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What tech talent really costs in 2026, from 167 placements.
TekRecruiter's 2026 guide is built from our own placements, not surveys: 128 US direct hires and 39 US contractors from January to September 2026, plus senior engineer pay across five Latin American countries. Base salaries and hourly rates by role and city, in US dollars.
Nine things the 2026 data shows.
- Senior software engineers in the New York area averaged $240K base, about 41% more than the roughly $170K paid in Miami for the same level.
- Forward deployed engineers averaged $220K in New York and $170K in South Florida. Remote FDEs were paid the same $170K as South Florida.
- Engineers building agentic AI platforms were the highest-paid large group: 21 platform and SRE placements averaged $190K.
- Back-end engineers averaged $210K in Boston, $203K in New York and $168K in South Florida.
- Contract software engineers billed at $105/hour in South Florida, $112 in Boston and $115 in New York. DevOps, SRE and platform contractors billed about 5% more.
- Senior engineers in Latin America earn $55K–$108K in base salary on the market; through TekRecruiter they cost about $39–$57 an hour all in, against $105–$115 for a US contract engineer.
- Employers paid between about 30% and 100% of employee healthcare premiums; most roles landed at 50–70%.
- Go-to-market engineers ranged from $130K to $220K base across 30 searches; senior technical account executives reached $250K–$300K in on-target earnings.
- Quant researchers at Boston investment banks reached about $300K base and up to $500K in total pay; senior quant analysts earned $170K base in Miami and $200K in Boston.
Base salaries by role and market.
Accepted base salaries from 128 TekRecruiter direct-hire placements in 2026. Senior level unless noted. Bonus and equity are not included.
| Role | Market | Placements | Base salary |
|---|---|---|---|
| Senior software engineer | New York area | 6 | $240K avg |
| Senior software engineer (product features) | Miami | 4 | $165K–$190K, ~$170K avg |
| Forward deployed engineer | New York | of 21 | $220K avg |
| Forward deployed engineer | South Florida and remote | of 21 | $170K avg |
| Back-end engineer (services and data layer) | Boston | of 13 | $210K avg |
| Back-end engineer (services and data layer) | New York | of 13 | $203K avg |
| Back-end engineer (services and data layer) | South Florida | of 13 | $168K avg |
| Platform engineer / SRE, agentic AI platforms | Miami, New York, Boston, San Francisco | 21 | $190K avg |
| SRE / platform engineer, Java and Kafka | Remote and New York / Boston | 5 | $180K avg |
| Founding engineer, VC-backed startup (plus equity) | New York and Miami | 7 | NY $190K–$240K · Miami $170K–$180K |
| Principal software engineer, AI and LLM systems | South Florida | 14 | $170K avg |
| Senior Salesforce engineer | South Florida and remote | 14 | $160K–$165K avg |
| Data scientist (Python, machine learning) | South Florida | 7 | $155K avg |
| Product owner | South Florida | 14 | $150K–$160K, $155K avg |
| SDET / test automation engineer | New York area | — | ~$170K |
| SDET / test automation engineer | South Florida | — | $155K–$160K |
| Product roles, senior | New York · South Florida | — | ~$180K · ~$150K |
| Product roles, entry and junior | New York · South Florida | — | ~$120K · ~$100K |
Forward deployed engineers: 21 placements, half on site and half remote, across New York and South Florida. Back-end engineers: 13 placements, about half in South Florida and the rest in New York and Boston. SDET and product-by-level rows are typical 2026 ranges from our placements; counts not broken out. Healthcare: employers paid about 30% to 100% of premiums; the Java/Kafka platform group had 100% employer-paid coverage.
Senior, staff and principal engineers.
Level is about scope, not years. Senior pay is from our 2026 placements above; staff and principal ranges reflect TekRecruiter's experience across 2026 searches in the US and vary widely by company, stage and market.
| Level | What they own | US base salary, 2026 |
|---|---|---|
| Senior engineer | Systems end to end: designs, ships and runs them in production, and mentors the team. | ~$170K Miami to ~$240K New York (placements) |
| Staff engineer | Technical direction across several teams: architecture, standards and the hardest cross-team problems. | Typically 10–30% above senior |
| Principal engineer | Company-wide architecture and multi-year technical strategy; advises engineering leadership. | ~$210K–$300K |
Contract bill rates by market.
