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Freelancers across Iran lost foreign contracts and saw income dry up during January’s internet shutdown, digital workers told Iran International, as weeks offline cut their access to projects and payments in an economy already hit by global isolation.
Iran’s internet, throttled for 20 days during January’s mass killing of protesters, has been restored since earlier this month, but remains unstable, with VPNs and other censorship-bypassing tools now far harder to access than before the shutdown.
“The internet is not stable enough for me to confidently take on projects, and transferring money has become so complicated that the losses outweigh the income,” one electrical engineer working as a freelancer told Iran International, speaking on condition of anonymity for security reasons.
Iranian entrepreneurs and freelancers are mostly shut out of global platforms and payment systems due to US sanctions, forcing them to depend on expensive workarounds that put their businesses at risk.
The engineer said that before the shutdown, earnings depended on the size and complexity of each contract.
Iran’s internet, throttled for 20 days during January’s mass killing of protesters, has been restored since earlier this month, but remains unstable, with VPNs and other censorship-bypassing tools now far harder to access than before the shutdown.
“The internet is not stable enough for me to confidently take on projects, and transferring money has become so complicated that the losses outweigh the income,” one electrical engineer working as a freelancer told Iran International, speaking on condition of anonymity for security reasons.
Iranian entrepreneurs and freelancers are mostly shut out of global platforms and payment systems due to US sanctions, forcing them to depend on expensive workarounds that put their businesses at risk.
The engineer said that before the shutdown, earnings depended on the size and complexity of each contract.
“If the project was small or academic, the hourly rate was around $50. Larger and more complex projects would pay between $1,000 and $1,500 in total,” he said. “The number of projects per month varied, but overall I had a good level of income.”
That stability has eroded amid repeated disruptions and mounting financial barriers, he said.
“Inside Iran there is no industry where I can find work in my field. It’s complete confusion.”
An online translator who works with overseas agencies described similar disruption.
“When the connection cuts out, I cannot join interpretation sessions or upload translated files on time,” she told Iran International. “Clients do not want explanations. They just move to someone in another country.”
She said several long-term contracts were suspended after repeated outages, adding that rebuilding trust with foreign employers may take months.
Network shock ripples through digital labor
Freelancers described what they called a “freeze” in project flow, particularly from overseas clients who rely on constant connectivity and predictable delivery timelines.
The business daily Donya-e-Eqtesad, citing one of the country’s largest freelancing platforms, reported that project volume on a major platform dropped by up to 96 percent in the first days of the shutdown. The newspaper said activity has yet to fully recover.
Official data on the overall size and income of Iran’s freelance sector is not publicly available, making independent estimates difficult to verify.
“The recent internet shutdown is not just an effort to silence the people; it has also devastated over one million online businesses, with their sales dropping by up to 80 percent and small businesses suffering the most damage," the US State Department's Persian account on X posted in late January.
"As a result of the Islamic Republic regime’s reckless policies, nearly half of all jobs are now at risk."
Economic uncertainty compounds losses
The internet disruption coincided with wider infrastructure strain and economic volatility, intensifying pressure on digital workers.
“The most important factor here is the internet shutdown, which can broadly be categorized as an infrastructure disruption,” economic journalist Mahtab Gholizadeh told Iran International from Berlin.
“Alongside that, we have seen electricity and gas outages and other infrastructure shocks that limit access to the basic conditions industries and businesses need to grow,” she added.
Political uncertainty and foreign policy pressures are further weighing on the economy, Gholizadeh said.
“With this level of uncertainty in Iran’s diplomatic environment, conditions become unstable and high volatility prevents making decisions about future,” she said.
Foreign contracts unravel
Freelancers working with overseas employers were particularly exposed during the shutdown.
“In a country where the rial continuously loses value, many of these individuals could secure dollar income through freelancing that stabilizes their livelihoods and even acts as an economic buffer,” Canada-based science and technology journalist Mehdi Saremifar told Iran International.
“However, internet shutdowns and structural restrictions remove even this limited opportunity and effectively block access to the global market,” he added.
Saremifar cautioned that headline income figures often reflect exceptional cases rather than sustained averages.
“The main issue in Iran’s freelance market is not the income ceiling but severe instability and total dependence on internet access,” he said. “With every shutdown or disruption, the entire income stream stops.”
Even after partial reconnection, several freelancers said employers remain hesitant to assign projects inside Iran, citing concerns over delivery delays and payment obstacles.
Digital workers who spoke to Iran International expressed deep concern over losing their jobs and professional reputations, with many increasingly considering emigration. Beyond financial losses, they also described psychological strain caused by repeated uncertainty.
The shutdown appears to have seriously undermined one of the few lifelines available to young Iranians amid deepening isolation and the rial’s unprecedented collapse, compounding economic and psychological strain.
Iran’s rial, trading at nearly 1.6 million to the US dollar on Friday, has lost half its value in just six months and risks losing its role as both a store of value and a functioning currency.
