A day rate always looks better than a salary until you price the weeks nobody is paying you. Holiday, sick days, and above all the gap between contracts — the bench — is where the apparent premium goes. This works out what you would actually clear either way.
Contract vs full-time calculator
Bench-adjustedA day rate only beats a salary once you have paid for your own time off, your own gaps between contracts and your own costs.
The bench is the whole game
Most people modelling a contract move assume they will work 48 weeks. In reality, unless you have a pipeline of repeat clients, planning for six to ten unbilled weeks a year is realistic, and more in a soft market.
The effect is brutal. At $450 a day, forty billed weeks is $90,000 and thirty billed weeks is $67,500 — the same rate, a 25% pay cut. This is why contractors who feel busy can still end a year behind a salaried peer.
What a salary is really worth
Comparing a day rate to a base salary is comparing the wrong numbers. The salaried package also includes:
- Employer pension contribution — typically 3–10% of base, paid on top.
- Paid holiday and sick leave — five or six weeks you are paid for and do not work.
- Health cover — in the US, often $8,000–$20,000 of real value.
- Equipment and software — a workstation and a Maya or Substance seat you are not buying.
- Training — conferences and courses on someone else’s budget.
- Stability — hard to price, easy to miss when it is gone.
Costs that land on you as a contractor
Beyond the unbilled weeks: professional indemnity insurance, accountancy and filing, your own pension, your own hardware and software, and the admin hours spent quoting, invoicing and chasing payment. Six per cent of gross is a reasonable planning figure for the direct costs, before the time.
Late payment is a real cost
Thirty to sixty day terms are common and often not honoured. A contractor needs a cash buffer a salaried worker does not, and that buffer is capital you are not earning on elsewhere.
When contracting genuinely wins
- You have repeat clients. Two or three studios that come back removes most of the bench risk, which is the single biggest variable.
- You are in a lower-paying region selling to a higher-paying one. Contract rates track the client’s market far more closely than salaries do.
- You have a scarce specialism. Technical art, engine work, real-time VFX and tools work all command premiums and rarely sit on the bench.
- You want a shipped title fast. A three-month contract is the quickest legitimate route from no credits to credits.
When a salary wins
Early career, when mentorship compounds faster than money. Any time you need visa sponsorship or a mortgage. And whenever the work you want is only done inside long-running teams — live-ops, engine, and most senior design work are hard to do in three-month slices.
Worth knowing: 69% of contractors and part-timers in games report being undercompensated, against 53% of the industry overall. Contract work is not automatically the better deal, and that gap is exactly what the bench figure above is measuring.
Frequently asked questions
What day rate matches my salary?
As a rough starting point, divide the full package by about 220 billable days and add a premium for the risk you are absorbing. The calculator above gives you the precise break-even for your own assumptions.
Should contract pay more than salary?
Yes — meaningfully. If a contract pays the same as the equivalent salary, you are taking on all the risk and all the costs for none of the reward.
Does this include tax?
No, deliberately. Contractor tax treatment varies enormously by country and entity, it changes annually, and getting it wrong carries real liability. This compares earnings; take the result to an accountant who knows your jurisdiction.
How do I reduce bench time?
Line up the next contract while the current one is running, keep two or three repeat clients warm, and specialise enough that people come looking for you. Rate setting matters too — the freelance rate calculator shows what utilisation your rate is assuming.
Compare against live roles
The job board marks every listing by type, so you can see contract and full-time roles side by side. To check whether either number is fair for your level and region, use the salary calculator.