Rates
Helping you create high-quality texts at affordable rates. Without any booking fees. Ever.
PROOFREADING & EDITING
My standard hourly rate is based on the Editorial Freelancers Association guidelines and is currently set at 50 EUR/hr. You can find my rates for translations here.
WHY PER HOUR AND NOT PER PAGE?
I have a set hourly rate because every project is different:
- The level of intervention varies. A well-written text takes me less time to proofread or edit than a text similar in length but one that requires more work.
- Not all pages are created equal. The number of pages varies depending on the font type, font size, line spacing, etc. For example, a page from a double-spaced scientific manuscript may contain 400–500 words, while a single-spaced literary text may exceed 800 words per page. Similarly, your text might contain lots of figures and tables, which take up a lot of space but don’t contribute much to the overall word count. Charging you for those pages would be unfair, in my opinion.
SO WHAT WILL IT COST TO PROOFREAD OR EDIT YOUR DOCUMENT?
Great question! Personally, I don’t like it either when a product or service is advertised without a price tag. I want to know approximately how much it will cost me in the end.
While many editors and proofreaders refuse to provide any numbers at all until they’ve seen your document, I’m going to give you some ballpark figures based on two broad categories:
ACADEMIC / MEDICAL / STEM
The normal charges typically range from 150 EUR to upwards of 280 EUR to proofread and from 200 EUR to 400 EUR to edit a 5,000-word scientific manuscript.
Don’t worry if you don’t have that much experience yet or don’t know which rules apply when. I will provide you with plenty of comments and suggestions for your future academic or scientific writing.
Also, make sure to let me know if you are a student or PhD candidate, in which case I can offer you a 25% discount.
BUSINESS / FICTION / OTHER
Proofreading or editing a text from these fields usually takes less time than a scientific or highly technical text.
Here, charges range anywhere between 90 and 200 EUR to proofread and between 120 and 340 EUR to edit a 5,000-word document.
Longer texts such as novels have often already been subject to extensive rewriting before I receive them and may therefore require much less time to edit or proofread.
ACADEMIC / MEDICAL / STEM
The normal charges typically range from 130 EUR to upwards of 250 EUR to proofread and from 200 EUR to 380 EUR to edit a 5,000-word scientific manuscript.
Don’t worry if you don’t have that much experience yet or don’t know which rules apply when. I will provide you with plenty of comments and suggestions for your future academic or scientific writing.
Also, make sure to let me know if you are a student or PhD candidate, in which case I can offer you a 25% discount.
BUSINESS / FICTION / OTHER
Proofreading or editing a text from these fields usually requires less time than a scientific or highly technical text.
Here, charges range anywhere between 75 and 180 EUR to proofread and between 100 and 320 EUR to edit a 5,000-word document.
Longer texts such as novels have often already been subject to extensive rewriting before I receive them and may therefore require much less time to edit or proofread.
Please note that the price ranges shown above serve as a rough guide only. I will provide you with a precise quote for your text once I have reviewed it and assessed the amount of work involved.
The best way is to simply send me a sample of your text of 500–700 words (or the entire document if it’s ready), and I’ll get back to you with a quote as soon as possible.
TRANSLATION
TRANSLATION
My standard rate for translations is 0.11–0.18 EUR/word (based on the source text).
Why can’t you be more precise?
Some texts are easy and quick to translate, others require significant research and creativity (e.g., marketing texts) and thus take much longer. That’s why I cannot give you a precise rate per word until I’ve seen the text or a representative sample.
Discounted rates for large projects and packages for recurring jobs are available—just ask!
What does your translation service include?
My translation rate includes a complete proofreading service of your translated document so that you can rest assured that your final text is ready for publication or submission. For more information on how I work, see my article on my 6-step translation process.
Upon request, I’m happy to provide you with a translation certificate (see the PDF example on the Resources page). However, please note that I’m not a sworn/court-certified translator in Germany, so I can’t translate documents that need to be notarized, such as marriage certificates, birth certificates, driver’s licenses, etc.
For larger translation projects (over 500 EUR), I reserve the right to send interim invoices based on achieved milestones. For example, when I’ve completed 50% of your project, I may send an invoice for the first half of the total payment. Once the first balance is settled, you’ll receive the second half of your project by the agreed deadline, at which point the final 50% of the total payment is due. We’ll finalize these payment terms before I begin translating your document(s).
translation EDITING
Translation editing usually takes less time than a translation that needs to be created from scratch. But this obviously depends on the quality of the translated text and the number of errors (stylistic mistakes, mistranslations, inconsistencies, etc.) that need correcting.
The charge for a translation editing service is based on my hourly rate of 50 EUR/hr.
You will receive a quote after I’ve seen the source text (original) and the target text (draft translation), both of which I will use to estimate the amount of time required to edit the draft translation.
My translation editing service includes a complete proofreading service of the final version so that you can rest assured that your work is ready for publication. For more information on how I work, see my 6-step translation process.
Upon request, I am happy to provide you with a translation certificate (you’ll find a PDF example on the Resources page). However, please note that I am not a sworn/court-certified translator in Germany, so I can’t provide translation editing services for documents that need to be notarized, such as marriage certificates, birth certificates, driver’s licenses, etc.