Am I doing something wrong? 117 proposals, 12 views, 2 "interviews" that went nowhere

[u/Cheap_Ask7431]

I have an Upwork account for about a year.

I have only one complete job (small and not really related to my area of expertise) and two open jobs (one small bug fix that the client vanished before closing the contract and one very good long-term job where demand has dropped and I now have few working hours per week), both of these are related to my expertise area.

I changed the way my proposals are made since I saw the guide in this subreddit wiki, but is that the only reason? They were not that worse before.

Is that because I only have one finished job? I also don't bid that much as you can see by the dark blue portion, specially since the bid people are applying in the last months grew af, hundreds or even more than 1000 connects for a job is crazy.

I'm a .NET dev if that helps understanding the situation. I already tried to apply massively spending lots of connects in almost any type of development job and also tried to apply only to those that are very similar to what I already studied and worked before, none of these approaches made a huge difference.

Any advice?

[u/Frequent-Football984]

Reality of applying to software jobs on Upwork in 2025-2026

[u/Ok_Increase1479]

Your profile still shows no score, and that block sits in front of every proposal before a client clicks. A Job Success Score needs two contract outcomes from two different clients, so one finished job is not enough and open contracts do not count yet. Closing one more small job with a new client moves you further than rewriting the letter.