Hiring a designer can be a daunting process, especially if your startup is rapidly growing. You have to balance speed of iteration with high-quality standards — and the choice of who you hire makes all the difference.

Working with a freelancer guarantees you’ll be directly working with the exact designer you’ve chosen. Many freelancers are highly skilled in specific niches or domains: sometimes even more focused than agencies.

Hiring a freelancer is a great idea if you want to validate an idea quickly, prioritize your roadmap, or extend your existing team. Since there is no middleman, it is easier to build a relationship, establish trust, and make the process smoother. In some cases, a freelancer can even transition into your first in-house designer once you reach the right stage.

Hiring an agency can feel like the natural next step. You avoid the hassle of screening and hiring, and agencies usually have several designers on board depending on your needs. Many also specialize in a specific domain. This option is great if the scope is large and you need to move very fast, even if you already have an in-house designer.

There are two main downsides, costs and continuity. Agencies carry overhead such as sales and marketing teams and must add a margin to operate. In addition, if you like a particular project an agency has done, the odds of working with that exact same designer are low. Teams shift, tenures are shorter, and larger groups mean less predictability in who you will collaborate with.

As your startup grows and matures, hiring an in-house designer and eventually building a design team becomes inevitable. But bringing someone in-house too early can backfire.

I have seen founders hire an in-house designer before the product direction was clear. The designer ended up waiting on decisions, filling time with less impactful tasks, and ultimately not contributing at full potential.

The lesson is to only hire in-house once your backlog is big enough and your product direction is well defined. That way, your designer can spend time on high value work instead of waiting for clarity.

Good design is not just about aesthetics, it is about justifying every decision with logic, research, and business goals. The best designers can explain:

If your designer cannot answer these questions, you might be making expensive guesses instead of strategic decisions.

At pre-seed and seed, a freelancer gives you speed and flexibility. Later on, an agency could help you scale polish across product and brand. Once you reach product market fit, an in-house designer ensures continuous iteration.

In some cases, a freelancer who already knows your product can even transition into your first in-house hire. In some cases you might not need a full time hire for a long time and it's totally fine. Choose based on your stage, and always work with designers who can back up their choices with clear reasoning, not just aesthetics.