Average hourly bill rates from TekRecruiter contract placements in 2026: what the client pays per hour, covering the consultant’s pay and our fee. Annual cost shown at 2,080 hours. Marketing automation roles were all contract or contract-to-hire this year; we had no direct-hire searches for them.
| Role | Market | Placements | Bill rate | Annual cost |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Software engineer | New York | 5 | $115/hr | ≈ $239K |
| Software engineer | Boston | 4 | $112/hr | ≈ $233K |
| Software engineer | South Florida | 11 | $105/hr | ≈ $218K |
| DevOps / SRE / platform engineer | New York | 5 | ≈ $120/hr | ≈ $250K |
| DevOps / SRE / platform engineer | Boston | 4 | ≈ $116/hr | ≈ $241K |
| DevOps / SRE / platform engineer | South Florida | 11 | ≈ $109/hr | ≈ $227K |
| Marketing automation architect | South Florida and remote | — | $95/hr | ≈ $198K |
| Marketing automation developer | South Florida and remote | — | $85/hr | ≈ $177K |
| Solutions / sales engineer (nearshore) | Latin America | — | $50–$60/hr | ≈ $104K–$125K |
Pay for technical go-to-market roles.
Pay ranges from the go-to-market roles we recruited on in 2026, taken from our applicant tracking system. These are searches, not only placements. Commission roles show base salary and on-target earnings (OTE).
| Role | Basis | Pay | Detail |
|---|---|---|---|
| Go-to-market engineer | 30 searches | $130K–$220K base | Junior ~$130K, mid $140–150K, senior $150–220K. San Francisco $220K, New York $210K, South Florida avg ~$156K. |
| Growth engineer (senior) | 10 searches | $150K–$220K base | In line with senior go-to-market engineers. |
| RevOps developer / architect | 10 searches | $160K–$220K base | South Florida and Atlanta. |
| Solutions / sales engineer | Mid and senior searches | ~$150K–$175K base + commission | South Florida. More packages now pay commission and bonus tied to outcomes. |
| Technical account executive | Junior to senior searches | $120K–$180K base; OTE ~$150K–$300K | South Florida: new grads and MBAs $120–130K base (~$150K OTE); senior $180K base, $250–300K OTE. New York about 20% higher. |
Quant and robotics pay.
Base salary and total compensation (base plus bonus) for quantitative roles we filled at investment banks in 2026, and starting pay for robotics and hardware engineers from our 2026 searches. Reported separately from the 167 placements above.
| Role | Market | Basis | Pay |
|---|---|---|---|
| Quant analyst (senior) | Miami | 5 placements, investment banks | $170K base · ~$230K total |
| Quant analyst (senior) | Boston | 6 placements, investment banks | $200K base · ~$260K total |
| Quant researcher (mid to senior) | Miami | Placements, investment banks | $200K–$250K base · up to ~$400K total |
| Quant researcher (mid to senior) | Boston | Placements, investment banks | ~$300K base · up to ~$500K total |
| Robotics and hardware engineer (entry level and PhD grads) | Austin | 2026 searches, humanoid robotics | $120K–$130K base out of school · up to $170K |
Contract bill rates by platform.
Average hourly bill rates from our 2026 platform searches. Where a platform has separate developer and architect roles, the rate is for the combined developer-architect profile most clients ask for. Zuora and Stripe billing engagements averaged about four months. Annual cost shown at 2,080 hours.
| Role | Bill rate | Annual cost |
|---|---|---|
| ServiceNow developer / architect | $130/hr | ≈ $270K |
| NetSuite developer / architect | $110/hr | ≈ $229K |
| Zuora / Stripe billing specialist | $110/hr | ≈ $229K |
| Microsoft Dynamics developer | $95/hr | ≈ $198K |
| HubSpot developer | $88/hr | ≈ $183K |
| Adobe Experience Manager developer / architect | $80/hr | ≈ $166K |
What senior engineers cost in Latin America.
Two numbers for each role. "Market salary" is the midpoint annual base that US-headquartered employers pay English-fluent engineers in each country. "All-in rate" is what you pay per hour for the same senior profile through TekRecruiter: the engineer's pay, employer costs, compliance, insurance and the search. After about a year, most of the recruiting fee comes out of the rate.
