How to write an illustrator invoice

What goes on a illustrator invoice

Six things, in the order they belong on the page. The invoice generator opens a illustrator / artist document with the lines already in place, so most of this is checking rather than typing.

1. Bill the commission as one line. The finished piece is known work at an agreed fee. It goes on as a single figure rather than an argument about hours.
2. Charge for concept sketches separately. Roughs are work whether or not a route is chosen. Naming them stops the client reading them as a free pitch.
3. Put the usage license and its term on the invoice. What the artwork may be used for, where, and for how long. This is the line that decides what happens when it appears on packaging two years later.
4. Name the revision rounds included. Two rounds included, further rounds priced. Rounds that are not counted are unlimited.
5. State whether the original files transfer. Layered working files are a separate deliverable from a flattened final. Say which the fee covers.
6. Send it with a due date. A named date and terms in days, because illustration is often paid by a marketing or production budget on a cycle.

The lines a illustrator invoice usually carries

These are the lines the generator opens with when you pick Illustrator / artist. The figures are a starting point to type over rather than a going rate: this site runs no pricing survey, and the number on your invoice should be the one you charge.

Add, rename, reorder or delete any line, and set tax per line where it applies. Priced as they open, that comes to $1,520 before tax.

A worked illustrator invoice, filled in

This is the same job as the table above, written out the way it would leave your phone. Every figure on it is a starting point rather than a going rate, and the tax line is shown at ten per cent purely so the arithmetic is visible: set your own rate, or none, per line.

Subtotal $1,520, tax $152, total $1,672. The parts worth copying are the structure rather than the numbers: the job reference next to the client, every line separately priced with its count showing, the tax on its own line, and terms that name a number of days instead of saying on receipt.

License and term, which is what you are actually selling

An illustration fee is rarely a sale of the picture. It is permission to use it, in defined places, for a defined time, and pricing it as though the client bought the artwork outright gives away the part with the long tail of value.

Write the license as its own line with three facts on it: the use (editorial, packaging, advertising, merchandise), the territory, and the term. A one-year UK editorial license and a perpetual worldwide advertising license are different products and should not cost the same by accident.

When the client comes back wanting more, that is a new invoice for an extended license, priced on the new use. That conversation is straightforward when the original terms are on the original invoice and awkward when they are not.

Concept sketches, and the pitch that quietly becomes free work

Illustrators lose more money to unpaid roughs than to almost anything else. A client asks for three directions before committing, then picks none, and the work has already happened.

Price the concept stage as a line and bill it whether or not a route proceeds. If a commission follows, the sketch fee can be credited against it, and saying so up front makes it easy to agree.

Then get the chosen route signed before you start the finish. A signed concept means the finished piece is the one they asked for rather than the one they had imagined, which is what stops revision four arriving as a correction.

Revisions, reproduction and the file the client actually needs

Two things get discovered late: how many rounds are included, and what file the client is going to print from.

Name the rounds on the invoice and price the extras. Then be specific about the deliverable: a print-ready CMYK file at a stated size is not the same as a web JPEG, and a layered source file is a third thing again.

If the artwork is going to reproduction, say who is responsible for the proofing. Color on press is where a happy commission turns into an argument, and the invoice is a cheap place to have set the expectation.

Hourly, fixed price or per unit: how illustrators price the work

Illustration is priced as a commission fee plus a license, and the license is the part that carries the long-term value. An illustration used on one book cover and an illustration used on national packaging take the same time to draw and are not remotely the same sale.

Price the concept stage separately from the finished artwork. Sketches are real work that a client can approve or reject, and separating them means a commission that dies at concept stage still paid for the thinking.

Working out what to charge

This guide is about what goes on the document, not what the number should be, and nobody should hand you a rate for your own market. What the site can do is the arithmetic: the freelance rate calculator works back from what you need to earn, the service price calculator prices a service against your costs, and the profit margin calculator checks what is left once the job is done.

Writing it on your phone, in five steps

Most illustrators write the invoice standing next to the work rather than at a desk a week later, and the week later version is the one that gets details wrong. The generator is built for the first case.

1. Open it with your trade already chosen. The illustrator / artist invoice loads with commissioned illustration and the rest of the lines already on the page.
2. Put the client and the job reference in first. It is the part you will not remember accurately in three days, and on agent, landlord or contractor work it is the reason the invoice gets paid at all.
3. Edit the lines rather than starting from empty. Change the quantities and the rates, delete what you did not do, add what you did. Keeping the descriptions means the wording stays consistent from one job to the next.
4. Set the terms to 14 days and add a payment link. A due date that is an actual date gets chased. A link and a QR code means it can be settled before you have packed up.
5. Send it before you leave. The clock on your terms starts when the invoice arrives, not when the work finished, so every day it sits unsent is a day added to getting paid.

Getting paid once it is sent

Put a due date and your terms on the document, because an invoice without them is hard to chase. Add a payment link and a QR so settling up is a tap rather than a transfer somebody has to set up. When part of it lands, the receipt maker records it as a part payment and prints the balance still due. If the due date passes, the late fee calculator works out what your own terms allow and writes the chasing letter to go with it.

Five dates decide whether a illustrator gets paid on time, and four of them are set before the work starts.

Mistakes that cost illustrators money

• No license term on the invoice. A one-year use and a perpetual one should never be the same price by omission.
• Concept sketches given away. Roughs are work. Price them, and credit them against the commission if it proceeds.
• Unlimited revisions by silence. Uncounted rounds are uncapped rounds.
• Vague deliverable. "The illustration" is not a file. Name the format, the size and the color space.
• No due date. Illustration is usually paid from a budget on a cycle. Give them a date to work to.

Illustrator / artist invoice questions

Free illustrator invoice template

The free illustrator invoice template opens with the lines above already priced, in any of 200 designs, and exports a print-ready PDF with no signup and nothing saved to a server. If you would rather edit a file offline, there are 72 Word templates, 72 Excel templates with the totals already calculating, and 72 fillable PDFs.

Invoicing guides for related trades

The same billing questions come up next door. These four guides cover the trades closest to illustrators, and each one sits alongside its own free template.

Every trade has one: see all 46 invoicing guides, or go straight to the 46 free invoice templates they describe.

Everything on this site, set up for illustrators

The whole toolkit, with the reason each one matters to illustrators rather than in general. The five marked links open with illustrator / artist already selected.

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