs Full Scale engineers as part of its own team. The people who learn your systems stay to use what they learned, instead of rotating out at the end of a contract.
For any long-term staffing relationship to evolve into a partnership, you have to start with trust. You have to lead with trust through the process and adjust with trust when things go wrong.
It's like we get a full-time resource there, part of the team. That's something I would have never thought we'd see with a contracting company.
The Full Scale team has staffed us with top performers in our company, even relative to some of the folks that we have here in the US.
Most offshore companies stack three layers of project managers between the client and the people writing code. We don't. You get engineers, employed by us, managed by you.
Under 3% of applicants get an offer. Fourteen scored items, not years served — then you interview the shortlist and you pick. We don't assign people to you.
No layered project managers between you and the developer. They work your hours, your tools, your codebase, and report up to your engineering leadership — dedicated full-time, not shared between clients.
Affordable and senior aren't opposites here — it's labor economics, not junior talent. Five US engineers run about $1.17M in year one. The same five run $364,000.
Get your shortlist in 1 business day, interview the developers you like, and have them on your team within 7 days. From there they join your standups, pick up tickets in your sprint, and ship code.
The invoice you get next year looks like the invoice you got this month. One rate covers salary, benefits, equipment, office, HR and our margin. No recruiting fee, no account-management line item.
93% of our engineers are still here a year later. The person you onboard in March is not on someone else's project in May — the team that starts your project is the team that finishes it.
The rate covers the engineer's pay plus recruiting, payroll, benefits, HR, equipment, and office space in the Philippines. There are no recruiting fees and no surprise line items.
A five-person US development team costs about $1.17M in its first year once salaries, benefits, recruiting, and turnover are counted. The same team at Full Scale runs $364,000. That difference is why clients keep their teams for years instead of cutting them at the next budget review.
Sometimes the right Upwork alternative is Upwork. If the job has a clear finish line, like a one-off integration, a small fixed-scope build or a prototype to test an idea this month, a freelance marketplace is designed for exactly that and will usually be quicker to set up than a full-time engineer. The same goes for a niche skill you need for a few days. Full Scale makes sense once the work is continuous and the context your engineers build up is worth keeping. If you're not there yet, use a marketplace. When you are, book a call with us.
Our engineers work across modern development stacks with the tools and workflows you already use.
React, Angular, Vue.js, JavaScript, TypeScript
Node.js, Python, PHP, C#/.NET, Ruby on Rails, Java
React Native, Flutter, iOS (Swift), Android (Kotlin)
AWS, Azure, Google Cloud, Docker, Kubernetes
Automated and manual testing, performance testing
User research, wireframes, visual design, prototypes
Hire by stack
Real results from product-driven companies across SaaS, fintech, and enterprise.
"With Full Scale's developers, we transformed the commercial real estate landscape. Their proficiency in agile development and proactive communication accelerated our product release."
Jeff Weiner
Realquantum
"Full Scale has been a cornerstone in the success of our lending platform. Their skill set and commitment to quality have exceeded our expectations on every project."
Andy Kallenbach
LendingStandard
"Full Scale's team was pivotal in elevating our facility management software. Their expertise turned complex challenges into seamless functionality and a far better user experience."
Luke Wade
Facility Ally
"Full Scale isn't just about filling gaps. They're about understanding your mission and amplifying your ability to succeed."
Chris Harbert
Testery
"Full Scale's developers were instrumental in revolutionizing our health management systems, seamlessly integrating advanced features and data security."
Glenn Fisher
NavMD
"The engineers weren't just contributors; they became an integral part of our story, sharing our values and aspirations. The talent for the price has been exceptional."
Matthew Curtis
Insight Voice
How the dedicated-team model works at Full Scale, from roles to rates.
React, Node, Python, .NET, mobile and more, all from the same bench.
Teams that replaced rotating contractors with engineers who stayed.
Our longer guide to the platforms teams use instead of Upwork.
A closer look at the talent networks if that's the model you want.
Thirty minutes with Wesley May about the roles you need to fill.
No. Full Scale isn't a marketplace or a talent network, and there are no gigs to bid on. We employ senior developers full-time in Cebu, Philippines and place each one with a single client company. This page is for teams hiring developers. If you're an engineer looking for work, our careers are at fullscale.ph.
It depends on whether you need a task done or a team member. For a defined task with an end date, another freelance marketplace such as Fiverr is the like-for-like swap. If you want candidates screened for you and are happy to engage a contractor, a talent network such as Toptal, Turing or Andela fits that model. If you need developers who join your team full-time and stay, look at dedicated-team staff augmentation, which is what Full Scale does.
Toptal is a talent network: it matches you with independent professionals from its pool. Full Scale is an employer: our engineers are full-time Full Scale employees, each placed with one client, and you interview and choose them yourself. The pricing model differs too. Ours starts at $35 an hour fully loaded; for Toptal's rates, see their pricing page.
It depends on what you're buying. If you want a screened contractor for a defined engagement, a talent network is built for that. If you want full-time engineers dedicated to your team for the long term, that's a different model, and it's worth comparing dedicated-team providers as well. We don't rate other companies' engineers. Whoever you consider, judge them on their trial terms and how easily you can change course.
Yes. You get a shortlist from our bench in 1 business day, run your own interviews, and most engineers are on your team within about 7 days. Every candidate is already employed by us, so there's no job post to write and no stack of proposals to sort.
Full Scale engineers start at $35 an hour fully loaded, which covers pay, benefits, equipment, HR and our margin, with no recruiting fee. Freelancer rates vary by platform and by person. Beyond the hourly number, count the time you spend sourcing and onboarding each new person. For continuous work, that is often where the bigger cost sits.
Tell us early and we'll work through it with you. Every engagement starts with a two-week money-back guarantee: if it isn't working in the first two weeks, you get your money back. After that there's no long-term contract, and you can scale the team down with 30 days' notice.
You do. You sign one contract with Full Scale, a US company headquartered in Overland Park, Kansas, and every engineer works under an employment agreement with us, so the IP created for you is assigned to you through that chain with no gap in it.
Worst case, you spend thirty minutes and find out what senior engineering actually costs right now. Best case, you meet the engineer who joins your standup within 7 days. We make it easy to leave, which is why our clients don't — most are past year six.
Upwork, Fiverr, Toptal, Turing and Andela are trademarks of their respective owners. Full Scale is not affiliated with, sponsored by, or endorsed by any of them.
