Side-by-side distribution
Investment Banking
$206,250
median · per year, annualized USD
- Disclosing
- 34.8%
- Live roles
- 23
ML Engineer
$205,000
median · per year, annualized USD
- Disclosing
- 42.3%
- Live roles
- 1,743
Highest-paying jobs
Investment Banker II
Investment Banker I
Associate - Investment Banking - Los Angeles
Investment Banking, Vice President & Associate, Consumer & Retail
Investment Banking, Associate, M&A
Investment Banking, Associate, Private Capital Advisory
Investment Banking, Senior Analyst/Associate, DCM
Analyst - Investment Banking - Los Angeles
Highest-paying jobs
Senior Software Engineer, Machine Learning (Audio)
Machine Learning Engineer - Fraud Risk
Research Engineer, Machine Learning (RL Velocity)
Research Engineer, Machine Learning (Reinforcement Learning)
Research Engineer, Machine Learning (Reinforcement Learning)
Research Engineer, Machine Learning (RL Velocity)
Machine Learning Engineer, Integrity
Principal Machine Learning Engineer, Ads Delivery
Machine Learning Engineer, Speech LLM Training - San Francisco
Senior Machine Learning Engineer, Search
Top companies hiring
| Company | Median | Roles |
|---|---|---|
| BT BTIG | $185,000 | 4 |
|
OffDeal
|
$486,250 | 2 |
|
Ducera Partners - Experienced Hires
|
$175,000 | 2 |
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 |
Investment Banking salary by location
| Location | Median | Roles |
|---|---|---|
| New York | $206,250 | 6 |
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 |
Investment Banking vs ML Engineer: which pays more?
The median for Investment Banking is $206,250 per year (typically $176,250–$228,750), versus $205,000 for ML Engineer ($173,500–$250,000). That puts Investment Banking about 1% ahead at the median.
Both figures are computed live from active listings on JobsRadar and normalized to annualized USD, so Investment Banking 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.