OpenAI and Upwork research finds AI-related freelance projects have 45% more diverse task mixes and larger budgets

Details

New research from OpenAI and Upwork indicates that AI is shifting freelance demand by reducing the share of certain tasks while increasing the complexity and budget of AI-related projects.
AI-related postings became 45% more diverse between early 2023 and late 2025, equivalent to an increase from about 15 to about 21 equally common tasks.
Although hourly rates remained similar, AI-related projects featured larger fixed-price budgets and involved more hours of work, suggesting broader project scope.
Of 63 analyzed work categories, 43 showed a pattern where activities common in ChatGPT lost share on Upwork, while 20 showed the reverse, indicating that AI use does not uniformly substitute for freelance labor.
Clients increasingly request AI application in varied fields such as chatbot development, video production, and marketing automation, often combining tasks that rarely appeared together in earlier jobs.
The study notes a "capability overhang," where current ChatGPT usage does not reflect the full range of tasks AI can support, and highlights that freelance postings offer an early view of market changes before they appear in economy-wide employment statistics.

Key point