// COMPARE

Talent marketplace (Toptal-style) vs a studio: which fits your project?

A talent marketplace gives you a good individual developer quickly, but you manage the project. A studio gives you the project: scoped, priced, built and shipped, with one party accountable. If you have a technical manager, the marketplace is efficient. If you don't, the studio is.

Side by side

	Talent marketplace	Authect (fixed-price studio)
What you buy	Hours of a vetted individual	A defined product at a fixed price
Price	$60–150+ per hour plus platform fee	One total, no fee, no hourly meter
Who manages the work	You: scope, priorities, reviews, QA	The studio; you approve previews
Team	One person at a time; add more and you coordinate them	A team that already works together
Speed to start	Days to match	Days to scope and start
Accountability	For hours worked	For the product shipping on the agreed date
After launch	Ends when the contract ends	Handover docs, optional support

When a marketplace is the better choice

You have an engineering lead who can write tickets, review pull requests and run QA.
You need to add capacity to an existing, well-run team for a defined period.
The work is clear enough that a good individual can execute it without product decisions.

When a studio is the better choice

There is no one technical on your side to manage the developer day to day.
The project needs several skills (front end, backend, infrastructure, AI) at different moments.
You want a price and a date, not a rate and a start date.

The management cost nobody quotes

Marketplaces are honest that you get a person, not a product. What they don't quote is the 5–15 hours a week a founder spends specifying, answering questions, testing and unblocking. If you have that time and skill, the model works well. If you don't, the developer waits on you, hours run, and the product drifts.

A studio absorbs that management: the scoping call becomes the specification, the team unblocks itself, QA is inside the price. Authect adds a fixed price and a confirmed timeline so the budget and the date are known on day one.

Common questions

Are marketplace developers better than studio developers?

Both can be excellent. The difference is not the people, it's what you buy: hours versus an outcome. Authect's engineers are senior and you meet them on the first call; the difference is that they come with the scope, the plan and the accountability.

Can I move from a marketplace developer to a studio mid-project?

Yes. We audit the existing code, document what it does, and quote the remaining work at a fixed price. It's a common starting point.

Does Authect charge a platform fee?

No. The fixed price is the whole price. Payment is by bank transfer, Stripe or Whop.

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