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Q2 2026 EDITION · UPDATED QUARTERLY

Salary Report

The typical tech offer now stands at $127,400 — up 2.4% on the year, from the 108,837 offers employers filed with the U.S. Department of Labor this quarter.

Tech median
$127,400
trailing 12 months, all roles
Vs a year ago
▲ +2.4%
+$3,000 on the median
Offers analyzed
108,837
this quarter
Fastest-growing role
AI Engineer
+246.4% share of offers vs a year ago
SHOWING
Pick any of the 12 roles to open its page — median, trend, offers, metros.
01Tech median by quarter
Q4 ’24 — Q2 ’26
The median across all 12 roles, quarter by quarter.
$120K$125K$130KTHIS QUARTERQ4 ’24$119,800Q1 ’25$122,700Q2 ’25$124,400Q3 ’25$127,900Q4 ’25$127,900Q1 ’26$127,900Q2 ’26$127,400$127,400

Tech pay rose 2.4% over the past year. Most of the rise came from ML Engineer and AI Engineer; Software Engineer pay slipped 2.1%.

02Median pay · all 12 roles
open any role for the full picture
RoleVs a year agoMedian
ML Engineer+10.1%$184,300›AI Engineer+8.1%$170,000›LLM / GenAI Engineer-3.1%$155,000›Data Scientist-2.6%$154,800›Software Engineer-2.1%$140,000›Security Engineer-1.5%$137,200›Mobile Engineer+6.1%$134,800›Data Engineer-2.0%$129,700›DevOps / SRE-1.2%$128,400›Platform / Cloud-8.7%$120,800›Frontend Engineer-3.7%$118,900›QA / SDET+1.1%$108,200›

Half of all offers in this report came in above $127,400. The gap between the top and bottom of the table is $76,100.

03This quarter’s movers
Pay change
ML Engineer$184,300+10.1%
AI Engineer$170,000+8.1%
Mobile Engineer$134,800+6.1%
Software Engineer$140,000-2.1%
ML Engineer and AI Engineer pay rose the most this year; Software Engineer fell 2.1%.
Demand
AI Engineer203 offers+246.4%
LLM / GenAI Engineer27 offers+126.8%
ML Engineer699 offers+35.8%
Software Engineer23,964 offers-6.4%
AI roles are small in absolute numbers but growing much faster than the rest of the market.
Location factor
SF Bay Area1.36×
Seattle area1.25×
New York area1.08×
Dallas–Fort Worth0.84×
The same role pays 1.36× the national median in SF Bay Area.
04Pay growth by role
ML Engineer+10.1%
AI Engineer+8.1%
Mobile Engineer+6.1%
QA / SDET+1.1%
DevOps / SRE-1.2%
Security Engineer-1.5%
Data Engineer-2.0%
Software Engineer-2.1%
Data Scientist-2.6%
LLM / GenAI Engineer-3.1%
Frontend Engineer-3.7%
Platform / Cloud-8.7%
Median base salary, change vs a year ago · same DOL filings
AI roles are the most in demand.
+246.4%
share of offers vs a year ago
$184,300
highest median in this report
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Quarterly editions

AI/ML Engineer Salary Report — Q2 2026median $184,000 · all AI/ML roles

Methodology

Base salaries from certified wage records U.S. employers file with the Department of Labor (LCA and PERM disclosures, including H-1B filings). Real offers, not survey guesses — we use the bottom of each stated wage range, so the numbers are conservative. Base salary only; no equity or bonuses. The filed population skews toward employers who sponsor visas. 108,837 offers analyzed this quarter across 12role groups; full bucket rules and caveats ship with each edition. You’re welcome to cite these figures — please link back to this page as the source.

TECH PAY REPORT · AYKOAINext edition · Q3 2026