Side-by-side distribution
GCP
$166,800
median · per year, annualized USD
- Disclosing
- 36%
- Live roles
- 923
System Administrator
$120,000
median · per year, annualized USD
- Disclosing
- 44%
- Live roles
- 459
Highest-paying jobs
Staff Software Engineer, Cloud Infrastructure
Software Engineer, Cloud Infrastructure
Staff + Sr. Software Engineer, Cloud Inference
Staff + Sr. Software Engineer, Cloud Inference Launch Engineering
Software Engineer, Cloud Agents
Member of Technical Staff (Software Engineer, Cloud Infrastructure)
Senior Software Engineer, Cloud Infrastructure
Security Engineer, Cloud Infrastructure
Staff Software Engineer, Replit Cloud
Principal Software Engineer - Performance Engineering (Cloud Infrastructure)
Highest-paying jobs
Systems Administrator 0-3 - Linux/KVM/Ansible/Slat/SSP/STE/STN/Scripting/AWS
Systems Administrator 2 - Linux/CI/CD/Ansible/Terraform/DevOps
Systems Administrator 2 - Linux
Systems Administrator 3 (On-Call) - Linux/Bash/Python/Ansible/SaltStack/Docker
Systems Administrator 1 - Linux
Windows Systems Administrator - McLean, VA - TS/SCI
IT Support Engineer, Application Administrator
System Administrator (SF)
Senior System Administrator (Storage Engineer)
Senior DevOps / System Administrator
Top companies hiring
| Company | Median | Roles |
|---|---|---|
Accenture Federal Services
|
$151,800 | 29 |
Crusoe
|
$166,500 | 12 |
TP-Link Systems Inc.
|
$170,000 | 8 |
Anduril Industries
|
$193,000 | 7 |
Illumio
|
$183,000 | 7 |
Oscar Health
|
$208,708 | 5 |
MetroStar
|
$197,000 | 5 |
SMX
|
$112,500 | 5 |
Top companies hiring
| Company | Median | Roles |
|---|---|---|
Saalex
|
$112,500 | 17 |
|
Accenture Federal Services
|
$141,175 | 14 |
Air Apps
|
$62,289 | 11 |
| GR GRVTY | $153,000 | 8 |
|
Anduril Industries
|
$150,250 | 8 |
|
Captivation Software
|
$200,000 | 5 |
|
SMX
|
$116,800 | 5 |
| PI Pingwind | $87,750 | 4 |
GCP salary by location
| Location | Median | Roles |
|---|---|---|
| Atlanta | $231,750 | 4 |
| Toronto | $213,000 | 5 |
| San Francisco | $212,000 | 45 |
| Boston | $195,000 | 11 |
| Austin | $187,500 | 7 |
| Denver | $178,000 | 8 |
| New York | $177,500 | 39 |
| Seattle | $176,900 | 9 |
| Chicago | $175,500 | 6 |
| Los Angeles | $174,000 | 15 |
System Administrator salary by location
| Location | Median | Roles |
|---|---|---|
| San Francisco | $146,250 | 10 |
| Boston | $127,500 | 4 |
| New York | $121,719 | 11 |
| Los Angeles | $102,500 | 5 |
| Toronto | $61,027 | 4 |
GCP vs System Administrator: which pays more?
The median for GCP is $166,800 per year (typically $137,538–$200,000), versus $120,000 for System Administrator ($94,500–$145,625). That puts GCP about 39% ahead at the median.
Both figures are computed live from active listings on JobsRadar and normalized to annualized USD, so GCP and System Administrator 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.