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Hi I am 21 years old from Egypt starting my career, problem is I have applied for 20+ jobs just to be either ignored or rejected, my laptop broke and I genuinely don't know what to do next, college is starting soon and I need to find a remote job that can pay at least 3-10$/h.

I can really use some advice here this is fr my first time trying to get a genuint job and I really can't handle being rejected that much just in 2 month

When applying for jobs, do you presume it is in person if it’s not indicated that it's hybrid or remote?

Posting this because a month ago I was doomscrolling this sub at 2am convinced I'd wasted 4 years on a SWE degree. If that's you right now, maybe this helps.

Quick context: B.S. in Software Engineering, no impressive internships, live about an hour outside a major northeast city. ~90 applications in 5 weeks, 17 rejections, the rest ghosted me. Ended with 3 final rounds, 2 offers, accepted a Data Analyst role at 70k.

What actually moved the needle:

1. I stopped only applying to remote jobs. Remote postings get thousands of applicants and mine went straight into the void. Local and hybrid roles responded at a WAY higher rate. Funny enough, one of my offers ended up being remote anyway. The point isn't "remote bad," it's that local applicant pools are smaller so you actually get seen.
2. I went straight to company career pages. Biggest unlock. Smaller companies near me often don't post on LinkedIn or Indeed at all. I googled "tech companies near [my city]," "largest employers in [my area]," etc., and clicked through career pages one by one. Tedious, but that's where the low competition postings live.
3. I widened my search beyond "software engineer." I also applied to Data Analyst, Business Analyst, IT, and Programmer Analyst roles. Tons of jobs require programming without "engineer" in the title. Yes, I still want to be a SWE eventually. But a paying job where I write SQL and Python beats a months long resume gap, and you can pivot later with experience + projects. My mentors all said the same: get your foot in the door first.
4. I sent a lightly customized cover letter with every app. One template, swapped 2 to 3 sentences per company based on their mission/role. ~5 extra minutes each. No idea how much it helped, but it cost me almost nothing.
5. I mirrored keywords from each posting in my resume. Only skills I could actually back up in an interview. Don't lie. I bolded them so recruiters catch them on a skim, and added them to my LinkedIn skills too. For the resume itself I used the free Google Docs template from this post. Clean, ATS friendly, did the job.
6. I messaged recruiters instead of applying and praying. After applying somewhere I cared about: company's LinkedIn page > People > search "recruiter," "talent," "early career," filter by location, then a connection request with a short note saying I applied to X role and would love to learn more. Most ignored me. A few didn't, and one turned into an interview.
7. I treated it like a job. 5 to 10 applications a day, daily searches for "new grad," "entry level," "junior," everything tracked in a spreadsheet. It kept me sane. Seeing the numbers made rejections feel like statistics instead of personal failure. Also, watch out for scam postings targeting new grads. There are a lot.

That's it. No referrals, no connections. Just volume + going where other applicants aren't.

I got lucky with timing too, this isn't a guaranteed formula. But it beats sending 200 apps into the same oversaturated LinkedIn postings as everyone else.

Don't give up. It only takes one yes.

Whole team cut in a ten minute Zoom. Two months later I signed a remote offer. Real talk first: this market is roughly 3x harder than 18 months ago. I used to see 1 response per 35 to 50 applications. Now it's closer to 1 in 150. Response rates dropped, but they didn't hit zero. Skipping the generic "fix your resume" sermon, here's only what moved the needle.

1. The trick that changed everything: stop searching job boards, search the ATS platforms directly.

LinkedIn and Indeed are aggregators. They reprint listings days late, after hundreds of people already applied. And they're full of ghost jobs. I watched the same listing get reposted every 3 weeks for 4 months straight.

But companies post on their own careers pages first, and those pages run on a handful of ATS platforms that Google indexes: Greenhouse, Lever, Ashby, Workday, Workable. So you can search all of them at once and filter to only what went up in the last 24 hours.

Paste this into Google:

("front end developer" OR "front end engineer") Remote (site:boards.greenhouse.io OR site:jobs.lever.co OR site:jobs.ashbyhq.com OR site:*.myworkdayjobs.com OR site:apply.workable.com OR site:jobs.smartrecruiters.com OR site:*.breezy.hr OR site:*.bamboohr.com OR site:secretremote.com)

Swap in your own title, then hit Tools, Past 24 hours.

You're now seeing postings that went live this morning, straight from the source, before they ever hit LinkedIn. Applying to something posted 3 hours ago vs 11 days ago is not the same game. The technique is called dorking. Security researchers use it, and it works stupidly well for jobs. Works on DuckDuckGo and Bing too, often with less spam. If you don't want to mess with queries, secretremote.com does the same idea prebuilt: it scans thousands of company career pages and filters out spam, duplicates and ghost listings. Free, no signup.

2. Email your resume directly to recruiters. Once. Then let it work for months.

Someone shared this method here a couple years ago and it still works, the only problem is that list went stale. I built my own updated tech recruiter list about 10 months ago, here you go:

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1p10y44QMgs39CZmPZ9z0AzwMYarqJR2tjVPoppRg_9g/edit?usp=sharing

If you're in the US with work authorization, use the US tab. If you're outside the US, use the International tab (companies that hire globally). It's tech recruiters only, if you're in a different field the post above explains how to build your own. Takes 2 to 3 days of grunt work, pays off for months.

