Project Manager hourly rate and day rate in Germany: what IT contract listings name in 2026
When Project Manager listings name an hourly rate, the median is €80–85 – a day rate of €640–680 for eight hours. Half of the rates named fall within €70 to €100. Only 2.9% of the 4,836 listings for this role since July 2026 name a rate at all: 141 rates. This is what clients and agencies write into the listing themselves – not an average of what freelancers in this role earn.
How high is the Project Manager hourly rate?
The median is €80–85: half of the listings naming a rate name at most that, half at least that. The most frequent group is €80–89 (27% of the rates named). 25% (35 rates) of the rates are €100 or more, 2.1% (3 rates) below €50. Each role has only a few rates; a difference of one €5 step from the month before or from another role can be chance.
Project Manager day rate
When a listing names a day rate instead of an hourly rate, it counts here divided by eight hours. The other way round, the median of €80–85 is a day rate of €640–680, and the middle half of the hourly rates a day rate of €560 to €800. The rate calculator, preset to Project Manager, works out what your hourly rate earns in a year and which rate your yearly target needs – with vacation, sick days and gaps between projects.
Which projects count
Project managers lead IT projects or sub-projects, programmes and PMOs and steer transitions, transformations, rollouts and migrations – whatever the technology or module involved. Every project counts under the role its title names. Hands-on development counts under the developer roles, not here.
Project Manager compared with other IT roles
Listings for this role name a median of €80–85 – a step or more above the €75–80 of all IT roles outside development; with 141 rates, one step can be chance. The middle half of the rates spans €70 to €100, narrower than for all IT roles outside development together (€50 to €90). 2.9% of this role's listings name a rate – about as often as listings overall (3.7%). Listings for developer roles name a median of €80–85 (717 rates); across all listings naming a rate the median is €75–80.
Bar: the middle half of the rates (lower to upper quartile), line: median; the scale runs from 0 to €100. On the right the median in €5 steps.
6 IT roles outside development reach at least 30 rates named and have a page of their own – the other 5:
Project Manager hourly rate month by month
The table shows per month how many listings for this role name an hourly rate, the median and the middle half of the rates. Because only a few listings name a rate each month, the median can shift by one €5 step from one month to the next without the market having changed; for months with fewer than ten rates the median and the middle half are left out.
| Month | listings | naming a rate | share | median | middle half |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| July 2026 | 1,110 | 37 | 3.3% | €85–90 | €70 to €100 |
| August 2026 | 1,106 | 33 | 3% | €80–85 | €70 to €100 |
| September 2026 | 1,131 | 22 | 1.9% | €90–95 | €80 to €105 |
| October 2026 | 1,489 | 49 | 3.3% | €80–85 | €70 to €95 |
In October 2026, 49 of the 1,489 listings for this role named a rate (3.3%), median €80–85.
Frequently asked questions about the Project Manager rate
What does a freelance Project Manager earn per hour in Germany?
Listings that name a rate name a median of €80–85 for this role; the middle half spans €70 to €100. That is the budget or ceiling clients and agencies name – what a contractor bills in the end is decided in the negotiation.
Day rate or hourly rate?
Project managers, consultants, product owners and Scrum masters are often billed per day, administrators mostly per hour; a day rate counts here as eight hours. The median of €80–85 is €640–680 per day. If you bill per day, agree how many hours a day covers – and reckon with vacation, sick days and gaps, as the rate calculator does.
Why do so few listings name a rate?
Only 2.9% of the Project Manager listings name an hourly or day rate in euros; across all listings it is 3.7%. Most agencies ask for the rate instead of naming a budget, and whoever names a figure first sets the anchor. Whether a rate is named also depends on the project board and the agency – the listings naming a rate are not a random sample.
Negotiating the Project Manager rate
- Ask for the budget: most listings name no rate. Whoever names a figure first sets the anchor for the negotiation.
- Read "up to €100" as a ceiling: a budget named is what the client wants to pay at most, not the rate they expect. At most a quarter of this role's rates lie above that figure.
- Mind the margin: an agency bills the client more than it pays you. What is known about margins is in IT recruitment agencies in Germany.
- For day rates: agree how many hours a day covers and whether travel time and expenses are included – a day rate of €640–680 here means eight hours.
- On the projects page you see the current listings; Projectmatch matches new projects against your profile automatically. Try it now.
All roles compared: IT contractor rates in Germany: hourly and day rates. See also: IT contractor rate calculator, IT contract length in Germany and Freelance, employee leasing or employment?.
Method
An AI model determines the role from the listing's title and required skills – by the role the title names, not by the technology involved; every project counts under exactly one role. Hands-on development counts under the developer roles. A role gets a page of its own once 30 rates have been named: from that number, a single listing moves its shares by at most about three percentage points. What counts as a rate – ranges, ceilings and floors, day rates divided by eight, the plausibility bounds and the €5 steps – is in the method section of the article IT contractor rates in Germany. The figures start in July 2026, are updated monthly and are published under the CC BY 4.0 license with the attribution "Projectmatch (projectmatch.io)" and, online, a link to this page.