How to Become a Data Engineer

Data Engineers earn a median of $138,038 per year, with most postings between $118,600 and $167,503. From 257 job postings that disclosed pay, across 99 companies, August 2026.

These are ranges employers published in their own job postings — not salaries people typed into a form years ago.

What Data Engineer postings actually ask for

Ranked by how many of the 400 posting descriptions mention them.

Data Engineering 53%
Data Pipelines 44%
Data Governance 33%
Data Science 28%
Machine Learning 27%
Data Modeling 23%
Artificial Intelligence 16%
Data Centers 16%
Data Architecture 12%
Power BI 12%
Business Intelligence 12%
Data Warehousing 12%
Electrical Engineering 11%
Data Integration 11%
Code reviews 10%
Data Warehouse 10%
Data Analytics 10%
Performance Tuning 10%

Would your background clear the bar?

These are the requirements Data Engineer postings list. Paste one of those postings and your résumé — FitToHire checks you against every requirement and shows the evidence behind each verdict.

15 companies in this sample have Data Engineer postings open right now.

Check your fit →

What Data Engineers earn

10th $102K 25th $119K median $138K 75th $168K 90th $209K
$88K $248K

Each bar is a pay band; height is how many employers post in it.

Data Engineer vs adjacent roles

Roles people compare this one against, taken from what they search.

  • data scientist
  • data analyst
  • data architect
  • software engineer
  • analytics engineer
  • ml engineer

Who is hiring Data Engineers

15 companies with open postings in this sample.

Google
$253,500 5
PlayStation
$247,800 4
Apple
$236,450 14
Capgemini
$167,503 3
Amazon.com
$160,700 28
Olsson
$152,500 18
RealmOne
$152,000 3
Peraton
$145,500 3
Deloitte
$142,650 7
Target
$137,000 3

Also hiring: CVS Health, Clean Harbors, Amazon.com, Olsson, Apple, Booz Allen Hamilton, Deloitte, Cognizant, REGENT BANK, Wells Fargo, JPMorganChase, Google.

Remote vs onsite pay

Median of remote-eligible postings against the rest.

Remote-eligible
$118,965
Onsite
$155,800

126 remote-eligible postings against 153 onsite. Onsite pays 23.6% more in this sample.

Pay by experience level

Level is taken from the posting title, so only postings that state one are counted.

Senior
$155,150 105
Lead / Manager
$167,503 16
Principal / Staff
$241,750 17

Pay by location

Metros with at least three salaried postings.

Remote, US
$145,000 13
Austin, TX
$160,700 12
New York, NY
$143,500 9
Aurora, CO
$126,800 9
US
$155,173 9
Seattle, WA
$160,700 8
Denver, CO
$118,600 7
Cupertino, CA
$254,750 7
Atlanta, GA
$160,700 6
Charlotte, NC
$121,452 5
Chicago, IL
$152,500 5
San Diego, CA
$206,000 5

Where this data comes from

  • 400 live postings analysed
  • 257 (64%) published a salary range
  • 174 (44%) were remote-eligible
  • 155 distinct employers
  • Requirements read from 400 full posting descriptions
  • Each employer gets one vote in the median, so a company running a large hiring campaign cannot move it
  • Ranges are converted to annual figures; hourly and contract postings are normalised before comparison