Manage your expectations: this is slow by design. You send once, you become visible in their networks, and responses trickle in over time. This alone gets me 2 to 3 interviews every 6 to 8 months without actively applying to anything.

3. Message the hiring manager within 5 minutes of applying.

Not the next day. Within minutes, while your application is at the top of the pile. Find whoever owns the role on LinkedIn:

>"Hey, I just applied for the [role]. Saw you're looking for someone with [X], that's most of what I've done the last few years, so figured I'd reach out directly."

No pitch, no passion paragraph. One of mine turned into an interview request in under 2 hours. Most won't reply. Costs you 90 seconds.

4. Track your channels with separate emails, and automate the volume side.

I set up a separate email address per channel: one for the recruiter blast, one for mass applications, my main one for targeted apps. When a reply lands, you know exactly which method produced it. On the volume side I used a resume distribution tool (paid) to push out 300+ applications from that second inbox. That channel produced 2 to 4 interviews per 6 to 8 months. If you're paying for a resume tool anyway, get one that also auto applies: drop in a job URL and it tailors the resume, writes the cover letter and logs it in a tracker.

5. Skip Easy Apply, apply at the source. And tailor.

Anyone with a pulse can click Easy Apply, and a remote posting pulls 1,000+ of them. If a job I wanted was Easy Apply only, I found the same posting on the company's careers page (trick #1) and applied there. Same job, fraction of the competition. My targeted numbers: 30 tailored applications, 5 interview processes. Way better hit rate than any "I sent 500 apps" story I've read here. For tailoring, this prompt and this writeup cover the fastest workflow I've found. 20 minutes per app, worth it.

6. Don't sleep on small gigs while you search.

Fiverr and Upwork rates have dropped, I won't pretend otherwise. But small gigs compound. I'm a software engineer and I still took a basic QA testing gig at $50/hr. Three jobs later the same client offered me a monthly contract off platform. In this market you don't have the luxury of being picky, and every client becomes part of your network. I've had clients from years ago come back with new projects out of nowhere.

7. Over deliver on the take home.

I put nearly a full workday into mine: clean code, README, a short writeup of my tradeoffs. They skipped me past two of their own stated interview rounds and made an early offer. Yes, "never do free work." But the anti effort crowd is stuck in a loop: phone in the task because "it won't matter," get rejected, treat that as proof effort never matters. And your GitHub doesn't replace it. In 2026 everyone assumes AI wrote half your repo. A task on their real problem, defended live on a call, is the one thing that's hard to fake.

TL;DR: Market's ~3x harder but not dead. Search ATS domains directly on Google with site: operators plus the 24h filter instead of scrolling stale aggregators (secretremote.com is the prebuilt version). Blast your resume once to a recruiter list (shared mine above) and let it work for months. DM the hiring manager 5 minutes after applying. Separate emails per channel so you know what's working. 30 tailored apps beat 500 lazy ones. Small gigs turn into contracts. Treat the take home like day one of the job. No affiliation with anything I linked, most of it's free anyway.

Today I signed an offer for my dream job. Fully remote, dream company, and double the salary I was originally hoping for. Ten months ago I couldn't code. I lurked this sub constantly during my journey, so here's my honest breakdown. No fluff, just what actually moved the needle.

Quick background: I'm graduating in May with a Psychology degree (yes, psych, zero CS). Started coding on the side, fell in love, ditched my grad school plans entirely.

The Learning Part (9 months)

Started with CS50. It's brutal. It's also the best foundation you can get for free. Do it.

Then I stopped watching tutorials and built my own thing. This is my number one piece of advice: tutorial projects don't teach you to code, they teach you to copy. Instead, come up with an app YOU would actually use. List the features. Rank them from "essential" to "no idea how I'd build this." Then start at the top and figure it out as you go.

You will feel completely lost. That's the point. Real projects force you to make your own architecture decisions, debug your own weird errors, and learn how to research, which, surprise, is half of a developer's actual job. Google, Stack Overflow, docs, YouTube videos of similar builds. Every "wasted" rabbit hole teaches you something you'll use later.

Pick ONE stack and marry it. I went with MERN. Same language on the front and back, tons of resources. Language hopping feels productive. It isn't. Course, then a unique project, then repeat.

Build for other people whenever you can. Even free. Boom, now you're a freelance developer and you've learned to work with someone else's vision. Both go on the resume. Bonus: freelancing remotely also proves you can deliver without anyone looking over your shoulder, which remote employers care about a LOT.

The Job Search (1 month)

Resume: Clean and scannable beats flashy. (template here) I kept my unrelated work experience (proves I'm employable, just worded it in a techy way) and listed my 2 best projects. Pro tip: I made two versions, one for Python/JS flexible roles and one for MERN specific roles. Tailoring is free. (here)

Portfolio site with GitHub links to every project. Can't design? Steal a template. Nobody cares. For remote roles your portfolio and GitHub basically ARE your first interview, so make them count.

