Salary data · Updated daily
Staff engineering salaries in the United States
Median $230k a year across 1,332 live postings that publish pay; the middle half runs from $196k to $262k. 89% of the 1,492 live postings in this segment publish a band at all.
The middle half: $196k to $262k. The ends are folded into the outer bars.
- Internship$80k
- Entry level$128k
- Mid level$163k
- Senior$190k
- Staff (this page)$230k
- Principal$238k
- Manager$238k
- Director$255k
- Executive$222k
Bars are the middle half of published bands; the tick is the median.
Highest-paying employers
humans&median of 2 published bands$450k
Anthropicmedian of 27 published bands$403k
Ivomedian of 3 published bands$386k
OpenAImedian of 4 published bands$353k
EliseAImedian of 2 published bands$350k
Patreonmedian of 2 published bands$340k
Mercormedian of 6 published bands$330k
Blacksmithmedian of 2 published bands$330k
Hiring the most right now
By job title
| Title | Median | Postings |
|---|---|---|
| Staff Software Engineer | $238k | 40 |
| Staff Application Security Engineer | $230k | 10 |
| Staff Platform Engineer | $202k | 8 |
| Staff Software Engineer, Backend | $252k | 8 |
| Member of Technical Staff | $225k | 7 |
| Staff Product Security Engineer | $255k | 7 |
| Staff Backend Engineer | $243k | 6 |
| Staff Mechanical Engineer | $154k | 6 |
The best-paid openings in this segment
- Staff Research Engineer, Multi-Agent ScalingAnthropic · San Francisco, CA $500k to $850k
- Staff Research Engineer, Discovery TeamAnthropic · San Francisco, CA$350k to $850k
- Staff Software Engineer, Code RLAnthropic · San Francisco, CA $405k to $625k
- Staff Software Engineer, Environments InfrastructureAnthropic · San Francisco, CA $405k to $605k
- Staff Software Engineer, Claude CodeAnthropic · San Francisco, CA $320k to $625k
- Member of Technical Staffhumans& · San Francisco, California, United States$450k to $450k
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Staff engineering elsewhere
Other salaries in the United States
Questions this data answers
What is the median salary for staff engineering roles in the United States?
$230k a year in base pay, across 1,332 live postings that publish a salary band. The middle half of those bands runs from $196k to $262k.
What do the best-paid staff engineering roles in the United States offer?
One in ten published bands has a midpoint above $295k, and one in ten sits below $173k.
How many staff engineering job posts publish a salary?
89% of the 1,492 live postings in this segment state a pay range. The figures here are drawn only from those.
Do remote engineering roles in the United States pay less?
Remote postings publish a median of $238k against $225k for on-site and hybrid ones, from 380 and 952 postings respectively.
Which companies pay the most for staff engineering roles in the United States?
Among employers with at least two published bands, the highest medians right now are at humans& ($450k), Anthropic ($403k), Ivo ($386k).
Where does this data come from?
Base pay only, as employers publish it in their own job posts: the midpoint of each annual range, in the currency most postings use. Equity, bonus and commission are not in it. Updated daily.
Base pay only, as employers publish it in their own job posts: the midpoint of each annual range, in the currency most postings use. Equity, bonus and commission are not in it. Read off the live postings on Refolk's job board, where an employer is only counted while the posting is open. Updated daily.