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← Salary Report · all roles
Q2 2026 EDITION · UPDATED QUARTERLY

QA / SDET

The typical offer now stands at $108,200 — up 1.1% on the year, and up 4% since Q4 ’24.

Median base salary
$108,200
from 2,234 offers analyzed
Vs a year ago
▲ +1.1%
tech-wide: +2.4%
Demand
i
This role’s share of all tech offers employers filed, compared with the same quarter a year ago.
▲ +4.1%
share of offers vs a year ago
Highest-paying city
SF Bay Area, CA
median $148,300 there
01Median by quarter
Q4 ’24 — Q2 ’26
The middle half of offers, on a rolling twelve-month basis.
$80K$100K$120KTHIS QUARTERQ4 ’24$98,400Q1 ’25$99,500Q2 ’25$99,700Q3 ’25$102,400Q4 ’25$102,600Q1 ’26$102,100Q2 ’26$102,100$102,100MEDIAN+$0 vs Q1$122K$87K
02By level
typical range
Where each seniority level typically lands.
03Where offers land
this quarter
MEDIAN$76K$108K$162K
Where does your pay sit?
Median$108,200
Middle half of offers$91,400 – $128,500
Top tenthover $150,000
Top 5%over $167,500
04Top cities
median
05Top employers
median
06Pay 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.
+10.1%
fastest pay growth this year
$184,300
highest median in this report
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Where these numbers come from

Every figure is a base salary a U.S. employer put on an official government filing with the Department of Labor (the wage records behind work-visa and green-card applications). These are real offers, not survey guesses. We take the low end of each stated range, so the numbers are conservative. Base pay only — equity and bonuses aren’t included. Full details ship with each quarterly edition.

TECH PAY REPORT · AYKOAINext edition · Q3 2026