Side-by-side distribution
Go (Golang)
$170,389
median · per year, annualized USD
- Disclosing
- 14.5%
- Live roles
- 256
Java
$133,632
median · per year, annualized USD
- Disclosing
- 16.2%
- Live roles
- 728
Highest-paying jobs
Staff Software Engineer, AI Code Review - Python, Go, Rust, C#
Staff Software Engineer, Go-to-Market Systems & AI
Staff Software Engineer, Go-to-Market Systems & AI
Software Engineer, Developer Experience (Go Lead)
Staff Software Engineer, Bazel & Go
Software Engineer (Go, Python, TS)
Senior Backend Engineer, Analytics Instrumentation (Golang)
Staff Software Engineer, Go-to-Market Systems & AI
Senior Software Engineer (RoR/Go), SSCS: Authentication
Senior Software Engineer (Golang)
Highest-paying jobs
Senior Software Engineer, Java
Senior Software Engineer, Java
Senior Software Engineer, Treasury and Reference Data (Java/Ruby/Python)
Platform Engineer (Hybrid) - Python/Java/AWS/Linux
Senior DevOps Engineer - AWS/Java/Linux/Ansible/Git/Python
Senior DevOps Engineer (Hybrid) - AWS/Java/Linux/Ansible/Git/Python
Front-End Developer (Mid/Senior) - Java/Quarkus/HTML/CSS/JavaScript/Oracle/AWS
Software Engineer 3 - Linux/Java/Jax-RS/REST/JSON/XML/Maven/Eclipse/Gitlab
Software Engineer - Java/OOP/Linux/Git/Maven/REST
Front-End Developer (Mid/Senior) - Java/Quarkus/HTML/CSS/JavaScript/Oracle/AWS
Top companies hiring
| Company | Median | Roles |
|---|---|---|
| RH RVO Health | $134,325 | 4 |
|
Block
|
$329,500 | 3 |
|
Instacart
|
$221,319 | 2 |
|
GitLab
|
$186,000 | 2 |
Certik
|
$141,000 | 2 |
Bloomreach
|
$73,397 | 2 |
|
Notion
|
$325,500 | 1 |
|
G2i Inc.
|
$312,000 | 1 |
Top companies hiring
| Company | Median | Roles |
|---|---|---|
|
Captivation Software
|
$200,000 | 23 |
Elastic
|
$119,499 | 19 |
Referral Board
|
$119,439 | 11 |
SentinelOne
|
$165,000 | 4 |
|
CLEAR - Corporate
|
$245,000 | 3 |
Accenture Federal Services
|
$138,100 | 3 |
| AD Adyen | $211,500 | 2 |
PitchBook Data
|
$202,500 | 2 |
Go (Golang) vs Java: which pays more?
The median for Go (Golang) is $170,389 per year (typically $141,000–$187,200), versus $133,632 for Java ($102,368–$200,000). That puts Go (Golang) about 28% ahead at the median.
Both figures are computed live from active listings on JobsRadar and normalized to annualized USD, so Go (Golang) and Java 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.