Senior front-end engineer
6–8+ years; JavaScript, React, Vue, Node · Market salary $55K–$90K · All-in rate $39–$50/hr
| Brazil | Mexico | Colombia | Argentina | Peru | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Market salary | $74K | $77K | $69K | $72K | $63K |
| All-in rate | $45/hr | $46/hr | $43/hr | $44/hr | $41/hr |
Senior back-end engineer
Python, Django/FastAPI, SQL, Terraform, AWS · Market salary $57K–$97K · All-in rate $39–$53/hr
| Brazil | Mexico | Colombia | Argentina | Peru | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Market salary | $79K | $82K | $72K | $75K | $66K |
| All-in rate | $47/hr | $47/hr | $44/hr | $45/hr | $42/hr |
Senior SRE / DevOps engineer
5+ years; AWS, Terraform, CI/CD, SLOs · Market salary $64K–$108K · All-in rate $42–$57/hr
| Brazil | Mexico | Colombia | Argentina | Peru | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Market salary | $89K | $92K | $79K | $83K | $73K |
| All-in rate | $50/hr | $51/hr | $47/hr | $48/hr | $45/hr |
How contract-to-hire keeps you at market.
Companies hiring on their own often end up paying above market for a skill set. Contract-to-hire lets you see real work before you commit a salary, so you convert at a price that reflects proven value.
- Consider more candidates: strong engineers a direct hire search would pass on get a chance to prove themselves.
- Convert on evidence: the salary at conversion reflects the work you have seen, not an interview.
- Pay the market, not more: during the contract you pay an hourly bill rate, like the rates above, with no conversion restrictions.
Where the numbers come from.
United States. Every figure is a TekRecruiter placement made between January 1 and September 25, 2026: accepted base salaries for direct hires, and average hourly bill rates for contractors. Each row averages one role in one market. Groups with fewer than four placements are left out, and no client or candidate is identified.
Go-to-market. Pay ranges for go-to-market roles come from the 2026 searches we recruited on, recorded in our applicant tracking system, whether or not we filled the role. They are labeled as searches and are not counted in the 167 placements.
Specialist roles. Quant figures are 2026 placements at investment banks in Miami and Boston; robotics and platform figures come from 2026 searches. They are reported on their own basis and are not counted in the 167 placements.
Latin America. From TekRecruiter's June 2026 compensation benchmark. The market range pairs public senior-engineer pay (LinkedIn, Glassdoor and Levels.fyi) for US-headquartered employers that hire English-fluent engineers in the region. Data from Latin America–based firms is excluded because it is dominated by roles paid far below the English-fluent market. The all-in rate is TekRecruiter’s typical hourly bill rate for the same senior profiles in 2026, rounded to the dollar.
Updates. This guide is refreshed every year at this address, with earlier years kept as trend lines.
Salary and rate questions, answered.
How much does a senior software engineer make in New York in 2026?
Across TekRecruiter’s 2026 placements in the New York area in 2026, senior software engineers averaged a $240,000 base salary. Senior engineers placed in Miami earned $165,000–$190,000, about $170,000 on average.
How much do senior software engineers cost in Latin America?
Market base salaries for senior engineers hired by US-headquartered companies run about $55,000–$108,000 a year across Brazil, Mexico, Colombia, Argentina and Peru, with Mexico highest, Peru lowest, and SRE/DevOps the highest-paid role. Through TekRecruiter, the all-in hourly rate for the same senior profiles is about $39–$57, which covers pay, employer costs, compliance, insurance and the search.
What is the hourly rate for a contract software engineer in 2026?
In TekRecruiter’s 2026 contract placements, software engineers billed at an average of $105 an hour in South Florida, $112 in Boston and $115 in New York; DevOps, SRE and platform engineers billed about 5% more. These are bill rates: what the client pays per hour, covering the consultant’s pay and our fee.
Which engineering roles pay the most in 2026?
In our data, senior software engineers in New York ($240,000 average) and founding engineers at New York startups (up to $240,000 base plus equity) topped the list, followed by forward deployed engineers in New York ($220,000) and back-end engineers in Boston ($210,000). Among large national groups, engineers building agentic AI platforms averaged $190,000.
Is contract-to-hire cheaper than direct hire?
It helps you pay the market rate and not more. Because you see the engineer’s work before you commit a salary, you can consider strong candidates a direct hire search would pass on, and convert them at a price that reflects proven value. During the contract you pay an hourly bill rate, like the US contract rates above; there are no conversion restrictions.
Where does this data come from?
U.S. figures are TekRecruiter’s own placements from January to September 2026: accepted base salaries for direct hires and average hourly bill rates for contractors, averaged by role and market. Groups with fewer than four placements are left out, and no client or candidate is identified. Latin America figures come from TekRecruiter’s June 2026 benchmark, which pairs public compensation data for US-headquartered employers with our own placement data.
Last updated . Compiled by Ron Smith, President & Founder.
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