Software Engineer Salary in 2026

Based on 291 software engineer listings aggregated by DailyJobFeed in 2026, the median software engineer salary is $116k. Half of listed roles pay between $91k and $150k; top earners (P90) reach $171k. Top markets by listing volume: US, United States, Japan. All figures are annualised, USD-denominated, sourced directly from public job postings — see methodology below.

Median
$116k
P50 — half earn more, half less
25th percentile
$91k
75th percentile
$150k
90th percentile
$171k
Sample size
291
listings analysed

How software engineer salaries are distributed

Median $116k
$40kP25 $91kP75 $150kP90 $171k$290k

Average: $119k. Based on annualised, USD-denominated base salaries from 291 listings DailyJobFeed scraped over the past 6 months.

Software Engineer salary by experience level

Lead / Staff
$183k
11 listings
Senior
$166k
11 listings
Entry-level
$92k
3 listings

Software Engineer salary by country

US
$116k
274 listings
United States
$151k
8 listings
Japan
$105k
3 listings

Highest-paying companies hiring software engineers

FAQ — Software Engineer salary in 2026

$116k per year, based on 291 listings aggregated by DailyJobFeed in 2026.

Methodology

Salary figures aggregate every active software engineer listing on DailyJobFeed posted within the last 6 months where the employer published a numeric salary in their original posting. We restrict to USD-denominated, yearly base salaries (or unset currency/type, which defaults to USD/yearly). Listings outside $10k–$10M are dropped as data-entry errors. For ranges, we use the midpoint. We re-run the aggregation every 30 minutes against the latest scrape.

What's excluded: equity, bonuses, sign-on, and benefits — base salary only. Roles without a published salary band are not included in the sample.

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