Tips to get your first contract on Upwork

There's absolutely no way to compete with the infinite supply of so-called "developers" from third-world countries and everyone appears to be an "expert" with 10 years experience in every technology you can imagine. The rating system has been gamed to death so there's no way for a client to tell the good from the bad, and given that a lot of them are non-technical they will fail to spot the red flags and go with the lowest bidder.

There are also horror stories when the platform itself fails to mediate disagreements and steals a freelancer's hard-earned money. I am not sure if this is resolved but as of last year, EU-based VAT-registered freelancers were still unable to work on the platform and abide by the rules because their payment system is unable to handle VAT, so your option is to either eat the VAT yourself or take the payment off the platform and break the rules.

You will overall make more money (more consistently and with less stress) by taking a low-wage job like stacking shelves in supermarkets or doing food deliveries.