Fiverr International NYSE: FVRR executives told investors the company delivered a “solid quarter of execution” in the first quarter ended March 31, 2026, while continuing an early-stage, multi-year transformation aimed at repositioning the platform toward more complex, higher-value outcomes.
First-quarter results and segment performance
CEO Micha Kaufman said both revenue and adjusted EBITDA came in at the high end of guidance, while the company remains “methodical in managing the existing business across both top and bottom lines.”
CFO Esti Levy Dagon reported first-quarter revenue of $105.5 million, down 1.6% year-over-year. She attributed the decline to “continued growth in high-value work, offset by headwinds in low-value transactional activity on the marketplace alongside a continued growth of service revenue.”
Adjusted EBITDA was $22.6 million, up 16.3% year-over-year, with an adjusted EBITDA margin of 21%, an improvement of 330 basis points from a year earlier. Levy Dagon said the margin expansion reflected “strong financial discipline.”
Within the company’s revenue mix:
- Marketplace revenue was $67.1 million, supported by 2.9 million active buyers, $356 in spend per buyer, and a 27.7% marketplace take rate.
- Service revenue was $38.4 million, up 30% year-over-year, representing 36% of total revenue.
Levy Dagon noted that spend per buyer increased 15% year-over-year, which she tied to cohort behavior as Fiverr pushes upmarket. She also said projects above $1,000 grew at a “strong double-digit rate,” driven by 18% year-over-year growth in clients completing $1,000-plus engagements.
Transformation focus: from transactions to complex outcomes
Kaufman reiterated that Fiverr is shifting from a “transaction-oriented marketplace into a trusted work platform for complex, high-value outcomes,” calling it a “fundamental evolution of how work is matched, delivered, and orchestrated.” He said Fiverr’s “North Star” is to become “the most trusted platform for completing high-value, high-trust work,” including “increasingly AI-driven workflows.”
Kaufman described early signals “two months into the transformation” across several pillars. He highlighted continued momentum in projects over $1,000, adding that growth is showing up not only in volume but also in the nature of the engagements. He pointed to examples including a global healthcare company producing multilingual animated assets for a product launch, a New Zealand sports platform building a mobile application through multiple development phases, and a European entrepreneur developing an AI-enabled invoicing SaaS product to comply with regional regulations.
Rebuilding matching and adding a fulfillment layer
A major initiative discussed on the call was rebuilding Fiverr’s matching infrastructure. Kaufman said Fiverr is moving from keyword-based matching to “context-aware, outcome-driven matching,” supported by a knowledge graph that captures what talent has delivered “in what context and with what results.” He also said the platform is shifting ranking from optimizing for conversion to optimizing for “expected project success and buyer satisfaction.”
Kaufman said tests in Fiverr Pro showed mismatch rates down nearly 10%, and he told analysts the company views mismatch reduction as central to improving trust, repeat usage, and the broader flywheel. When asked for baseline mismatch metrics, Kaufman said Fiverr has not publicly shared specific numbers and would provide more color as it focuses on new KPIs.
In addition to matching, Kaufman said Fiverr is building an “end-to-end fulfillment layer” to support complex work. The company’s goal is to provide visibility into project progress, early detection of risk, structured feedback loops, and “active orchestration by Fiverr.” Kaufman described it as a shift from being “just a passive connector” toward becoming “an active partner for our clients and talent.”
Go-to-market plans, AI agents, and talent strategy
Kaufman said Fiverr is building three “new growth engines” beyond traditional performance marketing: talent-led growth, industry-led growth (including tailored experiences for industries such as e-commerce and early-stage startups), and partner-led distribution intended to embed Fiverr into existing workflows where high-value demand is already present.
In response to questions about partners, Kaufman said Fiverr is focused on “human-in-the-loop partners,” citing demand for skilled talent networks to provide judgment, calibration, and integrity checks on AI-driven work. He added that Fiverr is running pilots with initial customers and sees demand for Fiverr to become a “fulfillment partner for SMBs to adopt automation.”
On AI agents more broadly, Kaufman said agents can increase workflow speed and efficiency but still require “ongoing judgment” and calibration. He argued that access to AI tools is broadly available and does not by itself provide a competitive edge, making human expertise and workflow design an “art.” Kaufman also said that the emergence of AI agents lowering barriers to business creation is “amazing news” for Fiverr, while acknowledging that building is only one step and that deployment, validation, and scaling remain difficult problems where experts are needed.
Kaufman cited category demand he said Fiverr is seeing, including “AI development up 118% year-over-year,” along with strong growth in AI consulting, business formation, and marketing automation. (The company did not provide the underlying base figures for those growth rates on the call.)
On recruiting, Kaufman said Fiverr is “on track” hiring AI-native personnel, though competition is “pretty brutal.” He said AI-native hires often have “founder mentality” and can build systems that multiply productivity, contributing to leaner organizations over time.
Guidance, margins, and capital allocation
For the second quarter of 2026, Levy Dagon guided to revenue of $95 million to $103 million (year-over-year growth of -13% to -5%) and adjusted EBITDA of $16 million to $20 million, implying an 18% adjusted EBITDA margin at the midpoint.
For full-year 2026, Fiverr maintained its revenue outlook at $380 million to $420 million (year-over-year growth of -12% to -3%) and raised its adjusted EBITDA guidance to $64 million to $80 million, with an 18% margin at the midpoint. Levy Dagon said the full-year margin outlook reflects hiring and investment tied to the transformation that “picks up over time during the year,” while the company remains committed to disciplined margins and healthy cash generation.
Levy Dagon said macro conditions remain largely unchanged and expects marketplace growth for the remainder of the year to track “broadly in line with Q1 performance.” She also said services revenue came in slightly higher than expected because AutoDS ran successful campaigns early in the year, pulling some sign-ups and revenue forward from Q2 into Q1. Kaufman later described the effort as a “very strong influencer campaign” executed earlier than planned and said it is “not something that we plan to replicate.”
On cash flow and buybacks, Levy Dagon reported $21 million in free cash flow in the first quarter and said Fiverr expects to continue generating strong cash flow while investing in the business. The company had $59.5 million remaining under its share repurchase authorization as of March 31, 2026, and Levy Dagon said Fiverr expects to continue executing the program “in a thoughtful manner.”
About Fiverr International NYSE: FVRR
Fiverr International Ltd. operates an online marketplace that connects businesses and individuals with freelance talent across a wide range of professional services. Through its platform, Fiverr enables clients to procure work such as graphic design, digital marketing, writing and translation, video and animation, programming and tech, and business services. By offering a streamlined interface for ordering and delivering gig-based work, the company seeks to simplify the procurement of specialized skills on a project-by-project basis.
Founded in 2010 and headquartered in Tel Aviv, Israel, Fiverr serves clients and freelancers around the globe, with a particularly strong presence in North America and Europe.
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