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

Software Engineer

The typical offer now stands at $140,000 — down 2.1% on the year, and up 8% since Q4 ’24.

Median base salary
$140,000
from 23,964 offers analyzed
Vs a year ago
▼ -2.1%
tech-wide: +2.4%
Demand
i
This role’s share of all tech offers employers filed, compared with the same quarter a year ago.
▼ -6.4%
share of offers vs a year ago
Highest-paying city
SF Bay Area, CA
median $191,000 there
01Median by quarter
Q4 ’24 — Q2 ’26
The middle half of offers, on a rolling twelve-month basis.
$100K$150KTHIS QUARTERQ4 ’24$120,300Q1 ’25$124,000Q2 ’25$126,400Q3 ’25$130,000Q4 ’25$130,000Q1 ’26$130,000Q2 ’26$130,000$130,000MEDIAN+$0 vs Q1$164K$106K
02By level
typical range
Where each seniority level typically lands.
03Where offers land
this quarter
MEDIAN$98K$140K$210K
Where does your pay sit?
Median$140,000
Middle half of offers$112,900 – $178,700
Top tenthover $213,000
Top 5%over $230,000
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