Engineering Manager vs ML Engineer

Put two roles head to head — any role, in any location or worldwide-remote.

Side A

Side B

ML Engineer pays about 8% more at the median.

Side-by-side distribution

Engineering Manager ML Engineer
$190k
$205k
$76.3k box = 25th–75th · whiskers = 10th–90th $316.6k

Engineering Manager

$190,000

median · per year, annualized USD

Median over time ▲ +11.8%
$170,000 $190,000
$141.8k 25th
$190k Median
$238.5k 75th
$92.8k
$285k
Box 25th–75th · whiskers 10th–90th Full range $5.3k – $5,000k · outliers off-axis
Disclosing
42.6%
Live roles
4,368

ML Engineer

$205,000

median · per year, annualized USD

Median over time ▲ +2.1%
$200,800 $205,000
$173.5k 25th
$205k Median
$250k 75th
$142.5k
$300k
Box 25th–75th · whiskers 10th–90th Full range $5.3k – $1,000k · outliers off-axis
Disclosing
42.3%
Live roles
1,743

Top companies hiring

Company Median Roles
Anduril Industries $193,000 37
Databricks $226,881 36
Brex $254,250 29
Atwell, LLC $117,500 24
OpenAI $339,000 22
Anthropic $445,000 21
Harvey $350,000 20
DoorDash USA $239,400 19

Top companies hiring

Company Median Roles
Reddit $276,000 18
Pinterest $260,867 17
Motional $185,500 17
Roblox $297,743 14
Airbnb $274,500 14
Torc Robotics $249,000 11
Nuro $242,540 10
Applied Intuition $173,500 10

Engineering Manager salary by location

Location Median Roles
Sydney $408,460 6
San Francisco $250,554 334
Seattle $226,625 101
New York $216,000 354
Austin $199,500 44
Boston $195,000 68
Atlanta $194,500 15
London $187,539 66
Chicago $175,000 49
Denver $173,495 36

ML Engineer salary by location

Location Median Roles
San Francisco $240,000 164
Austin $235,000 11
New York $225,000 100
Seattle $212,444 39
Los Angeles $205,000 11
Boston $200,000 41
Toronto $195,000 29
Paris $185,000 6
Atlanta $174,825 8
Chicago $173,875 12

Engineering Manager vs ML Engineer: which pays more?

The median for Engineering Manager is $190,000 per year (typically $141,791–$238,500), versus $205,000 for ML Engineer ($173,500–$250,000). That puts ML Engineer about 8% ahead at the median.

Both figures are computed live from active listings on JobsRadar and normalized to annualized USD, so Engineering Manager and ML Engineer are compared on equal terms regardless of the currency each role was originally posted in. Only roles that publish a salary range feed the medians; numbers refresh every few hours as new roles post and older ones close, so this comparison reflects the market right now rather than a fixed survey. Use it as a directional benchmark when weighing one path against the other.

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