LinkedIn, fully completed. Set alerts filtered to remote positions and apply daily. AngelList was great for remote startup jobs too.

Volume game: This is the best part of going remote. I wasn't limited to my city, I applied to remote roles across all of North America. Anything matching my skills or under 5 YOE, minimum 5 applications a day, all tracked in a spreadsheet. Red for rejections, yellow for "let's talk." Watching the yellows stack up keeps you sane.

Interviews (all on Zoom, obviously)

• Have your story ready. "Tell me about yourself" is coming. Self taught devs have the most interesting answer in the room, so write it down and own it.
• Send a thank you email after EVERY interview. An HR person told me I was the ONLY candidate who did, and she personally flagged it to the hiring manager. Two minutes of effort.
• I did zero Leetcode. Just common JS/React/web dev questions plus reading Eloquent JavaScript to keep the language fresh.
• Nerves: treat every interview as practice. Wrong answer? You'll nail it next time. And you can't always know the answer, but you can always be the friendliest face on that Zoom call.

NEGOTIATE. Seriously.

When my first offer came in, I had final rounds at two other companies that same week, so I had leverage and I used it. At company number one I bumped my ask from $50K to $55K and they said it seemed doable. Then I emailed the other two companies about the offer on the table. My top choice company moved fast: the CEO asked to meet me early to speed up their process, and after my final tech interview their VP of engineering asked my number. They pay New York salaries, so I said $65 to 70K.

Their offer came in at $80K. Fully remote. I turned down company one and accepted on the spot.

And here's the thing about remote: the company is based in New York, but I don't live anywhere near New York. Remote work lets you earn big city money without paying big city rent. When you're picking where to apply, use that.

My goal when I started job hunting? $40K. I ended up with exactly double that. Shoot your shot. It is SO easy to undervalue yourself as a self taught dev with no CS background.

One last thing: I'm a Black woman, and it can be hard to feel like you belong in rooms where nobody looks like you. If that's you too, my DMs are open. You belong here.

TL;DR: CS50, then real projects (not tutorials), one stack, apply to remote jobs in volume and track everything, thank you emails, negotiate like you mean it. 10 months, $80K remote, no CS degree.

I’m a recent Data Science and AI graduate looking for entry level roles in Data Science, Data Analytics, AI ML, Python, SQL, Business Analytics and Software.

I have experience with Python, SQL, Power BI, Excel, Machine Learning, AWS, Tableau and more.

Open to remote full time roles and internships.

If you’re hiring or know someone who is, please DM me. I’d be happy to share my resume and details.

Im 24, I live in Ontario Canada and I cannot for the life of me get a remote job. I'd do literally anything, bonus points if it's from my computer I have exceptional computer skills. I've been trying for years with no luck besides the very odd customer service job requires you to speak multiple languages and pays low for low hours. I'd even take the low pay if at least it was full time. I'd be fine living off of coffee and packs of sodium noodles if it meant I can work remotely.

I know I sound desperate, and maybe it's because I actually am. I'm not built for working in a factory or a restaurant, my skills all align with remote work.

Is this just a pipe dream that few very lucky individuals get into it by being at the right place at the right time?

saw a posting that was basically written for me, every bullet matched my last two jobs. so instead of applying and praying like usual, I tried something different

applied first, then found the hiring manager on linkedin and sent a short message. nothing fancy, just "hey, just applied for the X role. the posting honestly reads like my current job description so I wanted to put a face to the application. looking forward to hearing back either way"

she never replied. but she SAW it. 30 min later there's an interview invite in my inbox

I think the trick is the message wasn't asking for anything. no "can we hop on a call," just a heads up that my application exists. recruiters get a million desperate messages a day so a low pressure one stands out

obviously only works if you're actually a fit. the message just gets your resume looked at instead of sitting in a pile of 400

curious if anyone else has tricks like this that actually worked, the weirder the better

I just walked out of a job interview

Position was advertised as fully remote.

I rock up to interview, and they say that the role is actually hybrid (3 days a week in office) and they only advertised it as remote to get a bigger pool of applicants.

I showed no shade, and said that I would be writing reviews on Glassdoor, Google and Indeed explaining that this organisation does not operate with honesty and integrity, and that my experience should be a warning to others who might be attracted to so-called 'remote' positions.

I then walked out.

I was hired a month ago, signed and waited. And waited. Finally a generic email with VERY sparse details. I had to pretty much guess how to navigate all their system because never had my emails responded. For days, I spent hours guessing my way through Slack, DEEL, feather, etc etc etc… Then by my own efforts I finally find the tasks along with links containing their expectations.
The links to the tasks were ok but the links to my “training” were, guess what, NOT working.
I immediately emailed them but again no answers whatsoever.
I am a professional linguist, so I evaluated the tasks using the current practice standards while waiting for god knows who send me a reply, or something.
Then, just like that, I was told to do 2 tasks (which I had already submitted, but somehow they had not seen it, in another display of their professionalism…).
Next email, I am told a weird unintelligible blabber and I am fired. Because two tasks were an 8 and passing is only 10.

Hours and hours of my time wasted, just waiting for a class action to join…