trabalhador independente
Published 8 November 2026, 22:44
trabalhador independente — self-employed, working for yourself
Someone who works in their own name rather than as an employee: they have registered an atividade with the tax office, issue recibos verdes invoices to clients and pay their own Segurança Social contributions. The standard contribution rate is 21.4%, but it is not charged on total turnover: for services the contribution base is 70% of declared income, and for the sale of goods and production it is usually 20%.
Where you come across it. Freelancing and work for foreign clients, the quarterly declaration in Segurança Social Direta, discussions of how much to set aside from each invoice.
The 21.4% rate is often wrongly applied to total turnover, which comes to about one and a half times the real contribution. For some empresários em nome individual the rate is different: 25.2%. Income from foreign clients is declared in exactly the same way as Portuguese income.