COVID-19 Freelancer 4 Survey Data
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From July to August 2021, CSA Research surveyed freelance linguists worldwide for the fourth time
to see how the COVID-19 pandemic has affected them as providers of language services.
These are the overall results from the 559 responses received from 91 countries from August to July 2021.

 

See Other Business Confidence Survey Results



How has COVID-19 affected your business as of today?
The percentage of freelancers reporting decreases in income is significantly decreasing. It was 55% back in August last year, then 52% in January 2021, and now dropped to 29%.

  

 

 

Are you still feeling the impact 

of COVID-19 on your business?

Fully 38% of freelance respondents have been getting less work due to COVID-19’s impact. Yet, at the same time, 24% experienced an increase in business. 

    What has been your             experience with                     demand?                The highest-growth services for the first half of the year were remote simultaneous interpreting (RSI), over-the phone and video interpreting (OPI and VRI), and post-edited machine translation (PEMT). Interpreters expect a comeback of in-person modalities for the second half of the year, along with a slowdown for remote             options.        

 



How concerned are you about the following issues?

The general uncertainty of times remains the top concern for 85% of freelance linguists, along still with 71% that worry about a continued or new slowdown in demand due to COVID-19.

 

 

 

How do you feel about the language services sector for the rest of 2021? 

Nearly two-thirds of translators and interpreters are now optimistic about the future.


 

 

 

 

What percentage of projects do you translate using machine translation?

 On average, freelancers who derive at least 5% of their revenue from translation services use MT on 36% of their projects.