Uptooyoo is a South African-developed app and web platform, built to economically empower anyone with a skill they want to turn into an additional income stream or just to expand their current business profile.
From plumbers and hairdressers to digital marketers, anyone with a small business or side hustle has an opportunity to grow their network and their income.
Unemployment remains one of South Africa’s greatest challenges, with the rate hovering around 32% according to Stats SA, while the unemployment rate for youth (aged 15-34) reached 46,1% in the first quarter of 2025.
For the 2025 school-leavers and graduates attempting to enter the job market at the start of this new year, formal employment opportunities remain limited.
Yet across townships, suburbs, and cities, people are already creating their own work – designing logos, fixing cars, tutoring kids, cutting hair, or writing blogs.
Uptooyoo bridges the gap between talent and opportunity, putting service providers on the map – literally.
“We built Uptooyoo to link talent and opportunity. South Africans shouldn’t have to depend only on social chats, community groups, or word of mouth to find work. With Uptooyoo, you can formalise your hustle, grow your client base and easily build your own business-focused website, all within the app. It’s your business. It’s your rules. It’s Uptooyoo,” says Courtney Wilson, business development manager at Uptooyoo.
How it works
Service providers can join for free, set up a professional profile in minutes, and showcase their skills, from hands-on work like gardening, plumbing, and pet grooming to digital services such as logo design, social media content, children’s book illustration, web development, podcast editing, coding, and AI integrations.
The app offers:
- A centralised search and booking platform.
- Ratings and reviews to build/evaluate supplier reputation.
- A simple and extremely affordable subscription model for service providers – R99.99/month after the first three successful bookings – thereby proving the value proposition and financial viability to the service provider, the lowest in the market.
- And, for digital/online freelancers, Uptooyoo also offers additional financial protection for both service providers and clients. It retains 15% of all transactions processed through the system with an embedded secure payments platform and only releases payments once work is approved by the client.
“South Africa is rich in skill, yet meaningful, localised platforms to showcase it have long been out of reach. Uptooyoo exists to humanise technology and bring opportunity closer to home by connecting local skills with real demand. We’re creating an app where everyday people can be seen, trusted, and supported as they grow their businesses on their own terms,” says Shaheer Lala, marketing manager at Uptooyoo.
Locals using Uptooyoo can expect flexible earning opportunities across every skill level, an affordable subscription after the free trial, and a platform that’s proudly local, built by us, for us. Importantly, the app is open to all skills – from kasi hustlers and side-giggers to seasoned digital professionals.