Freelance copywriter rates 2025: the ultimate guide on what to pay (and why)

How much do freelance copywriters charge for their work in 2025 – and what can you expect for your money? Here's my definitive rundown.

This article is aimed at two audiences: clients who want to boost their knowledge about what copywriters currently charge and also newcomers to the industry who are looking where to position themselves.

It’s a long read! If you find yourself nodding off, skip to the end for a summary. Or drop me a line and I’ll price up your copywriting job in a jiffy.

When you're hiring a freelance copywriter today, you'll encounter a bewildering array of pricing structures. Day rates vary by hundreds of pounds, and hourly fees range from what seems like charity work to the kind of pricing you’d expect Trump’s lawyers to be billing.

Below is a detailed picture of what's actually happening in the UK copywriting market in 2025 – and why rates vary so wildly.

What UK copywriters actually charge (the real numbers)

The ProCopywriters 2025 survey of 400+ UK copywriters revealed an average day rate of £480 (up £40 compared to last year – nice!). But here's the thing about averages – they're not very helpful when you're trying to work out what you should actually pay (or charge).

The brutal reality? Copywriting day rates in 2025 span from around £250 for junior writers right up to £2,000+ per day for a handful of specialist experts. That's not a typo. Some copywriters are genuinely pulling in more per day than many people spend on a holiday.

According to multiple industry sources (and my own experience of client expectations), here's how the land lies:

Junior copywriters (0-2 years): £250-£350/day

Mid-level copywriters (3-7 years): £400-£600/day

Senior copywriters (8+ years): £500-£800/day

Specialist experts £800-£2,000/day

What constitutes a specialist? People like technical writers in high-value sectors such as medical or technology. Creative copywriters with an advertising background sometimes fall into this category, too – especially if they can knock out an award-winning advert.

Specialist copywriters, however, are not what 95% of copywriting clients need.

Copywriting hourly rates – what to pay

For hourly rates, expect to pay anywhere between £50-£100 for experienced copywriters, though the range can stretch from £25 at the bottom end right up to £250 per hour for the most sought-after specialists.

London copywriters typically charge more than the national average (15% or so), but here's where it gets interesting – remote work is equalising things.

Quality copywriters are increasingly serving London clients from their kitchen table in Cornwall, and nobody seems to give a shiny shit as long as their WiFi's solid and the writing hits the spot.

Specialisation is where the big money lies

As mentioned above, specialisation can be a fast-track to higher rates. But not always. If you specialise in model railways or cheese, your clients will be few and far between – and unlikely to have big budgets.

Healthcare and pharmaceutical copywriting can command a premium, with fees of £100+ hourly. Why? Because getting healthcare copy wrong isn't just embarrassing – it's potentially dangerous. You’re paying for the writer’s hard-earned expertise. America's Editorial Freelancers Association puts medical writing as its top-earning category.

In many cases, though, you really don’t need a specialist. A competent writer who's prepared to get stuck in will be fine most of the time – and, perhaps, they will come at things from an 'everyman' angle, ensuring the copy is easy to read and low on jargon.

Another issue with specialists is that they sometimes have ties to one client – even if only unofficially. For example, for a couple of days a month, I have been writing about cold storage solutions for a large company named TITAN Containers for almost three years.

As a result, I know more about “reefer containers” than 99.9% of writers. But I wouldn’t offer my services to a rival, as that would feel like a betrayal. I don't think TITAN would like it either.

Financial services and fintech copywriting can also command a high price tag – circa £600-£850 a day. Regulatory requirements mean clients need writers who actually understand what they're talking about – not just someone who's handy with a thesaurus.

True story: I was approached by Business Insider’s commercial arm last year to write about a bitcoin investment platform. However, as I didn't have faith in my ability to deliver, I politely inched myself out of the picture as swiftly as I could – which gave them ample time to find someone better suited to the job.

So yes – if you know your yield curve inversion from your quantitative easing, financial copywriting can certainly help pay off a large mortgage. How large? Well, if you want to see some really eye-watering rates that one financial copywriting business puts forward, check out this link.

