Ask HN: What's the hardest part about getting your first web developer job?
For hobbyist developers looking to make the transition to developing professionally, what have you found to be the hardest part of the process?
An open Ask HN community consultation from 2019 where @krogers convened hundreds of developers and bootstrappers to share real experiences, hard numbers, and tactics.
Core Principles for Independent Builders:
Participants share raw revenue figures, churn rates, and stack decisions that corporate PR never publishes.
Recurring answers reveal that distribution, not coding skill, is almost universally the rate-limiting step in developer businesses.
Practical recommendations on bookkeeping, payment gateways (Stripe vs Paddle), and freelance-to-product transitions.
Community Debate Themes:
Hundreds of active indie hackers contributed case studies, pricing heuristics, and pitfalls to avoid when moonlighting on side projects.
CATEGORY Ask HN Roundtables →
HISTORICAL ERA Cloud & Mobile Era (2014–2019)
COMMUNITY SCORE ★ 4 points
TOTAL DISCUSSIONS 4 comments
Getting it is always the hardest part.
Once you get it, if you have some patience, good work habits (dependable, reliable, etc), and are a little above average in your inclination with computers, you'll do just fine.
It's more convincing employers who have no data on you. I think most of the people who visit HN are capable enough, but you're still competing with a large pool of people who game the system.
For me, the hardest part was getting enough experience to show employers that I knew what I was doing. Once you get the ball rolling, it's much easier to get interviews etc.
Being confident enough in yourself to say “I don’t know” and being open minded to learn new things.