Freelance Skills in Q3 2017 – The fastest-growing

Upwork, the largest freelancing website, today released its newest quarterly index of the hottest skills in the U.S. freelance job market. The Upwork Skills Index ranks the site’s 20 fastest-growing skills and is part of a quarterly series that sheds light on new and emerging skills freelancers are providing. This comes on the heels of the “Freelancing in America: 2017” study, the most comprehensive measure of the U.S. independent workforce, which found that 57.3 million Americans (36 percent of the U.S. workforce) freelanced in the past year and also predicts that the majority of the U.S. workforce will freelance within a decade.

“Freelancers realize how quickly the skills needed are evolving and are the most proactive members of the workforce, reskilling much more frequently than traditional employees,” said Stephane Kasriel, CEO of Upwork and co-chair of the World Economic Forum’s Council on the Future of Gender, Education and Work. “Because of this, they will play a major role in guiding the future of work — something we all have a responsibility to do.”

The 20 fastest-growing freelance skills in Q3 2017 all experienced more than 100 percent year-over-year growth, while the top ten grew more than 200 percent compared to the same time period last year (Q3 2016).

The top 20 fastest-growing skills, Q3 2017:

1. Robotics
2. Blockchain
3. Bitcoin
4. Penetration testing
5. React.js
6. Amazon Web Services Lambda
7. Augmented reality
8. Deep learning
9. Instagram marketing
10. Final Cut Pro X
11. Swift development
12. AngularJS development
13. Salesforce
14. Vulnerability assessment
15. Natural language processing
16. HubSpot marketing
17. Machine learning
18. Objective-C development
19. Learning Management System (LMS)
20. jQuery development

Chosen excerpts by Job Market Monitor. Read the whole story at Upwork Skills Index: Fastest-Growing Freelance Skills in Q3 2017