Dig deep for tech and software copywriting, too

Technology and software copywriting ranges from around £450 – £750 a day, or higher still if you have in-demand knowledge. SaaS specialisation can be a nice money-spinner in some cases, although not all, as many SaaS businesses are start-ups and have comically small budgets.

At the bottom end of the scale are the likes of charity and non-profit work, where fees of around £250-£375/day are most likely. Writers in this space do, however, get to feel good about their work – which isn't always the case with other types of copywriting.

But there are no fixed rules. I was recently approached to do some copywriting work for a well-known luxury brand with a global presence, and they wanted to pay just £30 an hour. Many times over the years, I have found luxury brands to be surprisingly cash-conscious and even downright mean – but not always. When I wrote for Harrods, they were generous to a fault.

How copywriters actually price their work

Most copywriters have abandoned the old "per word" pricing model years ago.

The value of a killer hero headline on a website, for example, is so incredibly high that a writer can no longer say to him/herself, “Fifty words – let's call it 25 quid.”

I’ve spent as long as half a day on a website header and intro when it really counted. Fifty pence per word (or whatever) would have been little compensation for the effort involved. It would have been something like £6 an hour.

What you'll likely encounter instead are four main pricing approaches:

1/ Project-based pricing (most common): Fixed fees for defined deliverables.

2/ Day rates: Typically £350-£750+ depending on the writer’s experience and your expectations (including for amendments/revisions).

3/ Hourly rates: Circa £50-£100 for competent professionals (£100 is very much the top end and only applied by a small percentage of copywriters).

4/ Retainer arrangements: Monthly fees for ongoing work, often with 10-15% discounts. Working as a “fractional head of copy” is something I’ve been asked about a couple of times recently.

Typical copywriting projects and their costs

Here's what typical projects actually cost. These are ballpark figures, as they have to cover the full gamut of writers and also take into account the varying length/complexity of the work involved. But hey – you'll get an idea.

Website homepage: £300 – £2,000

Blog posts: £150-£700 for 500 words (remember that a meticulously crafted blog post paying close attention to SEO can be worth its weight in gold – though it’s likely to be longer than 500 words)

Email campaigns: £85-£500 per email

Landing pages: £200-£1,500

Full website copy: £1,200 (for a small website) to £50k+ (for a huge one).

The hidden value behind good copywriting

When a copywriter quotes you £600 for a homepage, that's not just "writing some words." The fee typically (but not always) includes:

• Consultation and brief refinement

• Research (your audience and competitors)

• Creative thinking and strategy

• First draft writing

• A round of revisions

• Final proofreading and checks

I’ll be honest, my own quotes for a homepage are rarely less than £750, as the work is so important and there’s so much work involved (I also provide fairly detailed copywriting visuals explaining what should go where and why).

The highest fee I’ve charged for a homepage was over £1,500 – but it was money well spent as it led to a spike in both traffic numbers and conversions on an ongoing basis.

It's worth remembering that the cheapest option often isn't the most economical. A £300 homepage that converts at 2% will end up costing you far more than a £1,000 homepage that converts at 7% (unless you sell products at pennies and you only get 10 visitors a year).

One thing I can’t stress enough is that there are THOUSANDS of inexperienced copywriters out there. People who think they’re a dab hand at writing and maybe spent 100 quid on a course.

By contrast, I’ve been writing for more than 20 years and have been paid to write more than a million words.

This experience not only raises the bar in terms of what you can expect, but it helps eliminate all the crap you’d have to go through if hiring an inexperienced copywriter.

Things like missing a deadline, sending an email asking “What’s a meta description?” and using unfiltered ChatGPT slop for your text.

What drives copywriting rate differences?

Honestly? It’s experience. But it's not just about years in the game – it's about results.

A writer can theoretically noodle away for decades without making improvements to their craft or learning about things like conversion strategy, user journey or SEO.

By contrast, a copywriter who can point to specific conversion improvements, sales increases, or brand transformations will always be worth more than someone who just "writes nicely".

Client type makes a massive difference, too. Large corporate copywriting clients expect to pay more because they want quality; they also want to know that you've had years in the game. They understand the business impact of words, so day rates of £500-£800 are unlikely to make them flinch.

