September 2026: a record month
Pakistan's freelancers earned $197 million in September 2026, the highest monthly figure the country has ever recorded. That is 49% more than September 2025 and 11% more than August, according to figures shared by Khurram Schehzad, Adviser to the Finance Minister.
The same month, Pakistan's IT exports reached $435 million. That is up 18% year on year and just $2 million short of the all-time monthly high set in December 2025. IT exports for the first quarter of FY2026-27 (July–September 2026) reached $1.25 billion, and freelancers alone brought in about $550 million over the quarter.
Schehzad described the freelance economy as "translating its young digital talent into exports." At Peham Ltd, we read these numbers a little differently from most headlines. They are not just foreign-exchange statistics. They are proof that companies around the world already trust Pakistani engineers with real work, and keep coming back for more.
Planning an AI platform or SaaS product? Team Peham is a PSEB-registered software development company in Islamabad. Book a free 30-minute discovery call to talk it through with our engineers.
Not a spike: a three-year climb
September did not come out of nowhere. Freelance export earnings have grown almost fivefold in three fiscal years, reaching a record $1.76 billion in FY2025-26, a 78% jump over the year before.
The wider IT sector has moved with it. Pakistan's IT exports hit a record $4.6 billion in FY2025-26, up about 21%, making IT the country's largest services export. Industry estimates put Pakistan's freelance workforce at close to three million people, the fourth-largest in the world.
From solo gigs to engineering teams
The most important shift is not the size of the numbers but what sits behind them. The Pakistan Freelancers Association has noted that freelancers are rapidly picking up AI tools and skills, and that more of them now work in teams and registered agencies rather than alone.
IT work is still the largest share, at more than $1.16 billion. The fastest growth, though, came from design, marketing, content and other non-IT services, which nearly tripled in a single year.
That matches what we see every day. The clients who once hired a single Pakistani developer for a two-week task now want a team that can own a product: architecture, design, QA, deployment and support. Industry leaders are openly encouraging freelancers to grow into startups and registered companies.
Pakistan is moving up the value chain, from extra hands on a task to engineering partners on a product.
Why hire software and AI developers in Pakistan
If you are looking for an offshore software development partner for an AI platform or a serious piece of software, Pakistan offers a combination that is hard to find elsewhere:
- Depth of talent. Close to three million freelancers and a growing base of software companies, with a young workforce that is adopting AI tooling fast.
- Proven delivery. Record export numbers mean thousands of international clients are already shipping products with Pakistani engineers.
- Working hours that fit. A full working-day overlap with the Gulf, strong overlap with the UK and Europe, and morning overlap with US teams.
- English-first communication. Technical work, documentation and client calls happen in English as a matter of course.
- Senior skill at sensible cost. Experienced engineers at a fraction of US or Western European rates, so your budget goes into more product, not more overhead.
Peham Ltd: a registered software development company in Pakistan
Peham Ltd is an Islamabad-based custom software and AI development company for startups, SMEs and enterprises that need products that actually ship. We are part of the story these September numbers tell. We started in freelancing, earned Top Rated status on Upwork, and grew into a full offshore development team.
We are a formally registered business, not a loose group of freelancers. Peham is registered with the Pakistan Software Export Board (PSEB), incorporated with the Securities and Exchange Commission of Pakistan (SECP), and registered with the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR). For you, that means proper contracts, compliant invoicing and a company that will still be here after launch.
Our team covers software engineering, AI development, UI/UX design, QA and digital marketing, backed by 15 years of hands-on engineering experience. We do not only build for clients. We build, launch and run our own portfolio of vertical SaaS products, including SalonDesk for salons, Tejarify for retail and point of sale, and DealDesk for real estate teams, hosted on infrastructure we manage ourselves.
That means we know what happens after launch day: billing, security, scaling, support tickets and the next feature request. Every client project benefits from that operator mindset.
Looking for a development team? Book a free 30-minute discovery call and tell us what you want to build.
AI development services and custom software we build
The next wave of software is AI-native. Models are becoming a commodity; the hard part is the product around them. That is where our AI engineers and full-stack developers focus.
- AI agent development and copilots that take real actions inside your systems, not just answer questions.
- Generative AI and LLM integration, including retrieval (RAG) platforms that ground answers in your own documents, data and CRM.
- AI workflow automation that connects models to the tools your team already uses, from CRMs to messaging and billing.
- AI features for existing products, from smart search to summarisation to forecasting, added without a rewrite.
- SaaS product development, from MVP to multi-tenant platform with billing, roles and analytics.
- Web and mobile app development for customer-facing products and internal tools.
- Cloud, DevOps and maintenance, with containerised deployments, monitoring and cost-efficient hosting.
Choose the engagement model that suits your stage:
- End-to-end product development — a fixed-scope MVP or platform delivered by a complete team.
- Dedicated development team — hire dedicated developers in Pakistan who work inside your sprints, tools and time zone.
- Staff augmentation — add senior engineers or AI specialists to your existing team, fast.
- AI integration projects — a focused engagement to bring AI into a product you already run.
Honest about the challenges
Pakistan's tech sector still has real constraints. Industry voices regularly point to internet reliability, international payment friction and policy consistency as the things holding the sector back from its full potential.
The record $4.6 billion still fell short of the $5 billion target for FY2025-26. The gap is also the opportunity: under the Uraan Pakistan plan, the goal is $10 billion in IT exports by FY2028-29.
We plan around them rather than pretend they do not exist. Our team works with backup connectivity and power, our production systems run on international cloud infrastructure, and we contract and invoice through clear, documented processes. Clients get predictable delivery, regular demos and full access to their code from day one.
Book a free discovery call with Team Peham
September's record is a signal to the world: Pakistan is no longer just a place to outsource tasks. It is where serious software and AI products get built.
Whether you want to hire AI developers, build a dedicated development team in Pakistan, or turn an idea into a working SaaS platform, the first step is a conversation.
In a free 30-minute discovery call, we will:
- understand your product, users and goals
- suggest the right architecture and AI approach
- give you an honest view of timeline, team size and budget
[Book your free 30-minute discovery call →](https://meet.peham.ltd/pehamltd/30min)
No obligation and no sales pitch, just engineers talking to you about what you want to build. You can also learn more about us at peham.ltd.
Peham Ltd is registered with PSEB, SECP and FBR.
Sources
- Pakistan's IT exports hit $435m in Sept 2026: Khurram Schehzad — 24 News HD
- Pakistan's freelancers make history with highest monthly earnings in September 2026 — Pakistan Observer
- Pakistani freelancers achieve historical record in monthly foreign exchange earnings — Daily Times
- Pakistan freelancers' earnings surge past $3bn in three years — Business Recorder
- Pakistani freelancers earn $352 million in first 2 months of FY2026-27 — ProPakistani
- Pakistani freelancers earn record $1.76 billion in FY26 — Nukta
- IT exports hit record $4.6b — Express Tribune
- Pakistan's IT exports hit a record $4.6 billion — Outsource Accelerator