Medium businesses? Circa £450-£650 daily.

In my experience, start-ups and SMEs tend to have smaller budgets and cluster around the £300-£450 mark. Some, however, recognise the importance of copywriting and are prepared to pay more.

Turnaround time can affect pricing, too. If you need something yesterday, a writer may reasonably ask for 20-30% more than their regular rate.

That’s because urgent copy disrupts their schedules and may mean evening/weekend work – or asking another client for a little wiggle room.

Also, if it's urgent, you'll have limited options, so expect to pay up. Supply and demand and all that.

The 2025 reality check and the impact of AI in copywriting

Here's what's actually happening down here in the trenches: cost-cutting and the availability of AI-generated content have made it harder for many freelancers.

How do I know? Two reasons: first, 43% of copywriters in the latest ProCopywriters study said they were 'very concerned' about AI’s impact on their ability to earn a crust.

Second, the number of enquiries I get through my website has fallen in the past two years, despite no discernible drop in my rankings.

In other words: fewer people are looking for freelance copywriters. I've heard other writers I know saying the same.

But it’s not all bad news. Now that marketing managers have had three years to get used to generative AI, many don’t want it. Or, at least, they don’t want it to write their websites, emails, white papers and so on.

I’m increasingly hearing this from people who reach out – usually via LinkedIn – and who are prepared to pay good rates to have an experienced copywriting professional onside. Even if it is just to work as their AI copy editor.

I'm not quite as busy as I was two years ago, which was my busiest year ever. But it feels like we’ve turned a corner – at least at the higher end of the marketing game, where people understand the limitations of AI.

Multi-skilled professional demand has also increased. Clients expect copywriters to possess SEO knowledge, and many are drawn to my bigger-picture “website architecture” capabilities. 

What's the ROI on copywriting?

One thing clients sometimes ask about is ROI, and I don't think it's something many copywriters are brilliant at sharing – although perhaps some are.

Why is this the case? There are a number of factors. Here's my take on it...

Very often, a freelance copywriter (me) has long since moved on by the time a copywriting project comes to fruition.

And it can take months longer still for the results of the work to become evident.

As a result, there’s often no real feedback. It’s unlikely that a marketing manager will send an email eight months after the work was delivered saying, “Sales are up 20% – and it's all because of you!”

There are other complications, such as staff changing roles – meaning the line of communication closes down. There's also the ever-present threat of a copywriter's words losing their impact as they move along the chain of command (management, designers, developers, SEO experts).

Things become diluted, and the writer has less and less ownership of their words and ideas as they move from what they filed to what they become. It might sound like a cop-out, but it's the reality of being a freelancer.

Luckily, though, this isn't always the case, and I have documented cases where clients show me the value of the work I have done.

I can sometimes see it for myself, such as running a Google search and watching a page I've worked on leap from page four to page one.

What all this means for your budget if you’re hiring a copywriter

Let's take a look at how far your money will get you:

Start-ups with £500 to spend

This might get you some basic copy (possibly as much as a 3-page website) from a relatively junior writer. It could also cover a simple project from someone more experienced.

SME/growing companies with a £2,000 budget

This would buy 3-6 days’ work from experienced copywriters who understand how to deliver great work on time. A full website may be possible.

Corporates with £5,000+

Potentially enough for a complete overhaul of your existing website – or, alternatively, maybe a 3,000-word white paper and a bit of time left over for something else.

Freelance copywriting rates 2025 – the bottom line

The UK average day rate of £480 only tells part of the story. The real story is that experienced copywriters who deliver results and position themselves strategically can earn significantly more.

Success in this market requires continuous learning, strategic positioning, lots of outreach work and a clear focus on delivering business value. Writing words really is just one part of the equation.

Good copywriting is an investment that can keep on paying off years after it’s been done. The difference between mediocre copy and exceptional copy can literally be the difference between a business making millions and disappearing before it has made its first sale.

All of which makes that £480 UK average freelance day rate seem like a bit of a bargain.

Written by Mike Peake, UK freelance copywriter and website content writer.

E: hello@bymikepeake.com

T: +44 (0)208 133 4306

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